Bored or Board?

Month 8 - Bite 11

Search out some free entertainment online that doesn't involve computer games!

There's always times during the school breaks (and at weekends come to that) when there's a need for sit down and do something calm! It's good to have a change from frenetic activity or to have something up your sleeve for days with poorer weather or when everyone fancies flopping about at home.

Have a session of surfing the web, not for cutesy videos of other people's pets or numberless gaming apps to use up your tablet's memory, but for downloadables. There's so much available whether that's quiz sheets, colouring pages, games to cut out and play..... Spend some time having a search and printing some examples off.

Be careful though... you won't want to wildly print off pages and pages of stuff which could a) waste paper and resources if it's not used or b) adds to piles of clutter about the place. Be selective about what you need right now and save other material in a folder for printing as needed at a later date.

With some of the materials you might find you only use one side of the paper, well, save it and print on the reverse next time.

With some of the downloads you could make it a paired or team activity and only print one copy.. just saying!

Month 8 - Bite 12

When I was little we always got a compedium of games either at Christmas or for birthdays. I well remember my mild dad becoming a ruthless hunter during ludo! My husband's family spent many hours playing Touring England - we now have our own game of it with a trophy to play for... There are the perennials too, of course, Scrabble, Mastermind and Monopoly (that often had to left out overnight as we never seemed to finish it.

What's in your cupboard? Have you any old favourites from your past that you haven't introduced your youngsters to? If you don't have any try a look around a charity shop or two to see what they have. 

It'll be interesting to see how individuals develop their own game playing characteristics once you get started.

Month 8 - Bite 13

After all that competition it's time for sharing an experience together. Try a film night, complete with popcorn and ice cream.

There will be plenty of films (or maybe some DVDs if you still have the machinery) to stream - even on free to view platforms. Or you could splash out on an old film you enjoyed in the past and see what the younger members of the family think about it.

Set the scene at home with low lighting and a quick 'speech' or 'trailer' about why the film is your choice. You might even make tickets to be exchanged for front row seating!!

Don't forget to ask your band of film reviewers/critics what they thought of the movie at the end....