The holidays are fast approaching. If you have children who will be on school break, you know that you need to keep them busy during this period.
Keeping your children engaged during the holidays is good for their development and also for you to have balance and peace in the home.
Giving your children specific tasks this holiday season can make the time fly by faster. What are the specific tasks that you can give your children this holiday season? The following tasks can help generate some useful ideas.
Set a Baking Day
If you have girls, you can set up a baking day. Girls (and some boys) love to bake, and an easy bake oven will go a long way. However, for your children to have a specific task, you can always try to give them the following important things to do:
- Set up and measure the ingredients. This is an easy task that teaches your child not just about the patience of measuring ingredients but some basic math as well. If you ask them to set up from the beginning, they will also learn how to use bowls and utensils that are clean and how much work is required for a single recipe. This task may seem simple, but it comes with a lot of great benefits for your child’s development.
- Mix the dry ingredients by hand. If you have watched some YouTube videos, you will notice that dry ingredients are the easiest for a child to mix. It may be messy at first, but it is surely fun for children while helping them feel productive in contributing to a recipe.
- Kneading dough also helps them have fun. If you are making a big batch of cookies, let your child knead the dough and have responsibility for its shape and size which will teach them the value of doing good work. Once they see what comes out of their efforts, they will appreciate it more.
- Baking time in the oven must be exact according to the recipe. If you are teaching your child about time, baking is a great opportunity for them to learn more about how to use a clock or timer.
Set a Grilling Day
If you have boys, you can arrange for a grilling day. A good old grilling of pancakes with dad can help them have that bonding experience. For this task set, your children can do the following:
- You can include your kids to help you with the supermarket day or grocery shopping. You can teach your children how to find things, read signs, get the right size of the container, and check the ingredients labels and prices—all valuable lessons to help while you are out shopping.
- Help with the preparation. Measuring and mixing must be followed carefully. Still, have them get creative by suggesting new ingredients to add like dried fruit or nuts to a recipe. There are a lot of tasks and life skills that you could teach your children.
- Of course, the best task of all is to become a taste tester. This is the best way to learn, even for us adults to make sure the recipe is turning out as intended.
Teach Your Children Some Gardening
Gardening is a great idea all year round. If you do not have snow where you live, you can teach your children some gardening activities and give them a task such as the following:
- Prepare the soil by tilling into the ground old plants that have died off during winter.
- Start some seedlings indoors in cups placed on the window sill, and have your children make sure they are labelled correctly.
- Water the plants every day according to the directions on the seed packet.
- Put some fertilizer on the plants as directed.
- Dig some places for your repotting or transplanting.
- Measure the size, weight, and quantity of any produce that gets harvested and compare the cost savings against what the same produce would cost in a supermarket. Be sure to add up the cost of any seeds, fertilizer, potting soil, etc. as your children figure out how much money you saved.
Gardening may not be a task for everywhere during the holiday season, but even planning for gardening in the spring and what will be needed is a good winter activity. Find some seed catalogues and let each child choose their favorite produce or flowers to plant.
If you have snow in your backyard, you can always just assign your child to shovel the snow in the backyard and make sure that your pathway is free from snow and clean all through the winter.
No Activity Can Be An Activity!
If you want to teach your children about the value of their time, you can try teaching them more about it by giving them the task to rest.
In today’s world, a lot of people tend to believe that we should all be as busy as possible. People tend to fill up their time with social media or work and end up getting burned out early in their careers. This is because of the mindset that idle time is wasted time. There should be a balance of activity and time to rejuvenate the body and mind.
This is why we believe that no activity can be considered an important task. A specific hour that you dedicate to your children having no task or no activity to do is important in staying healthy. A nap or specific hour where your children can just stay still teaches them more about life and being in control of their time and activity.
When you dedicate time to just taking a breath helps everyone feel alive. The holiday season is a great chance for you and your family to set aside time to disconnect and reconnect—disconnect from all outside forces and reconnect with each other and with the Lord.
A Bible-sharing activity or reading a nature magazine such as Creation Illustrated can do your relationship with your children some good.
When assigning tasks to your children, they need to know why you value that specific task and how they can benefit from it. Sharing a Bible verse with them and letting them take it in is a good way for you to teach them values and how to think and pray about important things in life.
Keep in mind that any activity can be beneficial as long as you put value into it. After all, your main task this holiday season is not just to keep your children active and busy. Your main task is to teach your children ways to make a contribution to the world so they can become better members of society and useful for the Lord’s work.
