A little bit of extra screen time during school closures definitely won’t hurt your kids, but here are some educational activities for when you pry them away from the screens.

Cook together!

You can teach your kids so much while cooking, and they might not even realize they are learning! Talk to them about:

• Nutrition/Food groups (K-5)
• Measurement, volume, weight (K-5)
• Following instructions (K-5)
• Solids/Liquids/Gases (K-2nd)
• Chemical vs. Physical changes (3rd-5th)

Get Outside and Play

This counts as PE, right? You can work on:

• Cooperation
• Gross motor skills
• Following rules
• Outdoor learning

Get Crafty

There are so many ideas for crafts with kids. Entire blogs are devoted to it. I challenge you to use only what you already have in your home. No need to get all fancy. You are recycling and social distancing by not going to the store. Bonus points for you, parents!

Study Those Math Facts

Teachers will thank you for helping your kids can get better with fact fluency during the break. Make it a race against the clock or drum up some healthy competition. Cut up some paper, and have kids make their own flashcards. Practice:

• Addition (K-2)
• Subtraction (K-2)
• Multiplication (3-5)
• Division (3-5)

Make Some Art!

This could occupy kids for awhile. You do not have to use paint. Try to:

• Teach kids about primary and secondary colors.
• Get crazy mixing colors.
• Talk about artists and use famous art as an example

Experiment Time

You can look for ideas together online then shut that computer, and spend some time working together!

• Make a baking soda volcano!
• Build a marshmallow toothpick tower!
• They’ve been begging to make slime.
• The options are endless here. Warning: it may get messy.

Put Them to Work

One of the best tricks of the trade for teachers is having a behavior management system. Kids will work surprisingly hard for some pretty simple, cheap rewards.

• Think stickers (or smiley faces) on a chart that add up to a bigger prize.
• You could give them small amounts of money for small chores.
• You could have them earn Mom/Dad and me time.

The key is that if you act excited about something, you can get kids excited too.

I hope this helps you brainstorm how to keep your kids busy and maybe learning something, too.

Parents, keep up the good work! Feed the kids. Keep them alive. Bathe them (occasionally). And if they are getting a little extra screen time, they will be just fine.