Families that don't do anything with children

I agree. There is this stubborn determination to keep them off "screens" at all costs (ugh, I hate that term as a catch-all) but I don't really think forcing DS6 to go to the park with me when there may or may not be someone he knows there is any better for him than playing Minecraft then. building Lego with the TV on in the background.

As it happens he has been on holiday with grandparents and to stay with relatives since school ended, and we are taking him to Wales next week, but for the last 3 weeks he can have as much chill time as he wants.

SIL (husband's sister) was like this. They live near a major city with loads of free things to do and places to go and she never took her kids anywhere. They would go to the park and go shopping. And that's it.

SIL is very un-curious about the world, doesn't travel, isn't educated, isn't interested in learning or finding things out, She has no interest in going to a museum or gallery would not ever think of taking her kids there.

I was a get out every day person. Now I have chronic pain and struggle to do outings. Luckily family help so ds gets out a few times a week. But you don’t know why people don’t go out really.

We absolutely do days out. But there are a lot of days that mine just sit at home all day. In a normal summer, it’s because we’re working (self employed before anyone gets their panties in a bunch). At the moment, it’s because Dh is working to support us both and I’m going through cancer treatment and sometimes just getting everyone fed and keeping them alive is all I have energy for.

That said, while I don’t think kids should sit around on screens 12 hours a day, being bored is very important. They need to not have every moment planned. They shouldn’t have to rely on others for entertainment. Playing and imagination is important and they don’t do that when they spend every day being stimulated and shuttled through various forms of entertainment. They need to be bored.

There is a difference obviously between being bored and being deprived though.

My 9 and 7 year old have been to three countries this summer, but I’m sure if you asked, they would just say they played PlayStation all holiday. So I would take that with a pinch of salt.

The boy may just be too lazy to say what he's done. My son has already said he is just going to write one experience from the summer in the inevitable back to school 'what did you do this summer' writing. We've done quite a bit but he's decided on the highlight...

Also sometimes we don't do things because money is a bit tight even for fuel to get somewhere....if you don't have Tupperware and a bag, going on a picnic can be difficult. Not everyone lives in an urban centre close to museums etc...

This is outing hence the name change.

I have two sets of twins - four and eight. One twin from each set has autism. We don’t all go out very often because it’s enormously challenging. The two autistic children run off and don’t understand stranger danger. If they both have meltdowns at the same time, there’s two other children to look out for at the same time. Plus it’s really hard to find activities that suit them all. We tend to do short trips to the park but that’s about all we can manage.

There’s also the astronomical cost of everything at the moment! A family of six costs a bomb.

yep agree it’s way easier to just go out for the day

i hate being home with my kids

I love planning days out and finding free things to do with them

I actually think there’s too much pressure to be doing stuff all the time (‘making memories’) and there’s nothing wrong being at home just chilling. Kids don’t have to be entertained all the time and it’s good for them to learn how to entertain themselves (and to be bored).

Reading all these activities listed I think it really must be people not having cars. For example I live next to a park and a pond but other than that I would need to travel to get anywhere at all and I couldn't be doing with getting on and off a bus with young kids with me. Maybe once in a while but it would be exhausting

That's very much your dc. She may like doing lots. Other children may not.

Dd1 liked to do a selection of things that appealed to her. She did 3-4 things a week and most of them she did until she was 6th form once she'd started.
Dd2 would have liked to do constant things every evening and weekend day. She did 10+ things at the highest. She liked to change around. Some things she continued doing, but often she'd try something for a term, then move on.
Ds did not like doing things. I told him he had to do one thing, and he did it under protest when he first started. He did grow to love it, and at one point did 15 hours a week on it, but he was clear if ever I asked that he didn't want to do anything else.

In holiday times dd1 and dd2 normally did one holiday club week. Ds occasionally did one related to the hobby he did. We were never bored whether we went out or stayed at home. As my dad would have said "only boring people are bored". There was always lots for us to do whether together or each on their own or in pairs/small groups.

Yes, see the problem with the free museums.Is that the parents have to pay for train fares to get there?And possibly to the children as well.Depending on age.

Then you have to tell the children, if you've got no money, they can't buy anything in the gift shop. Or have anything in the extortion at cafes?And that's a lot of the fun for children

Maybe parents just don't want the pester power and having to tell their children they can't have this and that.

No we shouldn't judge we should support. You don't know where they live so even if they want to take their kids to a museum maybe the travle is too expensive - trains are expensive and bus prices increasing. Also many parents have to leave their kids as they need to work and need the money. Depression can be helped yes by going outdoors but when it's really bad it's almost impossible to do so and people need to get stable before that. There aren't that many support groups or courses and many are accessible or actually catered to parents in deprived areas, or ethnic minorities and other situations. They need support if they have anxiety to even think about the graded exposure and the families in poverty and various situations the same. I was one of those kids and we just couldn't afford to even live in our house so what we didn't need was coming back to school and teachers making everyone say what they did over the holidays and hearing about trips abroad and having nothing to say when it was our turn.

People don't all live in cities, may not know about free activities and there aren't many anymore anyways, many libraries are closing down or open less. Also many clubs and sports are lots of money even the ones after school and many cannot afford something not necessary after bills and food etc. £30 for a musical theatre club may not be a lot to you, but it would have been to my family and many, music clubs now are in the £50s sometimes.

I take my kids out but even pals have ice cream vans and it’s £10 for those, I bring them a drink from home but maybe they want a different one.
it’s hard to say no, so I understand why some don’t go.

What’s the deal with free museums now? Is it that simple? I’m outside of London so train fare in is high but would love to do some of the museums

Clearly you are the exception. Not who the OP is referring to.

How do you know they’re just “sitting at home” all day though? There are plenty of things to do around the home that are fun, interesting and educational. They might be cooking, growing stuff in the garden, drawing, reading , sewing, the list goes on

You could just as easily ask why some people have to be out all the time. IME it’s much easier to go out, and harder work to entertain kids at home.

You can't imagine why someone would want to sit at home all day? I'm recovering from cancer treatment. So take your judgmental pity for my poor, bored child and shove it.

I'm not saying everyone should do 5 clubs a week. She as a very active kid who asks to do these things and a lot of them her school friends do so she wants to do them as well. Which one do you think she should drop?

Musical theatre which she absolutely loves and has grown her confidence massively?
Rainbows which she's excited for all week, I volunteer at and we go to together?
Yoga after school so she can watch most of her class go without her?
Swimming, so she doesn't drown immediately if she ever ends up in water?
Or dance which she's been asking to join all year but I told her to wait until Y1 because she already had a lot on?

She has plenty of downtime, 5 hours of activities she enjoys every week + 30 hrs at school isn't even the hours of a FT job.

There's a big difference between saying every Reception kid should be in multiple clubs and activities and children who throughout primary school never go to anything. Rainbows is at the nearest school which is a 5 minute walk from our house and costs £30 a term. We don't live an impoverished area.

We (me, husband and teenage daughter) have plenty of activities we can do at home that we love.
Reading, writing, building Lego, making jewellery, playing computer games/board games, making stop motion films on the laptop, listening to music, watching tv/films, drawing, cooking......
We do regularly go out. We were also happy as larry during lockdown when we couldn't go out.
People are different and like different things.

Some of my happiest times during childhood were playing in the garden with my grandparents, having picnics on the rug in the living room, and watching videos or playing games that usually we wouldn't have the time for.

You don't actually know what goes on in the house.

Sometimes relaxing is fine, you don't have to plan wall to wall activities.

I was almost never taken out as a kid - looking back the reasons are more understandable now.

My (single) mother is autistic (not diagnosed until her mid 50's), so crowds and noise have always been a thing to avoid. She was also generally burnt out and overwhelmed due in part to her own past trauma as a child. Weekends were her recovery space, and she has terrible time blindness, so we were often left to our own devices for weekend mornings.

We were also poor, so going somewhere where we might have asked her for anything (e.g. an ice cream) and she would have to say no felt too much for her. This also meant no clubs, or organized group activities. I don't recall any picnics but we did sometimes go blackberry picking at a path a few minutes walk from one of the places we lived.

She has trouble with social interactions, being aware she cannot tell if someone is lying makes her very cautious. So no play dates, etc, until we were able to arrange our own as teenagers.This meant she had no way of learning about any new to her activities that would be 'free'.

Edit to add: I suspect my son is autistic, and i can understand on that side why it may sometimes be easier to allow him his recovery time, avoid changes to routine, eat where his dietary preference is definitely catered for, avoid potential issues with toileting accidents for a six year old, etc. I do take him out regularly because i don't want him to have the childhood i had, but i can also recognise that it isn't as straightforward as saying that going out is a lovely thing for everyone.

A friend of mine never took her kids anywhere except to her mums. She used to have so many excuses. It’s too hot. It’s too cold. They were sniffly this morning. I don’t think she meant to but she was also overwhelmed with housework and used to think that was her priority.
So many families don’t take their kids out. I’ve heard kids say that they want to go to the park or library but their parents won’t take them.

I find it surprising that you work with these families, sonarempaid for this but you aren't able to understsnd why. That doesn't mean that you agree with them but do you really, really have no idea why families struggle to access things? I find it really hard to believe but take just one thing - money.
Yes, some activities are free to enter. But are they really free? Or are there going tk be lots of add ons that it's hard (or absolutely gut wrenching) to say no to your children, yet again.
Is it free to get there?
Is it easy to find out about if you are potentially of a low reading age?
Is it over a meal time so that you need to take and carry food (embarrassing maybe) or will your children be asking for food which you can ill afford.
Or are you worn out from lining up at a food bank this morning, worn out by working out what meals to cook with what you've generously been given but didn't choose.

SO maybe staying home today it just easier.

And that's just money. Not poor mental, physical health for adults/children. Disabilities. Neglect.