I was at a friend’s house when her eight-year-old asked for the latest gaming console because “everyone has one.” My friend caved, spent $500, and three weeks later the kid was bored with it, back on his iPad scrolling TikTok. I watched this happen and thought: what are we actually giving these kids? Because it’s clearly not what they need. The gadgets pile up. The trends change every week. And somehow, kids seem more anxious, more distracted, and more disconnected than ever. Maybe what they’re missing isn’t something you can buy on Amazon. It’s something deeper than that.
1. Unstructured Time To Be Bored
Kids today are scheduled within an inch of their lives. Between school, soccer practice, tutoring, piano lessons, and playdates, every minute is accounted for. And when there’s a gap? Just hand them a screen.
But boredom is where creativity happens. It’s where kids learn to entertain themselves, to problem-solve, and to imagine. When you constantly fill the silence with activities or devices, you’re robbing them of the chance to figure out who they are when no one’s micro-managing them. Let them be bored. Let them complain about it. Then let them discover what they come up with when they’re forced to actually think for themselves.
2. Real Sleepovers At Friends’ Houses
Remember sleepovers? So many memories get made when kids stay up too late, tell stories in the dark, navigate minor conflicts without parental intervention, and wake up in someone else’s house figuring out breakfast.
Sleepovers teach kids flexibility, social skills, and how to be a guest in someone else’s space. They show kids that they can be away from home and be okay.
Yet modern parents are more anxious than ever before. So sleepovers have quietly disappeared from childhood, and kids are losing something critical—the chance to be independent, to problem-solve on their own, to realize they’re capable without Mom and Dad three feet away.
3. Time In The Kitchen Helping Cook Dinner
My daughter helps out a lot at dinnertime—not watching, not sitting at the counter on her iPad while I cook, but actually helping. She measures ingredients, recites recipes, and sets timers. She’s my own little sous chef, and we both love it.
Studies have found that kids who cook alongside their parents develop stronger problem-solving skills. They learn to follow complex instructions, get better at managing their time, and feel a sense of contribution that boosts their confidence.
Cooking teaches math, science, patience, and the basic life skill of feeding yourself—something a shocking number of young adults can’t do. It also teaches kids that food doesn’t just appear, that meals take effort, and that they’re capable of contributing something real to the household. Those lessons matter so much more than screen time ever could.
4. One-On-One Time With Each Parent
Once a month, my daughter and I go on “Mommy-Daughter Dates,” where we spend quality time bonding, just the two of us. It’s so important to carve out time to give kids individual, focused attention and do something together without siblings, without distractions, and without phones.
Go to breakfast. Go for a walk. Work on a project. It doesn’t matter what it is—what matters is that the kid gets time when they’re the only one and don’t have to compete for attention or share the spotlight. Kids are starving for this kind of undivided attention, and most of them aren’t getting enough of it.
5. Art Projects That Take Days To Finish
Kids get such a kick out of making things from scratch that take days to finish. Painting, building, sculpting, drawing—it really doesn’t matter what it is. What matters is the slow, messy work of bringing an idea to life. Art teaches children that creation is a process, and that things don’t have to be perfect to be worthwhile. They learn that failure is just part of figuring it out. And in a world obsessed with instant results and polished outcomes, that’s a lesson they desperately need to learn. Plus, research on creativity shows that when kids work on open-ended projects over time, they develop better problem-solving skills, learn to handle uncertainty, and discover how to self-motivate. And those are all skills that actually stick.
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- People who grew up in the ’60s remember when getting hurt outside was your own business — you walked it off, you didn’t tell anyone, and you were back out there the next day
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6. Regular Trips To The Library
Sure, kids read plenty for school—but what about reading for pleasure? Visiting the library to browse, discover, and wander through shelves teaches them that reading can be fun. There’s something special about coming home with a stack they chose all by themselves.
There’s actually research showing that kids who visit libraries regularly and choose books they want to read develop stronger motivation, bigger vocabularies, and higher grades than kids whose reading is either assigned by teachers or happens primarily on screens. Library visits have dropped off because it’s easier to hand them a tablet. But that convenience is costing kids more than we realize.
7. Time With Grandparents Or Older Family Members
Older family members offer what nobody else can. They teach patience through slower, more deliberate conversations. They share stories that show kids what life looked like before smartphones ran everything. They pass down family history that connects children to where they came from. And they remind kids that they’re part of something bigger and longer-lasting than whatever’s trending right now.
8. Visits To Museums And Cultural Spaces
Museums expose kids to art, history, science, and cultures beyond their own experience. They teach that learning doesn’t only happen in classrooms or on screens, and that the world is full of things worth paying attention to.
A kid standing in front of a dinosaur skeleton or a painting from centuries ago is learning something you can’t replicate at home. They’re experiencing awe, scale, beauty, and history—things that feel increasingly rare in a world designed to keep them scrolling. And those experiences shape how they see the world and their place in it.
9. Family Movie Nights Without Phones
Everyone in the same room watching the same thing. No scrolling, no multitasking—just presence. It sounds simple, but it’s not so common anymore. Kids are in their bedrooms on their phones while parents are on theirs in the living room. Nobody’s actually together, even when they’re all in the same house. Family movie nights create shared experiences, inside jokes, references, and memories. They teach kids that sometimes you just sit with people you love and experience something together. It’s a small ritual, but rituals matter. They create connection, and connection is what kids are missing most.
10. Hands-On Projects Around The House
Fixing something broken.
Painting a room.
Building a shelf.
Planting a garden.
These projects allow kids to use their hands, follow instructions, problem-solve when things don’t work, and see tangible results from their effort. They teach kids they’re capable, that they can learn new skills, and that they don’t need to hire someone or buy something—they can figure it out themselves. And in a world that’s basically all virtual, the ability to build, fix, and create something physical is incredibly valuable.
According to researchers, when kids build or fix something tangible, it builds their confidence and sense of competence far more effectively than anything they do on a screen.
House projects also give kids a sense of ownership over their space and proof that they’re capable. Plus, when they’re twenty-five and a drawer breaks or a shelf needs hanging, they’ll know what to do instead of feeling helpless.
11. Quality Time In Nature
Kids used to disappear into the woods for hours, climb trees, build forts, and explore creeks. They’d get dirty, take risks, and come home when the streetlights came on. That kind of outdoor play is nearly extinct now, and the loss is significant.
Nature teaches things screens can’t—like risk assessment, physical capability, and wonder. There’s research showing that unstructured outdoor time boosts attention, creativity, coordination, and stress regulation far more effectively than indoor play or supervised activities ever could. Kids need to be outside, moving their bodies, testing their limits, and experiencing the world as something other than a curated, controlled environment. They need to remember that they’re part of a physical world, not just a digital one.
Related Stories from Bolde
- I’m 67 and I just realized I’ve been “saving money for later” my whole life, and now that “later” has arrived and I’m retired it turns out I didn’t spend fifty years saving money, I spent fifty years practicing self-denial, and now I can’t tell my brain the practice is over
- People who grew up in the ’60s remember when getting hurt outside was your own business — you walked it off, you didn’t tell anyone, and you were back out there the next day
- Psychology says people who can’t relax until every dish is washed aren’t uptight — they learned somewhere that rest had to be earned first, and the clean kitchen is the permission slip
