Screens are hard to avoid in today’s digital world. Although technology does offer many advantages to children, parents are becoming increasingly worried about the effects of too much screen time. If you are concerned about the amount of time that your child is spending on their devices, it is important to set limits and offer screen-free activities for children.

Setting screen time limits and ensuring that your child fills their spare time with enriching activities and experiences will help to protect their mental health. You should also encourage your child to participate in regular physical activity. It may be unrealistic and unnecessary to prevent your child from using their devices completely, but encouraging them to enjoy other activities is a good balance. Look into local extra-curricular activities. A new hobby can help to focus your child’s attention on something other than their phones or tablets. Here are some more screen-free activity ideas from an independent school in Surrey.

1. Cooking

If your son or daughter likes helping in the kitchen, you can easily turn this into a regular activity. In fact, cooking is a great way to develop your child’s reading, writing and math skills. Ask your child to choose a different recipe each week, write your shopping list and then help you to cook your family meals. They might even like to get creative and design a weekly menu for the table.

2. Games

Games are another fun family activity to keep your children entertained. Board games in particular will also support your child’s learning. Snakes and Ladders, Monopoly and scrabble are all great board games for developing academic skills without your child even realizing it! You could also try Jigsaw puzzles to help your child concentrate, analyse and problem solve.

3. Water

Water play is fun at any age. You can enjoy it in the bath, in a paddling pool or simply in the kitchen sink! There are also lots of lessons to learn through water play. You can experiment with different materials to see which ones sink and which ones float, or you can test what happens to certain materials then they are added to water.

4. Science experiments

Children are curious and love to experiment, ask questions, and see how things work. Help to stimulate your child’s curiosity with some home science experiments. Don’t worry you don’t need to blow anything up! You can set up a fun science experiment in minutes, using simple items you have in your kitchen cupboards. Like how we did with the egg and salt science experiment in our latest weekly update post.

5. Outdoor fun

One of the best ways to engage children is by encouraging them to use all of their senses. This can be achieved by taking your activities outdoors. Exploring nature can provide many fun learning opportunities, so try to encourage your child to observe their surroundings, weather and wildlife.

When battling with your children to put down their devices, the best advice to all parents is to set a good example and limit your own screen time! Put down your phones, step away from your computers and introduce more ‘unplugged’ family time.