Activities to do at home with children

One of the difficult things many parents will face right now during the Coronavirus pandemic is coming up with ideas to keep children busy and engaged in learning while they are home during isolation periods. But try not to worry about children being bored – in fact, it’s a good thing!

Storypark’s free Video library of activities to do at home

We have an entire library of free short videos to inspire you with open-ended, fun and educational activities you could do at home. We have science, art, mathematics, dramatic play, cooking…There really is something for everyone here!

We’ve curated these into a new playlist to make it easy for you to find them. Click on the icon in the top right of the video to navigate through the list.

More ideas to inspire imagination 

The team at Storypark came up with a list of activities they enjoyed as children to give you some ideas to help you: 

• Go on a bear hunt. 
• Be detectives, find “clues” to an unsolved mystery such as who ate the last cookie in the pantry.
• If you have a lawn, search for 4 leaf clovers.
• Set up a tent outside, and go camping!
• Have a picnic in the yard or living room.
• Fort building, lots of fort building!
• Make a cup (or tin) string phone.
• Set up a salon. Paint nails, make crazy hairstyles, make face masks.
• Card games. Time to teach children some games from your era.
• Make a shop! Find things around the house, put prices on them, set them up with signs, baskets, bags and pretend money.
• Hunt dinosaurs outside, search for fossils in your yard.
• Play teachers!
• Create an office where children can “go to work”.
• Make books and create stories together.
• Create pillow pits. Similar to ball pits but made from pillows.
• Potion making. Either outside with dirt, water and whatever nature has discarded. Or using water, food colouring and interesting things you find inside. Of course, the potions lead to MAGIC SPELLS! 
• Concerts. Practising dances, songs or plays which then, of course, leads to creating promotional posters, selling tickets and the grand finale of an amazing performance.
• Bubbles, there are hours of fun to be had with bubbles. Can you pop a bubble with your elbow? With your nose? Which bubble will fly the highest?
• Puppet shows from behind the couch.
• A fashion parade.
• Have top-secret meetings, with secret passwords required before entering. 
• Blind tasting competitions … guess what is on the spoon!
• Treasure hunts with maps… X MARKS THE SPOT!!
• Magic Shows.

If you have other ideas for activities to do at home, we’d love to hear them! Please add them to comments so other people can see them too.