Mummy, are we there yet?
How many times have you heard your 4 year old ask this question from the back seat of the car as you drive the last hundred miles home after the summer vacation.
Before we hit the highway, the younger ones were already fidgeting. And, despite the fact that the holiday home was still four hours away, the question kept coming every five minutes. If there’s one thing that can upset the older children who have no choice but to be seated beside the wee brats, this is it
The last thing the weary driver needs as she gives her full attention to the busy lanes, is someone distracting her.
Distractions are a must but not for the driver- for the kids.
I Spy with my little eye is one such game that will keep them occupied for a short while well, that is providing everyone is concentrating.
She spied something beginning with w s and of course we all thought this meant windscreen. However after many frustrating miles the answer was not forthcoming And what do you know, her nibs got her steering wheel and her windscreen muddled up! She lost some brownie points for that.
So when ‘I Spy’ is played out, what then? One option is to play Charades, and this can be good fun for a while too.
So, what is the long term solution to prevent four energetic kids from getting bored?
This summer, we found the answer in an audiobook article. We had to dig a bit into our hard earned cash but it was worth it. Four MP3 players later and we now had the right tools to silence the little lambs!
And, silence it was because the audiobooks we chose were fairly lengthy, now, not as long as War and Peace (60 hours) but long enough to keep the little darlings quiet for most of the journey.
The important thing to remember is not to download the same story on each iPod or MP3 player. Instead give them all something different so that they can swap them around eventually.
I would advise you to allow the children some choice here too, so that they do not feel forced to listen to something they might not be too interested in.
It even makes sense to look ahead to the English curriculum of your local schools for inspiration. Huckleberry Finn seems to be an evergreen.
In years to come, it’s possible to turn idle time into productive time by listening to classic literature or foreign language audiobooks on the way to school.
Anyway, here are some of the audio books we selected: The Book of Pirates, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Chaos King, Groosam Grange, Coraline, and Alice in Wonderland. And, there are plenty of titles for the adults as well.