This Fun Things to do with Kids post is part of the Avoid Homeschool Burnout series… <- check out more ideas in that main post! It contains some affiliate links, which eventually add up to buy ice cream for my crew!

We’re 20+ years in on this homeschooling journey so I no longer need encouraging reminders that I am enough to homeschool my kids. I don’t need a post listing the best curricula to teach our 6-year-old to read. But ya know what I do need to best homeschool my crew right now? I need reminders to be goofy.

Yep. Goofy. Silly. Playful. Fun. I don’t need reminders to wipe out my sink after meals or to put things away as I go, I need reminders to enjoy this all-too-short season of parenting and have some fun.

In case you’re rocking pre-algebra and have your curricula choices wrapped up & college visits mapped out but forget that homeschooling is actually a crash-course in family relationships and delighting in your children… in case you’ve turned this homeschooling journey into a checklist and forgot to glance up at the kids young adults across the table, in case you get so busy driving from co-op to practice that you forget how to have fun with your kids, I’ve made a list of the absolute best ways to make memories while they’re still home.

Pick one for today or make a Boredom Buster Bucket List with tons of your faves on it for summer. Make space for sweet memories in the midst of academic excellence and providing all those opportunities to thrive.

1. Bring the good music back. Play some “old” songs… and make the kiddos dance with you! Maybe start with Don’t Worry… Be Happy. Our teens love to cringe dramatically when my high school music comes on and I start dancing.
2. Load everyone up for a donut run. Pile in the van. Crank the music up. Splurge for a treat!
3. Tell a joke. We buy a joke book for our kids whenever they’re into something new. Over the years, we’ve heard alllllll the Dinosaur Jokes, Dog Jokes, Farm Jokes and we’re currently loving this Laugh Out Loud Jokes for Kids book.
4. Silly String War. Nothing says “let’s blow some steam” like tossing a can of silly string to your kid and declaring war.
5. Nerf War. If you aren’t interested in cleaning up the aforementioned Silly String, try a Nerf war instead!
6. Bubbles. No kid is too young and few teens are too old to enjoy some bubbles outside.
7. Taco, Cat, Goat Cheese, Pizza You can’t play this game without cracking up!
8. JAZZERCIZE!! Seriously, though, we have had some killer fun doing old workout videos together. If you haven’t been introduced to the Lion Face workout before… you’re welcome.
9. Eat lunch outside.
10. Sing Karaoke!! Our favorite is to go on YouTube and do a round or two of “guess the lyrics”.
11. Have a Bookish Day. If your family is bookish, surprise them w/a book day! Clear your calendar and your coffee table and load up on essentials: book marks, post its (I like these transluscent post-its so I can mark up my books temporarily) & colored pencils for annotating, snacks that won’t crumble into the couch, bottled drinks (so they don’t spill), new books to read, sudoku or crossword or coloring books for reading breaks, maybe a puzzle to put together between chapters. No school required… the only rule? Everyone must stay in the same space. Throw blankets on the floor or curl up into a corner of the couch- share favorite lines or just share space. {I just added this adorable mouse-reading-a-book baseboard sticker to my library- that would be a fun surprise to add to your bookish day!}
12. Make cookies. Or brownies (I’m partial to Ghirardelli Walnut if I don’t make them from scratch).
13. Make #12 better by piling in the van and crashing a friend’s house with those treats!
14. Go for a walk. We live in the country so I like to walk to the mailbox. When we lived in a neighborhood, we’d take “trash walks” with a grocery bag and walk until we filled it with trash.
15. Watch a movie together. The same one over and over is great because then you can start quoting it together. I’m partial to Princess Bride or Secondhand Lions for teens and Ratatouille for kids, personally.
16. Teach a cooking classic. If your family has a signature dish, pass it on! Bananas Foster is easy once you know how but feels so fancy. Homemade pizza could be another in that category. Our college-aged kiddo likes to have his friends over to make homemade pasta- it feels so bougie and tastes so good but is surprisingly simple!
17. Play in the sprinklers. We put out a HUGE slip-n-slide every summer on our hill and our teens and their friends have a blast! (Protip: Have bandaids on hand. Someone always ends up with a scrape!)
18. Have an impromptu poetry tea time! These are so easy: 1) Make tea. 2) Put out fruit or cookies if you have any. 3) Put poetry books on the table (or picnic blanket!) and take turns reading a poem while you sip tea. Don’t feel pressure to turn this into a lesson. While we like to share favorite lines or talk about complex phrases sometimes, other times we just read for pure pleasure!
19. “Alexa, tell me a joke.” Or play song quiz against your kid… I love a good, silly competition! 20 Questions is another Alexa classic!
20. Take school outside.
21. Plan a day trip together. Our kids love to have a voice in what we do… pick a nearby adventure and let them help plan the day out!
22. If there are enough kids (or neighbors), head outside for a 4-square tournament! You’re never too old for a good game of 4-square! (Tape or Chalk off a big square, divided into 4. The ball can bounce in each square only once then bump it into the next. If it bounces in a square twice or if it bounces out, that person is out & goes to the end of the line!)
23. If there aren’t enough people in your crew for 4-square, pick another game: basketball, soccer, toss a baseball, pickleball…
24. Serve ice cream for breakfast.
25. Mariokart Tournament!!!
26. Tell the fam to dress up for a fancy dinner that evening. Either head to a local steakhouse or serve a candlelit meal at home!
27. TACO TUESDAY!!! Add a piñata, sombreros for everyone or game (I recommend the game from #7 in this list) to make the evening festive!
28. Play Hide & Seek in the dark.
29. Fold and fly paper airplanes– whose goes the farthest?!
30. Facetime a Grandparent
31. Learn some shadow puppets. We like this man’s YouTube tutorial.
32. Fly a kite… if you can.
33. Pick a puzzle and pour hot chocolate… slow down and enjoy.
34. Drag out that play-dough bin and let your inner Michaelangelo shine! Give everyone a category and then play 20 questions to guess what the creation was supposed to be. (ex: everyone make a farm animal)
35. Play the classic “extra time to kill” games: hangman, tic-tac-toe, charades, the dot game
36. Speaking of games – do you have a closet full gathering dust? Haul them out and host a game day- just your fam or bring friends in! (Bonus- get rid of any your kids have outgrown.)
37. LEGO competitions never get old. Animals out of LEGO are fun (replace idea #34 with LEGO instead of play dough!)
38. Do a Scavenger Hunt! You could do a treasure hunt around the house with clues only your kids will know (ex: look for the next clue where Fluffy always hides her bones) or take it into town with clues to help you play tourist in your own city (ex: Suns out, guns out! These cannons have guarded our town’s entrance since 1565.)
39. Have a “Yes Day”. Set a few rules (ex: the budget for the whole day is $150, your adventure hours are 9:00 – 5:00 and dinner & a movie at home will conclude the day, etc) then tell your kids you’ll say yes to anything within a 20 minute drive. Take a hike, picnic at the overlook you’ve driven past 100 times, grab ice cream at a new spot, let them stop at PopShelf (my kids love that store LOL)… they can pick what happens next!
40. S’mores. Unless you live in Florida or the coastal south, you can likely pull off s’mores in the evening year round. One of the things we love most since moving up to Tennessee is the cool evenings. A fire is a surprisingly simple way to create context for lingering and conversation- two things that teens crave but it can be hard to create space for in a large family.
41. Build a pillow fort inside. Or a box fort. When we moved, the kids built a full castle out of the boxes in the basement. We’ve collected Amazon boxes one other time since then and built a fort… try it!
42. …
43. I’d love to add your favorites to get this list to 50! Email your ideas to: howdy@homeschoolmanager.com If we use yours, we’ll send you a sticker of our cute logo owl, Glim, and a coupon code for $5 off your next invoice!

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