Top 10 Activities for Kids this Summer at Home

The summer holidays can feel like an endless stretch of searching for ways to keep kids busy and engaged. It can be expensive paying for activities and buying toys and entertainment devices. The best way to keep kids entertained is by using the materials you have around your house in new and creative ways. These are my top 10 activities for kids this summer at home. 

Top 10 Activities for Kids 

1. Kids Car Wash

Kids love to wash cars, so set up a Hot Wheels car wash outside. Fill a tray with shaving cream where the cars can get “dirty’. Use a spray bottle full of water to clean the cars. The act of holding the bottle and squeezing the lever together is great practice for fine motor skills.

2. Kitchen Roll Art

Use washable markers to decorate pieces of kitchen roll. Try to fill up the entire piece leaving a small amount of white space between colours. Some kitchen rolls come with a design already imprinted on it, so older children can have fun tracing the patterns. Place the coloured kitchen roll on a baking tray and use a spray bottle of water to make it damp. The colours will blend together as the kitchen roll absorbs the water. This is a great little science experiment for teaching about absorption as well as a  fine motor skills activity.

3. Create Number/Letter Stones

These are actually great resources for learning that children can create for themselves. Before starting, decide on how many stones you will need – 26 for the alphabet or 20 for practising numbers. Find an area with lots of small size stones and collect the number you need of similar sizes – try to find stones with a flat surface on one side. Firstly, paint the stones in light colours with acrylic or poster paint. Once dry, using permanent maker or paint, write the letters or numbers onto the stones. Now use them as a resource to practise spelling words or working out sums. 

4. Colour and Shape Scavenger Hunt

More great activities for kids this summer at home are simple scavenger hunts. Scavenger hunts are always good fun and can be done either inside or outside. Keep the requirements quite broad so that they are adaptable but try to have a main theme or focus. These Colour Scavenger Hunt and Shape Scavenger Hunt worksheets are great for little ones who are still learning key vocabulary. Before starting, read the key words together and then start hunting! In the “Drawing” box, they can draw a picture of the item they have found. In the “Label” box, they can have a go at writing the word of what they found.

5. Crayon and Watercolour Artwork

A great way to show how wax resists water is by creating some crayon artwork. Draw a picture in crayon on a white piece of paper. Using watercolours, paint over the wax and check out the results. The wax will resist the paint so that the original drawing is visible with the watercolour filling in the white space on the page. This is a useful technique that can be used to create beautiful artwork. 

6. Painted Pasta Necklaces

Dry pasta can be a great resource for learning and creating! Penne pasta works well because it can be threaded to make necklaces. First paint the penne using poster or acrylic paint. Paint one side and lay to dry, then go back and flip them over to paint the other side. Once the paint is dry, the pasta can be threaded onto a string and turned into a necklace.

7. Blowing up a Balloon Experiment

Blow up a balloon and hold the end closed for a minute to stretch it. Let the air out. Find an empty, dry water bottle (approximately 500ml) and add ½ tsp of baking soda to the bottle. Using a funnel, add ¼ cup of vinegar into the deflated balloon. Put the end of the balloon over the end of the water bottle. Let the top of the balloon filled with vinegar hang down the side of the bottle. When you are ready, hold the balloon upright, letting the vinegar go into the bottle and mix with the baking soda. Keep your hand around the top of the water bottle, keeping the balloon in place. When the two are mixed they release CO2 (carbon dioxide) gas which will cause the balloon to blow up. If you alter the amount of baking soda added to the bottle, it affects how much CO2 is released and therefore how much the balloon blows up. For more fun science experiments for younger children, have a look at this blog.  

8. Washing Line

Set up a child size washing line outside. Gather some dolls clothes wash them in a tub of water mixed with a small amount of dish soap. After washing, use clothes pins to hang them on the line to dry. Squeezing the water out of the clothes and squeezing the clothes pins open are both great ways to build hand strength.

9. Paper Plate Fans

Beat the heat of summer by making your own fan! Paper plates work well for this activity as you can cut them in half and decorate them with colourful patterns using paint, stickers, stamps or any other art materials you have around the house. Use 2 popsicle/lolly sticks to connect into a triangle shape at the bottom which can be used as a handle for your fan. 

10. Homemade Puffy Paint

This paint is easy to make and fun to use. All you need is flour, baking powder, salt and food colouring. 

In a bowl, mix together:

1 cup of flour

3 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

1/2 cup water (enough to make the mixture the same consistency as pancake batter)

Divide the mix into four parts and pour it into ziplock bags. Put a few drops of different food colouring in each bag, seal and mix the bag around in your hands to spread the colour through the batter. Once mixed, secure a rubber band on one end to push the mixture into one corner of the bag. The bags should look like an icing bag. Cut off the tip of corner and squeeze the mixture out onto a paper to make designs, shapes and pictures. When finished, put the painting into the microwave for 30-45 seconds and watch the paint puff up and grow! 

Keep summer activities at home easy and fun!

These top 10 activities for kids this summer at home are just a starting point. There are so many creative ways to keep your little ones busy using just the materials in your house. There are so many great ideas on this website as well. Get creative and get messy!