It’s that time of year again when cold, rain and snow keep our kids restless and fidgety, cooped up indoors. Here are some tips on indoor kids activities that is sure to drive the indoor wiggles away!
1. Consider playing classic indoor games that are fun for you too. Hosting a scavenger hunt, for example, is a lot of fun to put together and can work for small groups or larger groups if you want to invite the neighborhood kids over to join in the fun. Plot your hunt so that it takes kids into every room in the house to keep them moving and their brains working!
2. Adapt outdoor games to the indoors. The popular summertime pool game, Marco Polo, for instance, can be adapted to a small, open (non-watery) space inside your home. Here’s how:
Before You Start:
- Choose one player to be ‘it’ and another to be his/her guide.
- Have other players spread out in the space.
- Remind them to walk, not run.
- Remind players how to use safe tagging.
- Review the physical boundaries.
How To Play:
- The player that is ‘it’ closes his/her eyes and calls out ‘Marco’, and all the others respond ‘Polo.’
- ‘It’ moves toward the rest of the players, trying to tag them gently.
- The guide will helps the tagger, especially when played in a small indoor space. The guide places his/her hands on the shoulders of ‘it’ and gently directs him/her away from objects throughout the room.
- When someone is tagged, ‘it’ becomes the new guide and the person tagged becomes the new “it.”
