Research from Early Intervention Support says that a child of 4 years old will usually have an attention span of around 8-10 minutes. This can be very tiring for parents when a family holiday can include long car journeys, long queues and very excited children – and adults! At Stork Gifts we’ve utilised our parental experience with large broods to come up with some useful tips to help you make your holiday fun and as calm as it can be!
In the Car
Having a SatNav the children can see, especially one that shows duration remaining, helps them to visualise how long is left of the journey. This also helps cut down the frustrating ‘How long before we get there?’ request. When we are travelling a familiar route it can also be helpful to make them aware of landmarks, and then see how quickly they can spot them. This is fun for your children as well as helping them appreciate the progress being made on the journey. Excited children have a short attention span, so to keep them entertained we go back to the old simple classic - I-spy or who can spot the coloured car/animal/landmark etc first.
Trains and Planes!
Travel games and books that are small enough to fit a few different ones in your hand luggage are great to entertain the kids on long distance travels. But not only that put one or two in your pockets and they prove invaluable during long queues for theme park rides. Let other children join in with you to make the whole experience more social.
Restaurants
All parents know that the long wait for food in a restaurant can be particularly boring for children, and it’s not always best to rely on the activity sheets & blunt pencils ‘sometimes’ provided. So we like to take stickers, stencils and pencils to help pass the time – and paper!
In the Hotel
A pack of cards and a good puzzle are a great way to bring the family together in the evenings, or when the smaller children need a nap. And don’t forget to bring a selection of story books to help send all the children off to sleep at night.
Planning
Some careful thinking can alleviate at least some of the coming frustrations with children. Plan toilet breaks and make sure everyone at least tries to go before getting in the car, joining a queue. Bring water and something small and healthy to snack on, but keep water usage to sips or you’ll end up making pit stops. On hot days take a small hand held fan to keep them cool and when all else fails bring out the Gameboy or DS!!! Even as die hard traditionalists accept that sometimes hand held toys can be a real saviour.
References
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