SIX WAYS TO HELP KEEP THE KIDS OCCUPIED

1 Marwell Zoo (marwell.org.uk) has lots of ways to keep in touch with its animals, such as video and image webcams of creatures including its flamingos, giraffes and lemurs. There are also downloadable activity sheets including instructions on how to draw a snow leopard, and colouring activities.

2 Hobbycraft has launched an online Daily Kids Craft Club, posting videos at 11am on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram to help keep youngsters entertained for a couple of hours and give them the chance to learn new crafting skills. The chain is also launching a weekly schedule at hobbycraft.co.uk/ ideas to give parents a heads up on what’s happening each day, so they can prepare for the fun.

3 The Natural History Museum (nhm.ac.uk) has a range of how-to videos, such as making a bird box, behind-the-scenes peeks around the museum and lots of crafts and activities such as making a compass or creating a wildlife-friendly garden. They’re the sort of things you and the children can do at home and outdoors. And it has links to wildlife webcams set up across the country.

4 Take a peek at life in the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California (montereybayaquarium.org) where you can hang out with the penguins, keep a safe distance from the big scary sharks, watch fishes and turtles in the ocean and keep up with the antics of the cute sea otters.

5 Take the family on a virtual holiday. You can visit a whole world of destinations via earth. google.com – including amazing sights in the national parks across the US.

6 Instead of just cooking chocolate crispies and packet cupcakes and biscuits, try getting the kids involved in making lunch or the evening meal. There’s a whole range of tasty, easy and fun-tomake recipes, from rainbow pizzas to banana pancakes, sunshine burgers, fish-cake fingers and squished tomato pasta sauce at bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/ collection/kids-cooking.