For many families, summer weekends, especially long ones like Fourth of July and Labor Day are a super time to gather and connect outdoors with friends and family. Though kids can find a way to have fun anywhere, if you’re hosting or helping to plan a get together, it can help to have some activities in your back pocket—especially activities that are versatile and open-ended enough to engage and appeal to a wide range of ages. Mixed age play and learning is what we do at Tinkergarten. So, to help, here are a few of our favorite games or activities to offer at your next mixed-age soiree.
Please note that, though we include age ranges as a guide, each child is unique and there is so much variation within one age. Don’t be afraid to try one of these and let kids take it in whatever direction works for them—even if that means that they move on to other things!
This activity is featured in our July Activity Calendar. If you do not yet have your free copy of the calendar, get it here.
The Guide
Water and Ice Play
Babies: If your soiree includes wee ones, create a space for babies to play together! And, if it’s hot, water and ice play can keep babies engaged, happy and cool. If babies are on their bellies, set out cookie sheets filled with baby-safe objects that have great colors, textures, and scents. Freeze some small towels or pieces of cloth so they can feel them and teethe on them.
Toddlers: For wee ones who can sit up or move around, fill low bins with water and ice and place them within reach. Add in slices of cucumber or citrus to add color, smell and even taste! Freeze water in cups or muffin tins to make larger chunks that last a bit longer in the heat, or use donut pans to freeze rings of ice for toddlers to pick up. Throw in some scoops for kids to scoop and dump water, too!
Preschoolers: Water play never gets old, so don’t be surprised if older kids want in, too! If you can, offer a few kitchen tools like muffin tins, bowls and measuring spoons to spark imaginative cooking play.
School-aged Kids: Add a sponge and a bucket of water to duck-duck-goose, and you increase the fun and cool everyone down. The person who is "it" fully soaks the sponge, then walks around. Instead of "duck," they let the sponge pass over heads and say "drip." When it's time for "goose!" they squeeze out the sponge and yell, "Drop!" Then, it's off to run and try to get back into the open seat without being tagged.
Ribbons
Babies and toddlers: Put out a basket of colorful ribbons for babies and toddlers to pick up and explore. Pure joy. (Pro tip: avoid ribbons with wires or sharp edges.)
Preschoolers and School-Aged Kids: Squiggle Play! Got ribbon? Got string? Cut big pieces of it and sprinkle it all over the yard. Who knows what they will become? Add in sticks, too, and the possibilities grow. You may see kites, snakes, dragons, tails, fishing lines, magic wands...or just some fun movement play with ribbon and string. Only the kids know for sure what their imaginations will invent!
Have a Ball (or LOTS of balls!)
You can never go wrong with round things! Gather up all of the balls you’ve got—include balls of different sizes and colors. Round things spark joy and naturally invite exploration. Somehow simply having a whole lot of them in a bin, on a blanket or just around in the yard provides an invitation for group play. If you don’t have a lot of balls, ask guests to bring their favorite ball or even ask to borrow neighbors’ balls.
Want to suggest some ways to play with the balls? Here’s a few favorites:
Babies and Toddlers:
Peek-a-Boo for Babies: Offer containers with varying sized holes and invite babies to try to put balls of different sizes inside and out again. Have a cardboard box? Cut out round holes to make ball-shaped places to put balls in and take balls out!
Ramp Play for Toddlers: Set up a ramp by propping an object with a flat surface (e.g. cookie sheet, cutting board or piece of cardboard) against a sturdy object in your play space (i.e couch cushion, tree stump). You can also make blocks or books available for stacking. Place balls at the top and let go, showing delight as the ball rolls down. Invite toddlers to try, too!
Preschoolers and School-Aged Kids
Parachute Pop: Get an old blanket or bed sheet out, fill it with the balls, then get everyone to grab hold of the sheet and send the balls flying! Repeat. It is wildly joyful!
Target Practice: Set out a large basket, bin or box and welcome kids to toss the balls into it. Wee ones will find this alone exciting. Older kids can challenge themselves to see how far they can stand and still get it in or add moves like spinning to their throw.
Messy Backyard: Split up in teams and put half of the players and half of the balls on one side of the yard. Then put the other halves on the other side. As soon as someone yells, “go!”, friends can toss the balls back and forth, trying to get all of the “mess” (i.e. the balls) onto the opposite team’s side.
Bubbles
Bubbles spark joy and invite experimentation and play for humans of all ages. Try some of these ways to speak joyful bubble play with a group of mixed-aged kids:
Babies and Toddlers
Bubble Bin: Fill a bowl or bin with an inch or two of water and a few drops of liquid dish soap. Give the contents a quick mix with your hands and you'll have a delightful bin of bubbles to engage kids of all ages. Offer a kitchen whisk to let toddlers whip up even more bubbles. Add spoons, cups or small containers and you'll inspire some bubble cooking play, too.
Car Wash: What toddler doesn't love the car wash? Offer some toy trucks, cars, and/or small action figures and invite wee ones to give toys a bubbly bath.
Preschoolers and School-Aged Kids
DIY Bubble Wands: Give kids a few pipe cleaners, and work together with them to find 2 pencil-sized/shaped sticks. Then, help them turn those sticks into bubble wands.
Giant Bubbles: Perhaps the only thing better than bubbles is GIANT bubbles! Read this DIY for a giant bubble juice recipe and to learn how to make giant bubble sticks.
Games
Get Silly! (ages 0-100)
Try some of our favorite ways to get silly in our Silly Olympics DIY activity. You can even turn them into events around the yard or park where you’re gathering. Welcome kids and adults to try them together, guide just the kids through the events or just let families or kids wander around and try the events that appeal to them.
Hide and Seek (ages 0-100)
There are so many reasons that hide and seek has been around for thousands of years—and it scales so beautifully with age. We’ve gathered up our favorite variations on the game and organized them by age: 0-2 years; 3-5 years; and 6 years +.
Never Ending Tag (ages 4+)
As long as kids can run and can understand what it means to be tagged and to sit down, this game can work for a really large group! Basically everyone is it—all the time. As you all run around, everyone tries to tag other people. Once someone tags someone else, the tagged person sits down. That tagged person stays sitting down until the person who tagged them gets tagged. Then, they are back in the game trying to tag people again, and on and on. There’s also a great way to manage disputes. If two people think they tagged each other at the same time, a quick round of rock-paper-scissors breaks the tie.
Why is this activity great for kids?
With the right objects and open-ended invitations to play, kids of all different ages can play happily alongside or even collaboratively in the same space. For centuries, kids have played, learned and grown up in mixed age groupings. And, research tells us that younger children learn a wide range of skills from older children and older children benefit from the chance to learn to care for others and be leaders when younger kids are around. Watch this fun video to learn more about the benefits of mixed age play.
Imagination is defined in many ways, but one we like is, "the act or power of forming a mental image of something not present to the senses or never before wholly perceived in reality." This is no small task to little kids, and yet young childhood is a time in which imagination is developed more than any other. How does imagination develop in childhood? Through an increasingly sophisticated life of make believe.
We all likely have a sense of what we mean by make believe or good old "pretend play." How do experts define it, though? To some, there are different types of make believe that vary in sophistication and make pretend play different than other types of play. For example, kids may use objects to represent something else (e.g. a block becomes a cell phone). Or, they may start to give an object certain properties (e.g. a doll is asleep or a tree is on fire!). Still yet, they may themselves take on the properties of someone or something else.
From there, pretend play evolves into acting out scenarios or stories, those getting increasingly intricate as imagination develops. As kids' pretend play grows more sophisticated, these stories come to involve not only the creative use of objects, but multiple perspectives (e.g. good and bad guys in the same story), and/or the playful manipulation of ideas and emotions (e.g. I am sad, but then become happy after I save the village from certain doom).
Why does it matter?
An ever growing body of research substantiates the many benefits of pretend play including the enhanced development of: language and communication skills; self-control and empathy; flexible and abstract thinking; and creativity. These are the skills that will help kids balance emotions, form healthy relationships, work effectively on teams, stay focused in school, be successful at various jobs and solve the problems of an increasingly complicated world. An individual's creativity in particular, both requires and is limited by her imagination.
Active Lifestyle
Category:
Body Skills
What is an Active Lifestyle?
At the end of the day, there is nothing more important than our kids’ health. From our perspective, children cannot enjoy good health without an active lifestyle that incorporates regular, physical activity as well as time spent in nature. And, we can only influence how they use their time for a short part of their lives. If we really want to ensure their wellness for the long haul, we need to get our kids hooked on being active outdoors.
Two bits of good news: little kids naturally want to be physically active, and they love to be outdoors. So, the challenge we face is how to make active time outdoors a priority in our lives and how to teach our kids to do the same. Understandably, this is increasingly challenging in a culture that imposes so many schedules and structures around kids time. And it is all the more important when kids spend the majority of their waking hours indoors, staring at a screen, or living in communities in which the green spaces are fewer and more restricted than ever before.
Why does it matter?
Research in the past 25 years has confirmed a link between physical activity that takes place outdoors and positive health outcomes. Also, it has drawn an association between an indoor, sedentary lifestyle and negative health consequences. For young children, time to play, ramble and explore outdoors leads to the most extensive and lasting benefits—more than adult-led, structured outdoor activities like organized sports.
Perhaps the two most common issues in children’s health to which a lack of outdoor, physical activity contribute are childhood obesity and ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder [ADHD]). Beyond the millions of overweight children, obesity rates have doubled for children (ages 6-11) and tripled for adolescents (ages 12-19) in just two decades. The number of children diagnosed with and medicated for ADHD continues to rise, and ADHD results in significant impairment to children socially and academically.
Studies have shown that lifestyles learned as children are much more likely to stay with a person into adulthood. For example, 70% of teens who are obese grow up to be obese adults. On the flip side, if physical activities and time spent outdoors are a family priority, they will provide children and parents with a strong foundation for a lifetime of health.
Gross Motor
Category:
Body Skills
What are Gross Motor skills?
Gross motor skills involve movement and use of the large muscles of the body (e.g. those in our arms, legs and trunk/torso) that enable such functions as walking, running, sitting upright, climbing, and throwing.
In the first 16 months of the average baby’s life, she rapidly acquires significant gross motor skills: rolling over, sitting up, standing, crawling and walking. Toddlers and young children go on to build gross motor skills such as throwing and catching a ball, balancing on a log, jumping, and running in a game of tag.
Gross motor skills develop through practice and repetition, which is why a baby takes weeks to perfect each new milestone motor skill, and a child will attempt that same climbing stunt again and again or take a whole season to learn how to throw or catch a ball successfully.
Each child develops at his or her own pace and in his or her own way. Typical gross motor skills development also requires that the brain, spine, nerves and muscles need to be intact and undamaged. If damage has occurred through birth trauma, accident or illness, then progress of motor skills, as that of other skills, may be not resemble the notes below.
Why does it matter?
Gross motor skills are essential for every day, important body movements including walking, keeping balance, reaching, lifting and even sitting. These skills are essential for getting around, accessing the things we need and participating in games, sports and other activities that promote wellness, social development and learning. Gross motor skills are also necessary for other physical functions. For example, a child’s ability to sit and hold his upper body strong and steady will likely impact his ability to use his hands to write, draw and cut as well as his ability to follow instructions and participate actively in a classroom setting.
Typical Gross Motor Development by age:
18-24 months
Babies learn to walk well, skip, jump, and run. They learn to climb on stairs, logs, small ladders and age appropriate playground equipment (or, if like ours, on equipment designed for kids much older!). They also enjoy moving and grooving to music.
24-36 months
Toddlers run, jump and climb with improved coordination. Toddlers start to enjoy playing games that coordinate more than one gross motor skill like those that involve running, kicking and/or climbing. Toddlers also enjoy experimenting with movement in certain directions such as: forwards and backwards; in straight lines; rotating until dizzy, etc.
Age 3-4
Large muscle movement grows more coordinated. Children can run faster and switch both terrain and direction with much more ease, making chasing games and races both fun and helpful. Many children this age begin to use pedal toys and attempt to hop with both feet and then on one foot while keeping their balance. They can toss objects in the direction of a target and play catch at short distances.
Age 4-5
Large muscle movement grows even stronger and more coordinated. Most children master the hopping with one or both feet. They can run, jump forward and often skip. They can throw objects and often hit a target. Games that involve kicking and throwing while running are now possible and fun. Toddlers this age love to balance on the edges of objects and walk in straight lines. Movement that is rhythmic is both highly engaging and possible.
Ages 5-6
Large muscle movement only continues to grow stronger and coordinated as children’s energy level soars at this age. Most kids can hop, skip, and even jump rope. They easily throw balls at targets and are improving their ability to catch balls that are tossed to them. Kids this age start to take more risks with their climbing, making it an great age to begin climbing trees, challenging logs and rocks.
Teamwork
Category:
Social Skills
What is Teamwork?
Teamwork is the ability to be both an individual contributor and a supportive member of a group. Not easy for little ones, but never too early to start learning how. Although the notion of teamwork seems rather self explanatory, the combination of skills that are required for kids to effectively work on a team is rather complex. People can work effectively in a group when they have a sense of their own strengths and needs, the ability to understand the needs and motivations of others, the ability to agree and focus on a common goal, and the capacity to adjust their personal needs for the good of the group. Needless to say, young kids are too young to master these skills, but they can make tremendous progress if we give them genuine experience with teamwork and help them develop the foundations that underlie this more complex set of skills.
On a most basic level, kids start to build teamwork skills as they learn to negotiate and share limited resources. Anyone who has kids know that these skills do not come naturally, but are developed with age and practice. Kids who have experience sharing and working in groups without the dominant management of parent or authority figure (e.g. the good old pick-up game of kick-the-can that was managed only by the kids in the neighborhood) get much more opportunity to develop the self awareness and skills needed for effective collaboration. The more chances we give kids to feel the pleasure in sharing and giving, the more quickly they become effective at sharing. In addition, when we model how to set a goal and allow kids to practice working towards that goal, we model the behavior they will eventually adopt as their won. Finally, when they experience success as a member of a team, they develop a lasting sense of the power of teamwork and the motivation to start to value a team over themselves.
Why does it matter?
Collaboration makes the cut on nearly every list of top 21st-century skills—and it has become not just a goal but a requirement for most jobs. Technology increasingly enables people to work together with people who differ by geography, culture and mindset, and businesses and institutions worldwide expect employees to work effectively in both face-to-face and in virtual teams. Those who collaborate effectively will not only be effective workers but will be poised to help find solutions to the increasingly complicated challenges this young generation will face.
Further, in most schools from elementary level up, kids get more out of the curriculum if they know how to work well in groups, and this trend of increased peer-to peer-teaching and learning is only gaining ground in older school years. Research even shows that how well young children solve simple problems in groups predicts how they will transition to and fare in formal schooling.
Age: 0 to 8+
Time: Under 1 hour
Materials: Various: water, ice and bins; ribbon or string; balls of various sizes; containers; and more!
