To ask how much you play with your kids?

[Contraversialcate]

On an average week how often do you actually sit down and play/ craft/ do an activity with your child? No judgement just curious.

I have three (7, nearly 4 and 20 months), work 3 days and have little two home 2 days and I reckon I spend less than an hour a week with any of them doing a ‘quality activty’.

I think doing things with your kids where you are all having fun is really important. Board games, video games, crafts or sports type games can be fun for adults as well as kids. Playing make believe Barbie not so much.
I trained my kids to play board games from an early age and we also played multiplayer video games like Mario party when they were very young. It was a way of interacting that was easy and very enjoyable. We still do these things now they are adults.

I did pockets uninterrupted play in 10 minutes chunks, every day, often more but it was just two of us.

I used to keep things to hand which was really useful particularly in the kitchen. Packs of Uno, battle ship, connect four, guess who. Quick games that would give us quality time whilst I was prepping dinner or afterwards.

My 2 eldest were 22 months apart so they entertained each other .When number 3 arrived 4 years later they played with him.
Always out and about every day and I would play legs, playdoh etc but not role play..absolutely mind numbing IMHO.
All outgoing, socialble , intelligent adults now.

Sounds like me.

Mine are 7 and 3 I put all my efforts into taking them places, arranging for them to see their friends, reading bedtime stories etc instead.

I can't do sitting on the floor playing cars. ⚰️

At least they play together a lot!

I love you.

Also, I know they get so much time for crafting and playing at pre-school/school so that alleviates my guilt too.

Agree with this.

I make sure I put down whatever I'm doing (if reasonable) when my children are talking to me. Even if it's about dinosaurs. Again.

What if most of the time there aren't other children around? I'd find it a bit sad if my child was playing by themselves the majority of the time. I always liked playing with my kids and they'd often ask me to join in

I get more playtime with my 1 year old as I have a day off with him during the week, and if he wakes up at 6 on one of my work from home days we have an hour to hang out and play together in the morning.

My 6 year old is busier with after school activities, homework, etc so I don’t play with her as much- although we did spend a nice half an hour last night playing some board games before bed. She likes to play “born yesterday” from Bluey when I’m taking her places and I have to pretend I don’t know what a car is or how to drive it. Weekends we like to do crafts or bake together, park, church, etc.

I do think learning to play independently is important and I do my best to leave my kids alone when they’re really engrossed with something so I don’t interrupt their flow! DDs imaginary games with her Sylvanians etc always seem to go a lot deeper when I’m not involved. I was the same with my Barbies when I was a kid, I could never get “in” to their world in the same way if an adult was sitting playing with me.

Granny here. It’s very different when it’s your grandchildren. i love playing cars, tractors and farms. Shops, post office and cafe role play. Jigsaws and Orchard board games. The list goes on. I know when to back off or not interrupt when grandchild is playing independently. SO different from when I had my own children! I was always tired being a mum. But granny time is great.

I have at least an hour a day of meaningful time with my daughter, that might not necessarily be play, as someone mentioned above, I don't like to get too involved with her play unless she directs me to do something specific or wants to pretend I'm the patient. But she loves being read to, drawing together, cuddles, games etc. I put a lot of other stuff aside in my life to be able to give dedicated time to her each day.

It would be interesting to see how many adults on here remember their own parents " playing" endlessly with them. Mine certainly didn't. When I was very young I remember " helping " with chores. Like collecting laundry, pairing socks shelling peas, finding items in shop etc but no " playing"

I was the model for DD1 obsession with playing hairdressers etc ( no scissors allowed) but she did that while I read magazines

@Gogogo12345 but those tasks are still meaningful human interaction and teaching skills as is playing with other children. The risk today of course is that quite often that meaning full interaction and the practical skills are lost with a screen in its place.

The idea that parents never used to play with kids comes from the fact that those societies were much more connected. Parents didn't play with kids becuase they played with eachother. Not alone. So if you don't want to play with your kids then you need to providing kids that do. So play groups, play dates, soft play, parks.

DS1 is 3, DS2 is newborn. I play with DS1 throughout the day, interspersed with doing other activities and him just being involved in our regular chores. I can't imagine refusing outright to play diggers or cars or marble run or trains. I am looking forward to when he gets into board games though, I much prefer structured play but he doesn't. I am more looking forward to when they can play together though!

The difference in that parents were getting on with their day and getting the kids involved in that rather than halting their own stuff to play kids games

How are posters here able to play with their kids for 1 hour per day when working full time? If you finish work and the kids are already home by 5 (assuming someone else could pick them up earlier), then you need to cook dinner, eat, do washing up, do their reading and by then it’s usually bedtime- at least for my kids. Where does this magical daily hour come from?

I don't currently do this with my kids but when mine were younger, they were up at 5/6am, would have breakfast and then we would play for an hour before leaving for nursery.

They also used to eat at nursery so no need to cook and eat dinner with them afterwards

We’re very lucky that we both work three days a week, we don’t have commutes either, so even on working days we have time without being knackered/having to rush tea etc.

I think the real question is, how often do people outsource parenting to screens.

I was going to say exactly this! I have read that play is only valuable to kids when they do it with other children and without an adult involved. They learn to negotiate with each other and communicate etc. if an adult is present the whole time, it stifles this as they will always look to the adult to be in charge.

I don’t really ‘play’ with my child. We read, build Lego together sometimes and play the odd board game but that’s it. I don’t like doing it either!

The sympathy posts are making me smile. Whenever someone says “oh I feel sorry for these children, I play with mine ALL the time”
I feel more sorry for their kids - helicopter parent springs to mind.

We usually do an hour of board games/playing cards/reading every night.

At weekend we usually do painting/ crafting for an hour, weather dependent

We also do a lot of outdoor activities

Proper sitting down play at home? As little as possible during the week, maybe 1-2h per day on weekends.
But they are still young - 18m and 3yo so they still need our help if we go to the park etc.

We spend a lot of time encouraging them to play on their own! (Or together, but that usually ends fighting over a toy)

I think there's a middle ground. Children need to play with peers and independently. But that doesn't mean that play with parents is unimportant. Play is learning, and play is learning about relationships and boundaries. Risky play, role play, it all has a purpose. So I disagree that no parent should be playing with their children just because 300 years ago no parents did, or some obscure tribe halfway across the world doesn't. I think playing with your children is important. However that doesn't mean you need to spend hours a day doing it or even long stints at once.

I really recommend the Playful Parenting book, because it made me not only realise how valuable play is but also how it can be incorporated into just normal stuff and how effective short bursts of it can be.

Guilty.