Kidactivities

@jacobreal document public google-docs-import systematicawesome Updated 2026-04-07

Kidactivities

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KidActivities
List of wonderful activities we did as kids (and possibly still do!)

Activities

Good for 3-7 y/o’s

Top Activities

Activities Kids Can Do Almost Immediately Independently

Hot Wheels
Darda Cars pull back with loops
Tech decks finger skateboards
Bubble machine
Blowing Bubbles

Labyrinth
Toy sailboat
Whoopie cushions

Big books e.g. Big Bird’s Big Book

Duplos
Rokenbok construction system #awesome

Tags:, computerGame, memory, Clevermedia, Games,, Neopets, or, similar, great, online, games, site, kids, can, safely, play, on, in, early, mornings, like, I, did.

Tags:, outdoors, jacobMemory, Playing, in, the, creek, by, Curt’s, cabin,, throwing, in, sticks, watching, sticks, go, down, the, stream;, the, water, striders

Toy Tools #jacobMemory Cutting the foam sharp corner guard with the little red saw and toy tools.

Toy Story- style toys/play. Theatre/pretend play

Electric trains
Tags:, older?, Lego, trains

Activities Need Some Parent Involvement to Get Started, then Independent

Spirograph

“Water Machines”: Take PVC pipes and a hose to create structures that squirt water out in distant places (ask Jacob)

Whack – fighting game with Poi balls. Making cardboard shields
3-D TicTacToe

Foosball
Ping-pong.Pinball.
Pool table

Slackline?
Pull propeller spinners

Klutz Kids Shenanigans book
Klutz book of knots
Nerf basketball hoop
Magnets and iron filings
Tags:, book, What, shall, I, draw, today?
Knex

Brio trains
Hot Wheels
Darda Cars

Tags:, computerActivity, programming, Turtle/Logo/Scratch
Tags:, computerGame, Sim, city

Spy devices— e.g. invisible ink lemon juice

Bridge building contest in elementary school with paper clips and straws
Egg drop contest w construction paper
Other marble tracks and marble machine devices, e.g. german

Balance boards e.g. indo board, or easier ones

Cooking desserts with mom #jacobMemory
Hammering colored wood pegs into Styrofoam in preschool
Woodshop crafting using the crankable drill, with class in preschool

Ceiling star projector. Glow in the dark stars and planets/stickers

Activities that Need Parent Involvement

Building a trebuchet
 building a rube goldberg contraption (incl from Klutz Kids’ shenanigans book)
“Wire tracks” / electronics
Balloon twisting
Tags:, hobby, model, airplanes

General Kid Activity Dump

#boardgame

#pencilAndPaperGame #fun Gomoku and variants, e.g. Neopets Cellblock (10x10)

Building Toys

Big tinker toys
Tinker toys
Wooden blocks – the colored ones and the castle ones
The marble blocks that fit together and could form a marble track
Rokenbok construction system #awesome

Tags:, memory, Flipping, a, coin, to, determine, which, restaurant, to, go, to;, then, making, actual, choice, to, find, out, my, actual, preferences
The little suction cup ball getting stuck on windows close to the ceiling and needing to build the tinker toy device to get it list
Indoor Black and blue flying foam plane
The paper airplane game #KidActivity

Flying Toys

Racing Toys

Lego racers 2 slammers
Tags:, videoGame, Lego, Racers., JetMoto2, (playstation),, Crazy, taxi, 2

Beyblades (spinning tops with pull-start wire)

Need Parent Involvement

Tin can telephone/Piezoelectric telephone

Air snare
Kids shenanigans book, building a rube goldberg contraption
Skill tester

Blocking balls with tinkertoy bat while bouncing on couch

Microscope / Digital Microscope

Mag glass?
Telescope
Fresnel lens? (careful w fire safety)

Art

Watercolor, pastels
Making things out of papier-mâché and sculptures

Kids Games to Play

Tiddlywinks, marbles, lawn darts
Bocce ball

Misc

Wooden animals

Puzzle boxes — making them out of Legos, having ones made out of wood that contain secret stashes
Tags:, tt, Ask, Chase, Varga
Metal puzzles in OT.

Silly putty
Bouncy balls
Periscope

Dry ice hockey
Lego soccer

Beanbag Toss
Slingshot – shooting at target
Sling?

Tags:, Music
drawer drum
rainstick
music maker
wooden pipes

Tags:, book, Klutz, book, of, knots

Weaving, knitting, lego loom, rubbing paper until it becomes a different texture, fuzzy like cloth. Construction paper,
egg drop contest

Little spiky ball toy that makes sounds

Nerf basketball hoop
Skateboard ramp in the backyard - sledding and building slide ramps. Digging tunnels in the sand at the playground and at the beach

Playing in the creek by Curt’s cabin and watching the little boats go down the stream and the sticks go down the stream and the water striders

Toy boat contest in acting in second grade
Singing ding dong ding dong

building a pressure sensing mat #spyDevice

Tags:, Books!, Wizard, of, Oz,, childhood, of, famous, Americans,, how, to, really, love, a, child,, everybody, poops,, love, you, forever,, Siddhartha

Tags:, summerCamp, science, adventure, camp
Model Rockets– science adventure camp. Colloids corn starch Jell-O. Making Jell-O. Fruit roll ups at Chris Ozuna house. Bicycle with training wheels

Slip and slide
Water balloons
Cool sprinklers
Tags:, summerCamp, Games, from, iD, Tech, Camps., Crazy, multi, person, chess., Outdoor, games
Making lanyards at soccer camp #summerCamp
Making dream catchers

Making bows and arrows with a stick and string

The wooden block or whatever it was pretending to have a do they have a steering wheel and you could pretend to be a Ship. Playing pretend
London bridges falling down game. One is silver and the other gold song
Using jumprope and trying to walk a tight rope at moms and accidentally breaking the snow globe.
Jumping rope

Pogo stick

Maglev floating globe

Shadow games and shadow puppets.

Marionette
What did I do at after school care in kindergarten? Besides making stickers
Power Rangers stickers putting them on the dresser. Sticker I put on the bathroom inner door

Toilet potty targets

nested colored cups toy

Russian dolls

Tags:, skillToy
Hat tricks
Tossing and spinning pizza dough/fake pizza dough
Yoyos
Luna Sticks
?Cup stacking

52 games chest inventing a flip chip.
Inventing card games on the camping trip.
The little wind up magnetic fishing game
The taller blue cardboard game where are you dipped in and catch fish. Fishin fun
Wind up walking toys that shook hands

Wind chimes. Making a key rack. Making construction paper things with moving parts with Brad's
Magnetic gears on the fridge. The green based gear toy
Magnetic words on the fridge
Trike racing around – later, electric scooter with JP

Tags:, older, Logiblox, Circuit, toys
Popup cards. Making pop-ups books

Folding paper and cutting it in a few places to make cool snowflake patterns
Inventing Games – Making twizzle sticks game, and frizzle the twizzle #Memory . Twizzle Cards. Making up Twizzle story with Dad, and writing my own story. “Secret Writers Society” video game
Inventing solitaire card game

Battleship #game

Fighting Toys
*?Fighting laser RC tanks.
Manas Bionicle. Cyberslam

Tags:, beach
Finding a sand pyramid on the beach and thinking there were “mini-Egyptians”. Building sand pyramids
Mud ball “recipe” at beach

*The little engine that could #ChildrensBook
Weight-based coin sorter
Robie robot coin bank
Toy story sorts of toys and play

Being an inventor Bed maker

*telling The Story with dad

Making dioramas

Making gingerbread houses and things out of food

Tags:, Gardening
Planting and growing seed
Topiaries. Chia pets

*Challenge of climbing around without touching ground. Even on rungs of chair under table. The world is a jungle gym at that size. How far can I climb without leaving furniture? Obstacle course #game

Science Kits
Mystery roller, gushing can
Color filters to reveal hidden message. UV light to review hidden message.
Pinwheels. Nodding Bird solar sculpture in the garden

Garden in a bottle #Cool #buy? ? Building the bridge to nowhere jumping dynamic from crash bandicoot
Toy miniature golf, having to whack the little baseball off that keychain with the Lego golf ball whacker in a course. Made out of Legos.
Ping pong popper – klutz crazy action contraptions book
Parachute toys – parachute army man

Tags:, videoGame, Zoombinis, and, mudball, wall, -, upon, reflection, I, realize, why, I, didn't, love, the, Zoombinis, games, –, a, lot, of, them, require, you, to, sacrifice, zoombinis., I, really, don't, like, to, think, that, way., I, want, to, save, all, of, them., It, seemed, heartless

Remote control sailboat racing (e.g. at Disney). String controlled sailboat racing
Charge up electric cars little toys. Even cooler was the chargeup electric skateboarder

Cracking pinenuts
Coconuts

Dyson 44 exp #KidActivity

Tags:, KidActivity
Baking - healthy muffins and cookies
Paint
Paint In the tub
Lion king type videos
Get outdoors on a bike
Fort building couch cushions blankets
Beach — Shannon?
Half a day — paints bed time
Have her Read books
School
Tags:, KidActivity
Blowing Bubbles. Blowing Giant Bubbles
Draw hopscotch on concrete -
4 square
Soccer
Get goals
Pillow fights
Kids yoga class

Tags:, KidActivity, bouncing, on, exercise, ball
Metal puzzles
Balance board
Max t

Tags:, KidActivity, water, wheels
Nerf balls

Making Pinwheels
Making Popup Books

Throwing stuff #KidActivity – balls, toys
Tags:, memory, throwing, jacket, back, and, forth, with, anu, at, picnic, w, mom
Going to the park with dad, playground, baseball, teeball, throwing a Vortex, or Aerobie Flying Ring, or Boomerang, or wind up airplane with aunt
little suction cup ball

Throwing stars (w suction cups)

Cardboard on Concrete Slides, e.g. at Golden Game Park
Sliding on grass in third grade with Shoes

Scratch Notes (Work in Progress):

(older) If you're mature enough then we can go on a trip where you live in your own space for 21 days – practice each element before and then the kid will have a taste of what it is to be fully independent, what is their training for. It's important to keep in mind that the parents aren't making things hard for the sake of them being hard but instead that's training for society with all its pleasures and challenges
What you are there to do is give them Key tips i'm things to look out for
Start w kids energy
Channel it
@joshwhiton fully resourced #KidActivity

Tags:, tt, @jacob, ask, Robyn, and, Shawn, and, other, people, who, had, cool, childhood., Felipe?, Stuff, from, Feynman's, childhood, curatedList, curate, Ask, Wegene—kids, activities., Mollie, f, @assistants
@jacob What all did I have behind my chair?

What did I do with Carson and Devon? Besides Diddy Kong racing
When there is ubiquitous Internet will the Jamaicans kids still be running races all the time? And be the best athletes?

Good for Middle Schoolers

Learning to program: https://logicbox.jahooma.com/
Jahooma’s logic box is a great way to understand some of the fundamentals of programming in the context of a fun game!

Parenting (WIP)

Tags:, todo, add, monet, article, on, kids, and, video, games

~monet
Labeled praise
“Positive opposites”
say what you expect the kid to do in the morning or whatever what's this day going to be like
Rewards charts
Coop game
Emotional check in for the parent
Tags:, Parenting

#Parenting alt parenting group

Replacing punishment with connection #Article #Parenting #Good https://allfunandgamesblog.wordpress.com/2019/03/02/replacing-punishment-with-connection/ To punish kids, very simply, is to make something unpleasant happen to them — or prevent them from experiencing something pleasant – usually with the goal of changing their future behavior. The punisher makes them suffer, in other words, to teach them a lesson” (Alfi Kohn)

Definition of revenge: To inflict punishment in return for (injury or insult)

So punishment and revenge…are the same thing?

When this idea was first presented to me, I was floored. I had to take a long hard look the way I was teaching my children. Time outs, losing privileges, having to leave the park, were all my way of being a gentle parent because I wasn’t spanking them or screaming at them (very often). But. I was still inflicting harm. They felt sad and hurt by my consequences which actually led me to believe I was getting through to them although, truthfully, the behaviors weren’t stopping.

At the same time I was ruminating over this whole idea of punishments being harmful at worst and ineffective at best, my then six year old daughter said to me, “Grown-ups get their kids to do what they want the same way people train dogs. The treats are just different.” It kind of hit me like a ton of bricks that my six year old was hip to my jive. She understood that the consequences were just a form of manipulation and control that, more often than not, was meant to give the child the illusion of choice. “You can either get into the car right now or you won’t have a cookie when we get home.”

That’s not a choice at all. That’s do what I say, or lose. Either way, you do what I want you to do.

Then the biggest gut punch of all. My youngest was two years old and he knocked over his five year old brother’s block tower. My five year old yelled at his two year old brother, picked him up and carried him into another room, causing him to cry. I came over and scolded my five year old. I said, “He’s so much littler than you and you scared him by yelling at him and putting him in there all alone!”

He responded, “But I’m so much littler than you and you scare me when you put me in a room all alone.”

I quit cold turkey. I started by apologizing to my kids and told them I wasn’t going to punish them anymore. That we were going to work through everything together. No more time outs and no more losing things that belong to you as punishment. If it sounds too radical, think about how many times you have put your child in time out and ask yourself, “Is this effective?” And what is the lesson? If you act out of sorts, you need to be isolated. You are unlovable and unwanted.

It is always interesting to me how the parents shocked that we don’t use punishments are the parents that most seem to struggle with unending battles with their children. Time out after time out after time out and still the behavior continues. I am not claiming, by any stretch, that empathy and calm discussions will stop undesirable behaviors in their tracks. However, neither do the punitive methods. At the root of punishment is that underlying glaring message of you hurt me, I hurt you.

The difference between responding with punishment and responding with connection is that with the latter, you stay connected. You foster a deep and unconditional love that will carry into a lifelong relationship with your child. You say to your child every day, in the way you respond to their behavior, I love you no matter what. You always have a voice. You are safe.

My new mantra became:

Every undesirable behavior is a cry for an unmet need.

Every undesirable behavior is a cry for an unmet need.

Every undesirable behavior is a cry for an unmet need.

Almost every single time, that unmet need is connection.

When you really get into the nitty gritty of it, what we’re actually doing when we send our kids to their room and into time outs, or away from the dinner table, is withholding affection and connection. In order for that to truly modify the behavior, they must crave that connection enough to do whatever it takes to have it back. There has to be depravation of it. It’s a bit heartbreaking when you think of it that way.

On the days when my kids are fighting and crying the most, I can almost always look in the mirror and realize I haven’t stopped and sat down and looked them in the face while they talk to me. I haven’t put my arm around them and sniffed their heads while they tell me their dream from the night before in every detail from start to finish. All day I’ve been saying, “Just a minute” or only half listening to what they’re saying while I’m checking Facebook, or returning emails, or loading the dishwasher and not even looking at them.

In those most difficult, blood pressure raising, infuriating moments, when I want to yell and send them to their rooms, showing empathy IS the most difficult thing to do in the moment. I know in my heart I can make it all go away if I just walk across the room and wrap my arms around them and say, “I’m sorry you are having a hard time right now.”

You have to try it. It really, really works.

If they did something after you asked them not to, it’s because they lack impulse control. If they jump on the couch, they need to get outside and run. If they spread mashed potato all over the wall, they need sensory play. If they tantrum, they most likely need a snack, or a nap, are overstimulated. If they’re hitting, they need practice with conflict resolution which they will not get sitting in the corner. If you have no idea what they need, a hug is almost always the right answer. If they won’t leave the park, they need a race to the car or 3 more times down the slide or, heck, a trip to the ice cream shop on the way home.

Before you say I’m rewarding them for their bad behavior, I counter that with the awareness that bad behavior is a symptom of an underlying issue. It is because they literally, developmentally do not have control of their emotions or healthy coping skills to deal with big feelings. Shoot, I’m forty one years old and I’m still learning healthy coping skills when I’m dealing with big emotions. I hope so much better for my kids, that they won’t still be struggling at my age.

These are all developmentally appropriate behaviors of a child whose brain functions are not fully developed. These are all opportunities for the adults to model good coping skills like communication, empathy, kindness, connection. Show them; this is how it’s done. This is how we take care of each other. This is real life.

The trouble with punishment is that it speaks to the selfish nature of humans. If I am stopping myself from a behavior just to avoid getting in trouble, this is a self-serving action. There is no intrinsic motivation to be a good person and do the right thing. If a child stops a tantrum by threat of losing their iPad, this doesn’t teach the child healthy ways to express themselves. There is no motivation for the child to think of how their behavior affects others. When we muddle a child’s brain with fear of punishment and feelings of shame, we take away from them the opportunity to truly understand how their actions impact others. Punishment makes children feel angry, ashamed, and out of control. They aren’t thinking about how the other person feels, I promise you that. Punishment hurts. What do hurt people do? They hurt people.

Studies show that punishment actually increases aggression in children:

“Decades’ worth of research shows that punishment—even when it doesn’t include physical force—promotes aggression. But studies conducted in the United States and in Sweden revealed another layer to that reality: Bullies in particular are more likely to have been raised by authoritarian parents who rely on punishment.”

(Published in Print: September 7, 2016, as Bullying the Bully: Why Punishment Doesn’t Work)

The alternative? We can try sitting with our child and quietly connecting, teaching, and empathizing. Help them to put words onto their feelings and the feelings of the people around them. When your child takes a toy from a friend or sibling. “I know you want that toy. It is hard to wait when something looks so fun! Right now we have to find something different to play with.” Remember that it’s perfectly normal child development for a young child to see something and assume that because they want it, they should have it. “Look at Zoe’s face. She is sad that you took her toy.”

How about for an older child? Can we follow these same guidelines? Let’s say your child is caught watching something on YouTube that you do not approve of. The first instinct is to ban YouTube and lock away every electronic in the house. The harsh truth is that the most likely result of this type of reaction is that your child figures out how to watch YouTube behind closed doors and erase their internet history. I can tell you from my real life experience as an adolescent that my feelings from being punished ranged from complete shame to rampant lying to avoid the reaction that brought me that shame.

So what if you don’t ban YouTube? What if instead, you watched the content with your child and explained why it’s problematic? What if you approached it from a place of love and said, “As your mom/dad, it is my job to keep you safe and protect you from things that you might not be ready for.” Ask them questions about what it is they like about the channel they are viewing and how they personally feel about the points you find offensive. I would be willing to bet that if it’s content you don’t approve of, there are probably things happening that your child doesn’t fully understand and wish they could ask you about without having the ax fall. You can set limits without shaming them. You can assure them that they won’t have their privileges ripped away from them if they ask you what “douchebag” means. In this way, you are keeping them safe far better than you could when they start hiding things from you.

Speaking of hiding things from you, what if you catch your child lying to you? Isn’t a lie most often a way to avoid punishment? If you remove the threat of punishment, you also remove the need to lie.

For clarification, it’s important to have very clear expectations and set limits to protect everyone in the house. It’s okay to tell your child you are angry and hurt by what they’ve said or done. We have rules. We don’t hurt each other, not physically or emotionally. We ask before using something that doesn’t belong to us. We clean up our own messes. One of the most important rules of all; no revenge. “You hurt me so I hurt you” doesn’t fly around here and my 6 year old will tell you that. Adults and children alike. We are firm on these rules. We all screw up and break these rules sometimes. We cry. We stomp. We yell. We forgive. That’s real life.

If you would like more information on how to parent without punishments, I highly recommend the book, Unconditional Parenting, by Alfi Kohn. Reading this book changed my life and my relationship with my children. #good

Phil

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