Fun Activities for Kids While At Home

As Santa Barbara children are displaced from their schools due to the coronavirus, the question has risen for parents: What will the kids do all day? The widespread school closures have sent a ripple effect into parent communities as many scramble to find ways to smoothly transition kids into at-home life. It’s one thing to entertain them all day on the weekends. It’s another when you have seven days a week to fill for an indefinite period of time. In this article, you’ll find a growing collection of fun online and offline activities for kids while you are home during this time.

10 Online Educational Activities for Kids

1. Enjoy a home safari online with the Cincinnati Zoo website.
2. 12 museums around the world you can visit online.
3. Over 30 Virtual Field Trips with Links.
4. Lunch Doodles with famous children’s author Mo Willems.
5. Scholastic launched a Learn at Home website with daily lessons that combine videos, stories and prompts for drawing and writing activities.
6. Khan Academy, a free online learning resource offering lessons, exercises and quizzes, has daily schedules for organizing at-home learning for students ages 4 to 18 years.
7. Crash Course is a YouTube channel offering engaging educational videos suitable for high school students. The channel features a wide range of subjects, from anatomy to world history.
8. NASA isn’t just sending missions into space; the agency has also launched Teachable Moments, connecting classrooms — and homes — with resources for investigating the latest discoveries about our universe.
9. “Space Racers,” an animated series for preschoolers about spacefaring cadets at the Stardust Space Academy, also offers science-based lessons, games and space-related educational activities that families can explore together.
10. Explore simple plant science with this list of Live Science experiments, or learn about non-Newtonian fluids by making colorful slime — regular or extra puffy — with glue and food coloring.

10 Physical Activities for Kids at Home

1. Inside or out, encourage your child to slither like a snake, hop like a frog, gallop like a horse, or walk like a bear on all fours.
2. Hide small toys like plastic dinosaurs, small cars, or marbles, and let your child release their inner pirate as they search for booty!
3. Kids love a game of chase, especially with a parent or other adult they trust. A game of running from a “scary” monster will involve much squealing with delight.
4. While the rules are simple, the options for movement are endless. Simon Says can have kids jumping like a kangaroo, standing as tall as a house, making funny faces, standing on one foot, or waving their hands over their heads.
5. Not everyone loves the raking jobs that come in autumn, but kids love leaves. Rake them up and let kids jump into the piles, throw the leaves in the air, and crunch the foliage in their hands. If you don’t have a garden or a tree, go for a walk and let kids make music as they crunch through the leaves on the ground.
6. A favorite with kids of all ages, hopscotch is a game that can be played inside or out. Inside, use painters tape on the floor to pattern your own board and use buttons, rolled up socks or bean bags instead of rocks.
7. Balls are a staple for so many games and activities. Using different types and sizes of balls, have your child see how far they can kick, or play goalie in front of a wall or fence and see if your child can kick the ball past you.
8. Indoors or outdoors, turn up the music, use lights or decorations for ambiance, and let your kids twist, macarena, floss, dance like their favorite animal, or freestyle their way to fun.
9. Pass a ball back and forth with your child or have them shoot at a target while teaching them to keep their stick on the ice (the floor) and to hold their stick with two hands.
10. There are so many ways to make paper airplanes at home. Throw them inside or outside and see how high they can fly, how far they can fly, or if your child can throw them through an object such as a hula hoop.