With so many cool gadgets and toys nowadays, many children haven’t learned the Classic Indoor Games for Kids we all grew up with. Next time you’re trying to think up some indoor games for the kids to play, consider the classics from your own childhood.
Games are one of the more important activities for children and adults to interact and bond. Some of these are well-known, and some are enjoyed not just by children. Adults can be children, too, at least on rainy days.
Animal Charades
This is going to be great if there are silly children around. Children sit around in a circle and one child goes into the center. Or, the child can stand at the front of the room.
The “animal” child acts out with NO SOUND only a very small portion of any animal action (a lion’s roar, a rabbit jump, etc.) he imagines and get the group to guess it. The animal child stretches the action if nobody gets it. Anyone guessing correctly gets to play the animal.
Guessing Game
In this game, you have to blindfold the young child. When they cannot see anything you have to jingle keys or snap your finger and have them guess what the sound was. This will help them to think of what things sound like.
Hot or Cold
A great indoor activity that teaches the child to listen. In this game the adults tell the child where to go in the room to find what is hidden and the child has to listen to the adults and make it to the object.
The adults cannot say things like “a little more” or “step forward” they can only say hotter or colder. Hotter means that they are getting closer and colder means that they are getting further away from it.
Hot Lava
Put some papers on the floor as “stones” to step on, the rest of the floor is a flood of “hot lava” from a volcano. There are two sets of “stones” for each team to travel, with parts that merges, meaning there are only a stone or two for use.
The object of the game is to transfer “dinosaurs “eggs” (rolled up socks) one by one from one end of the room to the other. The fun part is when two teams will fight out the parts where there is only one stone to step on.
Any “accident” and the team member has to start from the starting line again.
Hot Potato
The “potato” here has to be something soft and lightweight (a small plastic ball, perhaps or a very small stuff toy) that cannot break if it falls on the floor or gets thrown onto something hard.
This is actually a version of the musical chair. Music is played and the “potato” gets passed around. When the music stops, the “potato” suddenly gets “hot” and has to be thrown to the next child.
If there is no music, and someone is still holding the potato, she is out. Whoever drops the potato is counted out too.
Memory
A game played with a deck of cards that are laid face down so the children cannot see the other side. This indoor kid activity is modified for younger children to use only 4-8 cards so they can easily find the mates to begin with.
Going from the left of the dealer and continuing clockwise you take turns flipping over two cards to see if they are a match. If they are you get another turn. Then when all of the cards are gone you count up your mates and see who has the most and that is the winner.
Trip to Spain
Two children from each team are blindfolded. Once they are, the floor will be littered with soft objects (stuffed toys, pillows) as the obstacle course.
The blindfolded children are then made to walk and go to the end of the room across the obstacle course. Their teammates will guide each one of them, meaning telling them where to go to avoid hitting objects on the floor.
It is fun because both teams will be shouting directions and there will be shouting. The first one to reach the goal wins for his team.
Zoo
There will be pairs of children for this game. Each pair will represent an animal they want. (Make sure there are no duplicates.)
The children will all be securely blindfolded and scattered around the room. At the signal, they will look for their pair using only SOUNDS of their animal. There will be barking, meowing, clucks, quack-quacks and all kind of animal sounds in the room.
The winning team is the one who met each other first.
Considerations
Prizes could be candies and other goodies. Disputes and arguments (if any) shall have the game restarted. Any game wanted by the children to be played over and over should be played unless there will be objections. Indoor kid’s games should be enjoyed, not disputed.
The games which you have shared are engaging and also very interesting. No wonder why they are called classic indoor games. In our school days, even we use to play memory games and it was so much fun!