52 Things To Do When Kids Say “I’m Bored”

A common struggle of everyone being home 24/7, is definitely the struggle of having bored kids. Raise your hand if you’ve heard “I’m bored” eleventy billion times? Very few things send me in to a frenzy of frustration and annoyance than when I hear my kids are bored again. There is so much to do around here! In an attempt to combat this, we hope these boredom-busting activities help!

As many of us are navigating this brand new arrangement of no school and being home 24/7 during the COVID-19 pandemic, we wanted to share our list of boredom-busting ideas for kids. The goal is to list things that require little to no parental involvement. I certainly think the elaborate crafts and activities have their place, but this list specifically is meant to encourage independent play and creative thinking.

DOWNLOAD YOUR BOREDOM-BUSTING FREE PRINTABLE

I also would like to add a note that I know it’s good for kids to feel boredom. This is part of the reason a lot of the ideas are very general and meant to spark ideas for my kids. I believe wholeheartedly that kids should have unstructured time but I also know some kids (ahem, mine) need a jumping off point.

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Things To Do When Kids Are Bored

1. Make a bracelet or necklace
2. Listen to a podcast
3. Ask Alexa questions
4. Geography workbooks: a few of our favorites linked here and here.
5. Write a letter to a friend
6. Do a research project (animal, place, person)
7. Build a LEGO city
8. Prodigy
9. Listen to free audio books
10. Read
11. Make your own comic book
12. Mad Libs
13. Word search
14. Color in a coloring book
15. Board game 
16. Hide and seek
17. Dance party
18. Chores
19. Make a fort
20. Cincinnati Zoo YouTube
21. Learn to draw something new
22. Draw a map of the house
23. Indoor obstacle course
24. Butcher paper art: Theme ideas are city, space, under the sea, dinosaurs, things that go, geography, bugs, on the farm
25. Chalk a driveway mural
26. Learn a magic trick
27. Walk/scooters/bikes
28. Live streams of Monterey Bay Aquarium
29. FaceTime friends or family
30. Play cards
31. Sami Circuit workout
32. Hide the sticker
33. Hangman
34. Virtual tour of the Great Wall of China
35. Learn to cook something
36. Jump rope
37. Watch butterflies grow, draw their life cycles
38. Bubbles
39. Dress up
40. GoNoodle
41. Toothpick tower: all you need are toothpicks and small marshmallows
42. Give the dog a bath
43. Tour the Winchester Mystery House
44. Pull weeds
45. Scroll NASA’s complete online image library
46. Hogwarts digital escape room
47. Lunch doodles with Mo Willems
48. Take a virtual tour of Buckingham Palace
49. Go on Disney rides
50. Free science lessons from Mystery Science
51. Listen to an astronaut read a story
52. Take a virtual farm tour

Click image above to download free printable.

Get Creative

There are a lot of creative ways to implement these too! You can keep the numbered list on your phone and as soon as you hear that dreaded “B” word from your kid, ask them to pick a number between 1 and 52. Whatever number they pick, they do!

Another great idea is to put all of these ideas on popsicle sticks and have your child choose a stick every time every time they’re bored. The possibilities are endless!

We’d love to hear your ideas on what kids can do when they exclaim, “I’m bored!” Add yours in the comments below. Want to see our ideas in action? Follow us on Instagram!