Nowadays, kids spend their pastimes staying indoors. You may have video games, cartoon movies, and indoor board games to keep young family members busy. In addition, the rise of smartphones and internet access also means that your kids may want to stay in the house most of the time.
Even though you may say it’s safe this way, staying indoors can also mean the kids get less exposure to the health benefits of the sun. Spending time indoors may also reduce their social and interpersonal skills. Therefore, encouraging your kids to spend more time outdoors would be best.
You may find it hard to explain to them why it’s essential to spend time outside. Thus, it would be best to devise ways to encourage them to stay out longer. The tips below can help you successfully achieve this.
- Organise Outdoor Family Time
In most cases, children emulate what their parents or other adults do. If you’re always indoors, it may not be easy to convince your kids to spend some time outside. Therefore, it would be best to lead by example. The best way to do this is to plan more outdoor family activities, so you and your kids can spend more time outside. There are various places you can visit as a family. But you may need to vary the sites you visit unless they have a favourite.
Having a list of parks and other public spaces in your location can be significantly helpful in this scenario. From the list, you can adequately plan your trips. You can also go for walks, bike rides, or other activities in your backyard.
Giving the kids a hint of where you’re visiting next can help build the excitement of going to a new place and spending more time outdoors. After a while, you can use your general observation to determine which sites the kids like most. It will help you plan future trips more effectively.
- Have Creative Outdoor Playing Spaces With Appealing Features
Ensuring your outdoor areas are appealing to the kids can be your quickest way to make them spend more time outside. You can set up structures like a swing set from Swing Set Mall, a trampoline, a kids’ climbing wall, a pirate ship, or a mini castle. You can also have a play area with a sports feature, like a basketball hoop, a soccer goalpost, or an archery target for endless outdoor fun.
Besides encouraging your kids to stay outdoors, such features can also help improve their motor skills and physical development. Furthermore, they can improve their imagination and enhance their overall health.
- Organise Outdoor Games, Activities, And Crafts
Various activities can keep your kids outside for extended periods. You can organise treasure hunts in your backyard or teach them to create distinct art from twigs, leaves, and flowers. Apart from making them stay out, these outdoor activities can hone their creativity.
You may also initiate outdoor games that require minimal input. For example, you can draw on a paved surface and create different games. If your kids love board games, playing them outside can still be an outdoor activity. You can build a designated game area in the backyard where they can keep their playing equipment.
Depending on the season, you can take advantage of the weather elements and partake in outdoor crafts. If it’s winter, you can help them build a snowman.
- Incorporate Technology With Outdoor Adventures
There’s no denying that technology today greatly influences how kids interact. That is why getting your kids to stay away from their devices for longer may be challenging. Therefore, you may as well use technology to your advantage.
For example, you can download various mobile apps to help get your kids interested in plant and animal knowledge. Some applications allow you to photograph plants and generate their names.
You can also encourage them to take photos of animals and plants with various scenic backgrounds. After that, you can print, frame, and display these photos in their bedroom or the living room. You can teach them to take videos describing plants or animals.
Participating in an activity like geocaching together can also work. Overall, showing your kids a different use of technology outside the house can fascinate them and ultimately build more interest in spending more time with nature.
Final Thoughts
While today’s setup minimizes the time kids spend outdoors, you can still find various ways to encourage it. Whether they’re older or still young, outdoor family times, crafts, and activities can prove helpful. Besides that, you can also use technology to organise outdoor adventures. Try out these tricks and encourage your kids to spend more time outside.
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