From starting a mini business to the charity shop challenge… Seven clever ways to beat teen boredom this summer

FED up with hearing “I’m bored”? Research shows mid-August is peak time for school holiday tedium, with one in ten parents saying their offspring complain daily. Stage a cooking competition and split into teams – these could be a parent plus teen, or teen friends Credit: Getty A styling challenge is a great one for older teen girls, especially if they are style conscious Credit: Getty Teenagers often struggle the most with boredom over the break thanks to adolescent brains seeking stimulation while childhood fun no longer cuts it. If you’re stuck for things to suggest for keeping older kids busy, here teen expert and author Liat Hughes Joshi offers Laura Stott some affordable suggestions. Sign up for the Fabulous newsletter Thank you! Come dine with us STAGE a cooking competition. Split into teams – these could be a parent plus teen, or teen friends. One team makes a meal and the others judge their culinary skills and hosting techniques. Once you sit down, it’s no screens at the table – so it’s a great one to get everyone chatting. You could even blindfold the diners and make them guess what they are eating. If they really enjoy it, you can introduce themes such as Mexican, Italian – or whatever the teens fancy, for next time. Most read in Fabulous Limit menus to ingredients you already have to lower costs, or give them a limited selection of ingredients in the style of 90s cooking show Ready Steady Cook. Styling challenge THIS is a great one for older teen girls, especially if they are style conscious. Encourage them to offer makeovers to friends, parents and the wider ­family. This could include creating new hairstyles, applying make-up and choosing garments to style an outfit from existing clothes. You might be surprised by how ­differently they dress you compared to your own choices – even when they make outfits from your own wardrobe. This doesn’t have to involve actual haircutting though! Garden camping If you have a garden, then pitching a tent gives the kids the novelty factor of ­camping without campsite costs Credit: Getty IF you have a garden, then pitching a tent gives the kids the novelty factor of ­camping without campsite costs. If you don’t have your own the sun garden, you might need to persuade grandparents or hospitable friends to offer up their lawn instead. Toasting marshmallows and telling ­stories by torchlight has a fighting chance of getting teens to leave those screens inside. Hide their devices and turn off the router if necessary. There’s a risk they’ll be woken by foxes and up with the dawn ­chorus though. If you don’t have camping gear, buy second-hand or borrow some. 30-day photo challenge Set a challenge where teens must come up with a list of 30 categories to inspire a photo each day Credit: Getty TEENS love taking photos, so make the most of it. Set a challenge where they must come up with a list of 30 categories to inspire a photo each day. This could be “my favourite thing” or “food” – or make it tougher with a subject such as “inspired by a song”. For older teens, subjects could be ­artier, cooler and more obscure, such as emotions or feelings. If you are trying to get them off their phones, propose a disposable or Polaroid camera. Suggest printing images at the end to make an album, or get them to choose their favourite photo and frame it. Random acts of kindness day Set your teen the task of coming up with five to ten kind things to do in a day Credit: Getty SET your teen the task of coming up with five to ten kind things to do in a day. This could be delivering home-made food to an elderly neighbour, helping a sibling with a chore or asking someone with fewer friends than them to come over. The activity here is coming up with the ideas as well as executing them – so let your teens offer their own suggestions for ways of injecting a dose of generosity into their day. Start a business Teens can supplement pocket-money by starting their own small business, like dog-walking Credit: Getty STARTING their own, very small (for now) business is a great boredom-buster for any teen with a can-do attitude who wants to earn some extra cash and be a budding tycoon. They can suggest their own pocket-money boosters – but car-washing, making greetings cards or dog-walking are all great introductions to the entrepreneurial world. Encourage them to consider business questions such as what is different about their product or service, who are their customers and how will they advertise. They should also consider budgeting. Charity shop contest A charity shop contest is a fun one for teens where they can get creative – and out of the house and off their screens, too Credit: Getty THIS is a fun one for teens where they can get creative – and out of the house and off their screens, too. Give them a small ­budget and set challenges for them to solve while scouring local charity shops. The tasks could be things like, who can get the most useful item or who can find the coolest object. You could even give them a list of things, Apprentice-style, that you actually need and see how many they can find. They could work as a team so you don’t end up with duplicate items. If they are doing the photo-challenge idea you could combine the two. Comment now