Does the idea of your child becoming obsessed with video games fill you with horror? Did you once have visions of doing a huge range of fun things together but now struggle to get them interested?
You might look back upon your own youth and wish you’d learned more. But kids don’t have that kind of perspective. The best way to get them learning without persuasion is by finding great hobbies that they’ll love.
There are so many useful hobbies that teach children much more than the hobby itself. From music and sports to looking after animals and stoking their creative side, hobbies are fantastic methods of providing your children with a well-rounded education.
We’ve compiled a list of ideas for hobbies that are fun and absorbing for kids of all ages. And if it’s time you picked up a hobby too, you can join in. Plenty of these are ideal for doing together.
Let’s take a look at educational hobbies that will challenge and entertain your kids!
1. Learning a Musical Instrument
Learning a musical instrument as a child can be a much shorter route to proficiency than later in life. Not only are children’s brains still developing and take to music learning faster, but playing an instrument from a young age can also result in a boost in intelligence.
The key to making an instrument a fun hobby is to let your child be involved in the process of choosing an instrument. Forcing them to learn an instrument that they don’t like might cause more stress than benefit.
Lots of music teachers offer trial lessons so you could sign up for a few and see which one your child likes the most. To make things even more fun, you could learn together.
2. Taking Part in Sports
Did you know that less than a quarter of kids get the recommended amount of daily exercise? Exercise doesn’t just have benefits to health, it’s essential to a healthy life. Getting your kids involved with exercise from an early age is a great way to keep them strong and healthy.
This doesn’t mean signing them up for a gym or lifting weights! There are so many options for fun exercise. Team sports are a great hobby that keeps children fit while teaching discipline, social skills, and teamwork.
Other sports like martial arts provide a clear path of progression. They teach self-awareness, discipline, and mental strength.
3. Starting an Aquarium
Common pets like cats and dogs can be wonderful companions for children. But there are a host of other ways to turn pets into an educational hobby. Home aquariums are brilliant learning tools and make for great hobbies that the whole family can do.
Caring for an aquarium will ease your kids into learning about science in a fun and interactive way. From learning about water filtration to why creatures like copepods can be essential to a harmonious aquarium environment, there’s so much to discover.
It’s easy to start small with an aquarium hobby and add more fish or marine creatures and plants as you go. Many aquariums with a vortech pump can be low maintenance and cheap to run.
4. Scrapbooking
Everybody has some degree of creativity and giving it an outlet can not only help nurture it, but it can have a calming and focusing effect. Scrapbooking is one of the best family hobbies since everyone can get involved or it can be done alone.
From vacation photographs and magazine cuttings to doodles and journaling, let your children’s imaginations run wild with their own scrapbooks. There are so many fun scrapbooking tools and materials available and kids can express themselves creatively however they choose.
Painting and sketching can also be experimented with in scrapbooking, making it an all-round artistic hobby. Just watch out for messy fingers!
5. Learning a Language
Ever heard that young children learn second languages faster than adults? Well, research shows it’s true. Children under 10 can absorb language learning faster and with greater ease than adults.
There are lots of ways to implement language learning in a fun way. From interactive phone apps to taking a weekly class, learning a new language doesn’t have to be hard.
Adding context can help. Going on vacation to a country that speaks the language will be wonderful but if you can’t make it, try having a weekly dinner with the national cuisine.
6. Sewing
Sewing is a useful hobby as an adult when you need to put a new button on your jacket but as a child, it has even more benefits. As an outlet for creativity, sewing gets kids into designing and creating things they like.
Fine motor movements are also honed with sewing and you can watch their accuracy improve as time goes on. Keep it as fun as possible by suggesting they make clothes for their toys or design and sew a patchwork blanket together.
7. Making Movies
Once children start using phones, it can be a challenge to get them off them. But gadgets aren’t always about social media. Most phones these days have incredible cameras and are perfectly capable of creating movies. Free apps and computer software can edit recordings into creative movies that are fun to make.
Digital cameras often have excellent movie modes too and will help teach children about lighting and camera settings. Making movies on any medium is a creative and technical hobby. It’s one of the coolest family hobbies since everyone can get involved in writing a movie and starring in it!
Great Hobbies That Spark Lifelong Learning
Children are geared to learn, so getting them involved in some great hobbies allows you to take full advantage of this ability. Hobbies might last for a few months, a few years or even their whole lives.
Having a range of hobbies gives kids insight into areas they might never have had the opportunity to learn about before. Most hobbies teach much more that you get at face value, too. With social skills, discipline, focus, and so much more to offer, hobbies are a well-rounded way of learning.
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