Mental Wellness Wednesday

Keeping kids occupied during the summer

It’s summer and many parents are thinking of ways to keep their children occupied. Here are 2 research-backed ways to reduce stress and enjoy summer.

1. Keep some routine

Family routines are associated with fewer behavioral problems and better social-emotional skills.

2. Don’t overschedule – keep time for play Unstructured play leads to better self-regulation, problem solving skills, and even healthy parent-child interactions.

How you play matters- *Use imagination In a study tracking children over 15 years, researchers found that pretend play make a big impact on a child’s cognitive development.

* Put down the phone- Parents whose eyes are focused on their phone instead of their child during playtime, may raise children with shorter attention spans, according to a new study. (4)

The researchers put head-mounted camera on 12-month old’s and found that when parents focused on their child instead of a phone, children were able to focus their attention on the objects for nearly 4x longer compared to infants whose caregivers’ attention strayed relatively quickly.