By Bridget Shirvell
In the third instalment of our new series, Advice and ideas on raising kids in the climate crisis, the author of Parenting in a Climate Crisis, Bridget Shirvell, explains why it is essential children experience boredom and why it is a critical tool in the climate crisis.
Raise your hand if modern parenting often feels like a sprint; you’re always losing. We’ve been sold the idea that we need to constantly optimise every moment of our kids’ lives. That keeping kids occupied is not only necessary, but a sign of good parenting.
Between summer camps, day trips, and bucket lists, that pressure intensifies in the summer. And yet, boredom, I believe, is not only a gift we can give our children, but something that is essential to raising climate-resilient children.
Boredom is a secret weapon of climate-conscious parenting
Boredom is a necessary state. When kids aren’t given instant entertainment, they’re forced to engage their imaginations, problem-solve, and tap into creativity.
Without a planned activity, adult direction, or screen time, kids often end up outside. They notice the spiderweb glistening in the corner of the porch, the ant trail snaking across the driveway, and the sound of crickets starting earlier than last summer.
These small, quiet encounters are the foundation of ecological literacy—the kind that starts not in a classroom but in the heart. When kids fall in love with nature on their own terms, they develop a more profound desire to protect it.
Boredom creates space for that relationship to blossom. And in the climate crisis, raising children who feel connected to the natural world is one of the most powerful things we can do.
Boredom as climate resistance
Boredom, or rather, the choice to allow it, is a small act of resistance against the hyper-consumerist culture that fuels the climate crisis. Yes, that might be a stretch, but think about it. So much of the “summer fun” industry is built around spending: tickets, gear, food. None of those things are bad in moderation, but they reinforce the idea that fun must be bought and scheduled. Choosing boredom disrupts that. It says, “We can make our own fun, with what we already have, right here.”
It isn’t about denying our kids joy but redefining it as something they can create, not consume.
How we practice it
I do not ban activities. We created a summer bucket list. My daughter has participated in several camps, which I need as a working parent, and as an only child, she wants time with people her age. Plus, we took a vacation with days jammed packed with activities. However, I leave chunks of our summer calendar blank by scheduling a week of camp, followed by a week of nothing, mostly on repeat.
During those off weeks when my daughter inevitably flops into a chair in my office to say, “I’m bored,” I respond not with curiosity but with a question: “Hmm, what could you do?”
Often, she will sulk for a few minutes before figuring it out. She’ll wander outside to pick flowers for potion-making, pull out the dress-up bin, or sit down to draw cats in her sketch book. Psychologists call this “self-directed play” or play initiated, led, and sustained by the child, essential for developing executive function, resilience, and independence. In a world where so many forces compete for our kids‘ attention, letting them get bored is like handing them the keys to their own mind
Of course, boredom doesn’t mean no boundaries. At a picnic beach concert earlier this summer, my daughter and a friend came over to say they were bored. We told them, “Go play, but remember the rules: stick together, no going in the water without a known grown-up, and no touching wildlife.”
That wildlife rule was an addition made after the previous week when they’d discovered an opossum along the trails and, in their curiosity, tried to poke it with a stick. A good reminder that “self-directed” doesn’t mean “completely unsupervised.
By letting her be bored, my kid learns that boredom isn’t an emergency, it’s a starting point. Finding a solution to her boredom flexes her problem-solving skills and nurtures her curiosity, things I believe are essential for raising climate-resilient children.
You can still use screens (if you want)
I’m not anti-screen. I’ve found that our unscheduled summer weeks make it easier to use them more intentionally, as tools rather than defaults.
Just this week, on a day I had no plans for us, my kid came to me saying she wanted to learn more about dreams, and could she watch something about them? We found some educational programs on dreamcatchers, and after watching a couple of segments, she turned the iPad off on her own to make and decorate a dreamcatcher at the kitchen table.
When I think back to my childhood summers, my favourite memories aren’t of planned outings or even summer camp—they’re of long, unstructured afternoons when time seemed to stretch forever. I want that for her.
Bridget Shirvell is a freelance journalist and the author of Parenting in a Climate Crisis. A handbook that explores the challenges and opportunities of raising children in an era of climate change. Her work has been featured in various publications, including The New York Times, Grist, and Fast Company, where she combines personal insights with expert perspectives to inspire and inform readers. Bridget is passionate about raising awareness and sparking meaningful conversations around climate action and the future of the next generation. You can follow her Substack here.
Discover more from A greener life, a greener world
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.