Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Games

My kids love to play games. I get a little tired of Chutes and Ladders after the 10th time. Here are some games that require a little imagination and creativity.

20 Questions AKA "I'm Thinking of an Animal" You give clues and guess what the animal is. We adapt it to whatever our kids are into: star wars, disney, cars, pirates . . . (thanks for the idea Camie!)
20 Questions AKA "Man or Woman" You decide on a person in their life. Then they guess man or woman. You tell them which one it is. Then they ask identifying questions (moustache? Does he/she live in our house?) until it is narrowed down enough and they make a guess. (Thanks Megan!)
"I went to Grandmother's button box, and I found..." then you name an object. It can be anything, the sillier the better, it doesn't have to be something you find in a box ( like a giraffe). The next person repeats what you said and adds their own object. For example: "I went to grandmother's button box, and I found a giraffe, and a car" Then the next person repeats what was said, and adds their object, and so on. It is a great memory builder that can be challenging for any age. (Thanks Kristie!)
Charades
Hide and Seek
Treasure Hunt (give hints using "warmer/colder" or "closer/farther")
Red Light, Green Light
Simon Says
Follow the Leader
Mother, May I?
Freeze! (while the kids are running around or just playing, yell "Freeze!" They freeze where they are. Then you say, "Thaw!" and they can start moving again. You can also try it with music.)
Storytelling (take turns talking for 1 minute each, adding to the story each time)
I Spy With My Little Eye...something green, or a triangle shape, etc.
Make Your Own Memory Game (use stickers or photos or cutouts from magazines)
Use a Mr. or Mrs. Potato Head to help teach body parts and where the body parts go and what they do...Ears are for listening...noses are for smelling and blowing...hands are for shaking and hugs...and so on. (Great idea Connie, thanks!)
BINGO (don't get stuck on numbers--you can make your own set for shapes, alphabet, animals, and more. Use stickers or draw each item.)

What games do you play for fun?

5 comments:

Balagna Bunch said...

A favorite game at our house or on long car rides is "I'm Thinking of an animal." You give clues and guess what the animal is. We adapt it to whatever our kids are into: star wars, disney cars, pirates . . . our two year old even plays but usual just says whatever he is thinking of! This is a really neat site. Well done.

Connie said...

We like to play "Mr. or Mrs. Potato Head" it helps teach body parts and where they go and what they do...Ears are for listening...noses are for smelling and blowing...hands are for shaking and hugs...and so on. It seems to be very repetitive so we have the variety pack with lots of options for different color body parts...makes it easier to do every day!

Kristie said...

We play "I went to Grandmother's button box, and I found..." then you name an object. It can be anything, the sillier the better, it doesn't have to be something you find in a box ( like a giraffe). The next person repeats what you said and adds their own object. For example: "I went to grandmother's button box, and I found a giraffe, and a car" Then the next person repeats what was said, and adds their object, and so on. It is a great memory builder that can be challenging for any age. The thing I love the most about it is you can play it when you are busy doing housework, or in the car, etc.

Megan and Jon said...

Another we like is Man or Women.
They guess Man or woman and you tell which and they keep guessing things until they have narrowed down who it is.

(ie, do they have a mustache,live at our house, taller than me,live at grandmas, have brown hair)

We don't always get this right and alot of my sisters have mustaches when we play.. he he

Gidget Girl Reading said...

with my oldest we played these 2 games alot:

1 way was we would say a word and she would ryhme it and we would have to ryhme the word she said and so on!

the other game was we picked a theme and we had to come up with a word for each letter of the alphabet!