I have a 4 year old child who has endless energy. It's not easy to keep her entertained. And buying toys is extremely expensive. So I thought of 30 different ways to keep her occupied for some time so she wouldn't sit in front of the Tv.
With certain games I reward her with some strawberry ice cream. And with others the crafts she makes is a reward in itself.
All these activites are indoor ideas. I firmly believe that free play outside for many hours is the best activity for a child. But with monsoons on the way parents shouldn't fret about what to do with their kids inside. Here are a few things I did with my child. Hope a few ideas work for you too.
My 30-Day Special Planner:
Activities with Ariaana:
1. Collage – take old photos and put them together on a large black chart paper. Ariaana’s Family & Friends
2. Take 2 white chart papers, stick them together and draw out her outline. Trace out her skirt and shirt and tell her to colour it in with paint.
3. Stencil – colour in a stencil. You can get these from the Hobby Store.
4. Food colours – chop up bhindi, aloo, pyaz, and a few more vegetables and dip them in pain and make a painting using imagination with different fruits and vegetables. You only need to use a slice of it and not the whole vegetable.
5. Styrofoam cups – Give her Styrofoam cups, paint and a few brushes. She’ll colour them in the way she wants.
6. Puzzles – make new puzzles with her taking a picture she likes of a cartoon or family. Stick it on a thermocol and cut them into pieces for her to put back together. Fun to make and fun to put together.
7. Cutting photos from magazines and sticking them with scotch tape on a chart paper. Make a story out of it or general things she likes. Let her cut with a child friendly scissor and not adult scissor. They have blunt ends.
8. Doll house – find things from the house to make a doll house. Make a small tent for her with pillows and tell her to find things from the house that she will need including kitchen utensils, cushions, sheets, towels etc. This way she figures out where things are kept in the house.
9. Print out a colouring page from www.pbskids.org and give her a new box of crayons to colour with.
10. Make a mask – Cut out a round shape from a paper or take a paper plate. Cut out two holes for the eyes. Tell her to colour in a mask they way she wants. Attach a rubber band with staples at the back and make a mask she has made for herself.
11. Maths games – Take a large piece of chart paper and write the numbers 1 -50 in rows and columns. Then play “Mama says/ nanu says” with a piece of object. So you give her things to put on numbers you say. Like – Put a glass on the number 9. Put a glass on the number 29.
12. Vegetables and fruits – Shopping day. Take her shopping for fruits and vegetables and come home and cook that vegetable with her. So “lets make it a red day.” red fruit – red vegetable – red juice – pomegranate – bell pepper – tomato juice. Etc. Do the same with different colours.
13. Fabric painting – get a plain shirt her size from a cheapie place. Get some fabric paints and stencils. Make an outline of a cartoon and let her paint inside and tehn she can wear the shirt
14. Sidewalk chalk – many hours of this on the sidewalk colouring and painting in according to design
15. Making granitas – In a bowl let her put some orange juice/ juice + sugar + one lemon ka juice and heat it up. Mix it and put it on an ice tray. Once frozen, crush them in a blender and scrape out in a small glass for her to have slowly. Not too much bcos she’ll catch a cold.
16. Dance – Her fav playlist.
17. Treasure hunt – hide small éclairs in different parts of the house and do a treasure hunt with her giving her clues.
18. Make movies – record movies of dancing or singing and them play them back for her. Also record things that she likes on a walk and play them back once you come home.
19. Nature walk around a park or lake – Pick things from the park or lake and click photos of different things that she can identify once you come home. Repeat it the next day after showing her what you need to spot with her. Try it with a letter – everything that is “green” – spot it.
20. Pasta maker – get 2-3 different bags of pasta – example – fussili, penne, macaroni. Put them in 3 different dishes and put some food colouring in each dish. So you have red, blue and green. Then give her some glue and paper and tell her to stick different coloured pasta on the paper making a new design. If you don’t have food colouring, you can do this with different types of chola, rajma, lobia, and other coloured things around the kitchen.
21. Puppets - Print out a few characters from a few of her favourite films Madagascar, Toy Story etc. Cut out the character and paste it on a orange bar type stick with a little hanging out. Tell her to colour or play with her puppets making up a story.
22. Face painting – Give her makeup and ask her to paint her face as if she’s going for a party, as a pirate, as her fav cartoon character.
23. Building blocks and lego – She has a princess lego and some other blocks. She can combine things to make new designs.
24. Kitchen Set – Give her a water bottle half full and let her make things with her bartan set and vegetable set.
25. Gardening – Give her a scooper and a bucket (She has a beach bucket) Let her play in the grass/mud putting seeds into the soil and watering the plant. It’s a little messy but tell her different types of flowers etc while gardening with her. Make sure she wears a hat if she’s doing this in the sun with lots of sun block.
26. Hand painting – chart paper, different colours and she can use her fingers to make a painting.
27. Ribbons – give her a ribbon with some scotch tape and tell her to tape it onto thins that are easy to find around the house. “Tape it on a red cushion.” “Tape it on the fridge” “tape it on the tv.” “Tape the ribbon to the washing machine.” Shoes, mirror, computer, toaster, main door, toilet seat,etc. Do it with objects, colours – something green, etc.
28. Window painting – washable paints and let her paint a window.
29. Cardboard box – Multiple uses of a cardboard box – painting, making it into a vehicle where she sits and with some rope is dragged by another friend, becomes a tent, etc.
30. Reading a book. – Simple. Always.
