You can use tape to create the boundaries of the obstacle course or paths to help your child navigate. Books and bedsheets - Use a bed sheet to create a magical tunnel to crawl under. Using two chairs or a sofa, throw the sheet over the top to form the tunnel and use a book as a weight to keep the sheet from slipping.
May 13, 2013 · To start, stand in the first box and jump sideways to the next box and then sideways again to the next. Think of it as skiing across the driveway. For an added challenge, vary the distance between...
Oct 16, 2017 · Set up some bigger physical obstacles. A few ideas: Drape a sheet between two chairs, where your child has to crawl under or limbo under. Pile some pillows that your kid has to “mountain climb” over. Put a small bouncy ball on the floor, which your kid has to pick it up with her toes and drop it into a paper towel roll suspended above a bucket.
Painter's or masking tape is the single-most important product for making a good indoor obstacle course. It can be used to make paths, dotted lines, or arrows to kids on course. Arrows can lead...
Lay the ropes in a curving path and tell kids to walk heel to toe over the string, trying to keep their balance. Have kids hop over the rope, both forward and backward, five times in a row. Set two ropes a small distance apart and have kids "leap the brook." Hang rope or string from a …
You don't need anything fancy to build a great indoor kids obstacle course at home. You can make fun obstacle courses for your kids out of things you already have to hand at home. We've provided suggestions in this guide, but you can choose to get as creative as you like with your own obstacle course by adding unique items from around your home.
Obstacle courses are great if you have smaller children too. Toddlers are naturally finding lockdown confusing and difficult as they're unaware of the bigger reason for being indoors all day; this makes it even more difficult for them to be stuck inside. But fortunately, obstacle course activities can be suited to toddlers too.
Once the obstacle course has been built, now it's time for the games to begin! Have some fun music ideas ready to make the day feel like a party. You could time your kids so you can keep track of their personal best and include some prizes for the winner and everyone who takes part.
Every obstacle course has a starting point, and we made ours easy with a recycled cardboard platform with an arrow on top to kick things off. Next to the starting mark, we had a pile of empty plastic bottles that were ready to be recycled. Students had to have one foot on the cardboard platform before the timer could start.
Create platforms with reclaimed or scrap wood. The goal of this section is to have students leap from one platform to the next, balancing with their plastic bottle in hand the entire time. Decorate the platforms with recycling images or your school colors!
Recycled materials make up the entire over-under challenge. The cans are the posts, and the bar across the top is made from plastic bottles. We just glued them all together to make them secure. To help hold it into place, we used two-liter bottles filled with sand.
Here’s another one you can make with reclaimed materials. Keep it safe and secure, but you can use a fallen log or pallets to create this for your obstacle course.
The roundabout can be done in so many ways. It’s basically a way to bring in a challenge where students have to weave from one section to the next.
Every school can find extra cardboard to use. This cardboard tunnel is made of several different boxes to give students a section to crawl through. Remember, students still have to be holding their plastic bottle. Attaching all the boxes together really makes it challenging (and fun) for students.
Every good race has a good finish. Since we wanted to spread the message of how important it is to recycle, we put a recycling bin at the end of the course. After they made their way through the tunnel, students dunked their bottles into the bin.
If you've heard "I'm bored" for the hundredth time, tell your kids it's time to peel themselves off the couch for the Quarantine Cup. Leah Dwin, a certified Pilates instructor and mother of two in Carlsbad, California, has her two daughters plan out the obstacle course with her.
To stay safe, make good use of cushions, yoga mats, and blankets as much as you can. And be sure to move sharp corners and breakable items out of the way. "This is the time for kids to get wild, so we like to incorporate padding where we can," says Dwin. She says that safety really is about using your own judgement and knowing your kids, too.
Balance beam. A basic 2 x 4 on the floor makes for a perfect balance beam, as does a rolled up area rug. But if you're short on space, even just a strip of painter's tape can give kids the challenge of maintaining their balance.
Obstacle courses are not merely physical. They are based on rules and challenges that are the perfect foil for boredom-induced brain-drain. Try having kids come up with a list of rules, like when they crawl through a tunnel they need to sing their ABCs or when they walk the balance beam they need to clap their hands every third step.
Kids will rapidly grow bored of the obstacle course if there isn't an incentive to keep it going. Time the first round and then challenge them to beat their last time. Or add time restrictions to certain stations. There is nothing worse than taking more time to build an activity than your kid does using it.
If they are already tiring of the course, change things up with a storyline! Give your course a theme or turn it into a narrated adventure. Maybe they are ninjas in training. Maybe they are superheroes trying out for the ultimate bad guy-beating adventure. Maybe they are secret agents on a mission. Or maybe they are pirates on a treasure hunt.
Dwin says every obstacle course moment should be one that they are expending energy on. She likes to make cleanup a game and a component in the challenge. Add a timer to clean up and set it to some upbeat music, or have kids clean up certain areas before the timer goes off.
Grade school kids, ages 6 and older, are up for a challenge, so you can raise the difficulty level of the backyard obstacle course. This doesn't mean you have to go out and buy expensive props or build your own climbing wall. Here are some simple but fun obstacle ideas designed around common household objects.
If the real estate gods have blessed you with a backyard the size of Central Park, and you're such an experienced do-it-yourselfer that the folks at Home Depot not only call you by your first name, but they think you work there, then you might as well build your kids their very own permanent backyard obstacle course.
When you marry someone, you don't spend a lot of time wondering what kind of parent they are going to be. Or at least guys don't worry about that sort of thing. Maybe we assume that all women are born to be great mothers. Or maybe we intuitively know that any woman who can put up with our whining can easily handle the worst toddler tantrum.
Crab walk or bear crawl through a rainbow of hoops, practice movement skills while hopping on one foot or jumping through taped-together rings on the ground, zig-zag through vertical noodles stuck in the ground, and work on throwing with a giant target game.
Get ready to walk the plank! Or maybe it’s a tightrope, a gymnastics beam, or a log over a ravine. Place a beam across a round stump and make a seesaw to walk across. These activities will challenge kids’ coordination and vestibular system.
Crawl-through fabric tunnels make a perfect obstacle. If you don’t have one at home, a large cardboard box or a blanket draped over two chairs is also fun.
Place a pool noodle across two stumps and create kid-friendly (and short!) hurdles to run and jump over. Step, step, step across them, or roll one through the grass. Use the stumps as anchors to create a rope maze to belly crawl under.
Use a bat, hockey stick, or even a broom to help develop hand-eye coordination while coaxing the ball across a finish line. Want a bigger challenge? Try using a balloon.
If you have plywood, 2x4s, tools, and time, these slanted steps look amazing. I’m going to scour the garage and see if we can build a set.
Sew your own at home with dried beans or rice and some scrap fabric, and toss them onto a board painted with numbered circles, or try to get the most into a bucket or laundry basket. Toss all your bags and then move on to the next obstacle!
This is definitely a great way for your kids to get outside and burn off some energy!
This kids obstacle course is also a great way to work on gross motor skills!
This kids obstacle course was made using things that were lying around the house.
Next they had to climb on and over the spiderweb swing. (Trust me this is not as easy as it looks;)
After vaulting the swing;) the kids had to pause at the concrete driveway to write the first letter of their name using chalk.