If the children are starting to get a little restless staying indoors due to the winter gloom – don’t worry, we’ve got you covered with a host of ideas to put the sunshine in their lives!
Following on from our last blog post, on the best indoor activities the team at Paultons Park has come up with a range of fun outdoor activities to keep the kids entertained during the national lockdown.
Create your very own ‘Critter Creek’ nature bugs
Kids will love this super fun outdoor activity! To make these eco-friendly nature bugs you will need a square piece of cardboard (no bigger than an A4 sheet of paper), some paint, a paint brush, and craft glue. You will need go out exploring in your garden or neighbourhood to collect some leaves, sticks, and twigs in various shapes or sizes.
To get started, paint the cardboard square a solid colour and leave it to dry. Once the cardboard has dried, arrange some nature items on it in the shape of an insect. Now remove the items and glue them one by one and leave it to dry.
We’d love to see your nature bugs! Once finished, take a picture of your creation, and share it with us on social media – and don’t forget to give it a bug-tastic title!
Use a pinecone to create a weather station to predict rain or tornados!
With the opening of ‘Tornado Springs’ around the corner, teach your little ones this fun trick to predict the weather and watch out for downpours! Did you know that pinecones open and close depending on the level of humidity? This helps preserve the seeds from bad weather.
A closed pinecone signifies rain, and an open pinecone means dry weather.
First, you’ll need to round up the family and go hunting for pinecones. Then, task the children with building a mini weather station in your garden – this simple trick will help you and the little ones predict the weather with the help of nature. This activity is good for all ages, and we recommend putting your pinecones in front of your windows, outdoors, for best results.
You can then ask your children for the daily weather forecasts and task them to keep a weather diary!
Excavate frozen dinosaurs!
Kids love ice melting and if they’re fans of the dinosaurs of our very own Lost Kingdom, then we’ve a fun-filled, sensory preschool activity to make playtime at home more engaging. Let’s create frozen dinosaur eggs and place them into warm water for dinosaur egg-melting joy!
Grown-ups, while you’ll need to lend a helping hand with some of this activity, such as blowing up the balloons, there’s plenty of hands-on fun for the little ones, too.
You’ll need:
- Dinosaur figurines
- Regular balloons, not water balloons
- A large bowl
- Warm water
Method
- Take a balloon and blow it up for 30 seconds, then let the air out
- Open the top of the balloon and insert the dinosaur figurine (repeat for as many dinosaur eggs needed)
- Fill the balloons up with water and tie a knot
- Place the balloons in the freezer and allow them to fully freeze
- Take the dinosaur ‘eggs’ out from the freezer and peel off the balloon from the egg, then place into a large bowl
- Give the children a bowl of warm water and ask them to hatch all the dinosaur eggs for some sensory fun. How long do they think it will take for the first dino baby to arrive?
Peppa Pig’s outdoor treasure hunt!
This outdoor activity will keep your children entertained for hours and also teach them about sequencing. Even better, it’s also one of Peppa’s and George’s favourite game! Kids love this activity, especially if there’s a treat or little gift to be won at the end of the hunt.
You’ll need:
- A4 paper
- felt-tip pens
- 2 treasures (such as a toy and a treat for each team)
Depending on how many children there are, you might need to split them into two teams. To get started, ask each team to choose a ‘treasure’ (such as a toy) and get them to hide it somewhere in the garden – please make sure the other team isn’t looking!
Once the toys are hidden, give the two teams an A4 piece of paper with some felt tip pens and task them to draw a map of the garden. Once that’s completed, tell them to plot the treasure on the map and to draw a ‘path’ leading to it.
Now for the fun part… get the teams to go treasure hunting, using the maps they’ve created. Once both teams have found their treasures, reward them with a treat!
To make this activity even more fun and challenging, why not ask the children to draw a map of the house and the garden?
We hope these outdoor activities give you plenty of things to do to keep the children busy during the national lockdown and February half-term. We’d love to see pictures of your activities, so don’t forget to post them on your socials, and tag #paultonsoutdooractivities so we can all enjoy the fun.
Once again, we look forward to welcoming you back to Paultons Park – the home of Peppa Pig World – as soon as it safe to do so!
