"School's Out for Summer!" Play Day
Celebrate the end of school with an hour or two of outdoor play.
Items to Collect / Purchase:
- Pack of sidewalk chalk
- Water balloons
- Kiddie pools or slip-n-slides
- Water guns / water squirters / Super Soakers (one per child)
- Buckets
- Hose
- Washable finger paint
- Stapler + white paper (two sheets per child)
- Water color paint set
- Silly string (one per child)
- Eggs (one per child)
Make Summer Flags
- Instruct each child to find a stick.
- On two pieces of paper, have children design and then paint a "School's Out!" or "Happy Summer!" flag.
- Staple the paper around a stick to turn it into a flag.
- Encourage children to parade around chanting "IT IS SUMMER!" and then have children stake flags into the yard.
Relay Race: "School to Pool"
- Every participant should wear a swimsuit covered by shorts, a shirt, flip-flops, and a hat.
- Mark a start and finish point for each "lap". (Participants can run around the outside of the house or in a straight line to an end point.)
- At the end of each lap, each participant must remove one piece of clothing, in order: flip-flops, a hat, a shirt and finally a pair of shorts (revealing their swimsuit). Alternate participants for a relay race or have everyone race at once.
- When children finish, they must cross the finish line by jumping into their kiddie pool, sliding down a slip-n-slide, or getting drenched by a hose.
Sidewalk Chalk Contest
- Each child or team should draw / write out a sidewalk challenge with chalk.
- Help children to make a path that includes obstacles and instructions such as "Spin 3x". The other team has to complete the challenge.
- Other ideas include: run, walk backward, hopscotch, leapfrog, gallop, follow a zig zag line, bear walk, donkey kicks, jumping jacks, etc.
Body Paint
- Each child or team paints their bodies and/or their teammates' bodies in whichever way they choose.
- Divide colors between the teams so they're wearing their "team colors" at the end.
Egg Toss
- Play this classic game where players pair off and toss a fresh egg back and forth. If the pair catches it without breaking, they take one step back - making the distance between them slightly longer each round.
Water Balloon Fight
- Each family or team gets their own bucket / kiddie pool filled with water balloons.
- Each player is only allowed to have two balloons at a time. Set boundaries and let the game begin!
Fire and Water
- You stand in the middle of your yard with a hose.
- Children are fire and must race to the other side of the yard and try not to get hit by the water. Enjoy hosing your kids down and hearing them scream with glee!
Silly String Dual
- All players stand back to back, silly string in hand.
- Together, everyone takes 10 big steps away from the center.
- When you get to "10" everyone turns and sprays each other!
- Last one spraying silly string wins!
Roving Water Hide N' Seek
- Fill the water balloon buckets with water.
- Each player gets a water squirting device. They can only fill up their water squirter at their team bucket.
- Pick an "it" and have everyone else hide. Hiders are allowed to change hiding places but cannot hide in the same location as another hider.
- The child who is "it" searches for hiders and sprays them with water when found/caught.
Popsicles
End your outdoor play with a sweet popsicle treat!