It is not uncommon for your child to say “I’m bored.” When this does happen, it’s only natural for you to want to rescue them. You may jump into a game, direct them about what they should do or perhaps have a conversation to help them navigate their way to fun.
These approaches are necessary but may in the short term only serve as quick fixes. In the long term, they don’t get your child any closer to understanding where boredom comes from, nor how to beat it. If I am completely honest, sometimes I have work to do and just can’t stop what I am doing to play with my kids. Finding a way to conquer boredom from both a parent and child perspective is WIN-WIN for all.
You may have noticed that when a child is bored quite often, all you have to do is name a game and they automatically get excited and are ready to play. Granted you are suggesting them to play something that interests them. So it is quite apparent that boredom is simply caused by forgetting. For kids it is forgetting what toys, activities and games (T.A.Gs) are available.
I’ll never forget the day when my son said, ‘I’m bored.’ I could really empathize with how he was feeling and my first impulse was to jump to the rescue. This time however, I stopped and had the following conversation. I said, “Son, I think you forgot all the things you could do. How about WE create a list of all the things YOU can do? This way, whenever you get bored you just go to your list for ideas.”
To my surprise, he was so fired up and so the fun began with boredom receiving the first punch in the nose.
What was so cool about this exercise was that the mere activity of creating the list was a boredom crusher in and of itself. My son was having so much fun trying to think of all the things he could do. When he couldn’t come up with any more ideas he would run upstairs to his room and come down with a few more ideas. It was so cute when he would forget then have to run back upstairs.
So here is how it goes.
Eddie got a piece of paper and a pencil. He then created an exhaustive list of all the T.A.Gs he could turn to whenever he was bored. You may choose to laminate it, post it on a wall, take a pic and save it on your phone, tablet or laptop.
Here are a handful of T.A.Gs that showed up on Eddie’s Beat Boredom list:
1. Cars 2. Coloring 3. Jenga 4. Electronics 5. Pinball 6. Hockey
If you take the time to do this along with your child and even your teenager, or have them do it on their own with a bit of your involvement, what you will have in the end will be something so very practical. The next time your child gets bored, you won’t have to get all worked up or even break a sweat. All you have to do is simply remind them of their list. This will do several things for you. First, it will help them understand that boredom is a feeling you experience when you forget all that life has to offer. Second, it will get them more independent – by them facing boredom on their own and the list will contain things they can do on their own. Third, it will free up some space and time for you to focus on you.
I hope this simple approach does wonders for all you parents out there, and especially for you moms who have sacrificed so much for everyone else.
Boredom can be beaten especially when you’re armed with a list loaded with T.A.Gs.