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Indoor Games for Kids
Indoor Games for Kids
It's always good to have some indoor games for kids planned so if the weather isn't cooperating outside, things will still be nice inside.
Kids Breakfast Recipes Table of Contents
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Homemade Play Dough
There's no need to pay for store-bought Play-Doh. This recipe makes a colorful, pliable modeling dough that can be used for a couple of months if stored properly in a sealed container.
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Mix water and food coloring in a saucepan. Then add the rest of the ingredients. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until dough leaves side of pan.
Remove from pan. When cool to the touch, knead for a few minutes.
Supply kids with cookie cutters, miniature rolling pins, plastic knives, etc. to mold and play with dough.
Glurch
Glurch is a slippery, slimy material. Kids enjoy making shapes that "melt" into a pancake shape. Or they can hold it in their hand to watch it "melt" through their fingers.
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Mix the following together in a large bowl. Add food color if you'd like:
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Then mix together in a separate bowl:
- 1/3 cup water
- 1 teaspoon Borax laundry detergent
Add the Borax mixture to the glue mixture. As you stir, a slimy putty will form. Place the putty mixture in another bowl.
There will be leftover glue/water mixture. If you want to make more Glurch, make another water/borax mixture and repeat the process. You can do this about four times for one batch.
After the finished product sits for a minute in a bowl, pour off extra liquid. It's now ready for the kids to play with. Supply them with clay toys.
Store Glurch in a plastic jar. It can be stored and reused for approximately one month.
Note: Borax is a powdered laundry detergent. Children should be monitored constantly while playing with Glurch.
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Indoor Games for Kids:
Pretend Post Office
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Do you get a lot of credit card applications in the mail that you just throw in the trash can? Before you throw them away, remove the return envelope and save a stack of them. You then have a fun, inexpensive activity for your children. Kids LOVE to play post office. |
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Supplies:
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Give each child an old shoe box to decorate anyway they'd like. It could be with stickers or markers or pre-cut shapes that can be glued on.
Write each child's name on their mailbox. For children not old enough to read, use photos on each mailbox so they know who they're sending letters to.
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Adult: Cut a slit on one end of the shoe box that allows mail to be inserted into the box. On the other end, make a flap and use a velcro strip to secure it to create an opening that allows the recipient to collect their mail. Click on the photo for more details. |
Supply the children with junk mail envelopes and recycled paper to create mail to each other. They can send mail and receive mail as they wish throughout the day.
Indoor Games for Kids: Indoor Fort
An activity you don't have to buy supplies for!
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Simply take a large blanket and drape it over your kitchen table and you have an instant fort. Put blankets or pillows on the floor for comfort. Supply the kids with flashlights, books and toys to keep them entertained for hours inside their little fort. |
Printable Crafts
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I originally came across these printable crafts on Pinterest. The best part, there just as many boy printables as girls! |
Every time we have a rainy day or a weather-related day, I pull up their options of something to make from this site and they are happy!
Go to Printable Crafts.
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Watercolor Painting
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My daycare kids have always liked to paint with watercolors. Every year, when the school supplies came out, I would buy some of the 8-color paint pallets and some of the 12-color paint pallets. |
Throughout the year, we would have days where I would print out pictures that are appropriate for water color painting. Simple pictures with large blank areas to fill in work best. It was kind of frustrating though. These kids were so young, it was hard to get them to understand to dip the paint brush in the water and then dip it in the paint and then paint on the paper. And then do that all over again.
So, after a lot of years of frustration, I came up with a solution. I now buy the same paint trays, but I dissolve the paints in water. The paints easily pop out of the trays you buy them in. Drop one in a small jar with about 1/2 cup water. Less water will make stronger colors. Stir well. I mark the jars with masking tape that I've colored to match the color of the paint because it's sometimes hard to tell. Kids can now just dip a paint brush in the jar and paint. Easy, peasy!
Indoor Hide and Seek
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My kids LOVE to play Hide and Seek. But it was always really frustrating for me when they tried to play the game indoors. They either got into areas where they were not allowed, or there was not enough places for them to hide. |
So we play Indoor Hide and Seek. You can give them any type of objects to hide. I use these heart-shaped pieces that game with a toy I bought once. There are six of them which I feel is the perfect number.
One child hides the objects while the other kids are in another room. Then the children come out to find the objects. They start by looking on their own. Then the child that hid them and I start the "hot" or "cold" game to give them clues to find the objects there were not able to find.
This game can literally keep kids busy for hours!
Card Game for Kids:
Beg Your Neighbor
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Card games are great for indoor activities for preschoolers. And this game works especially well because the kids don't have to hold cards in their hand.
Game Rules: |
The person you choose to go first places a card face up in the middle of the table. If it is a 2 through 9, play goes to the next player. If it is a jack, queen, king or ace, the player demands payment from the person to his left. Payment is as follows:
- Jack = 1 card
- Queen = 2 cards
- King = 3 cards
- Ace = 4 cards
The player who owes the payment makes payment by turning the appropriate number of cards upright on the pile in the middle. If this player turns up a face card or an ace, they immediately stop payment and demand their payment from the player to their left. The rules apply the same to this new player making payment. If, while they're making payment, a player doesn't turn up a face card or an ace, then the player who was demanding payment gets all the cards in the pile. They place them face down on the bottom of their card pile.
When a player runs out of cards, they are out of the game. The player who ends up with all the cards wins the game.
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Marcia Reagan is the creator of DaycareAnswers and lives in Central Minnesota with her husband and two children. She's been an in-home daycare provider for over twenty years and loves to share her experience and passion for daycare with other providers. |
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