Build a human snowman
Where: indoors
Space needed: not much
Number of children: 6+
Equipment: toilet roll, sticky tape
The object of this game is simple: get the children to cover a leader in toilet roll and turn them into a human snowman. Divide the children into teams of three to five, each with a leader. Give out the toilet rolls and explain that they have to cover as much of their leader as possible. If you’re feeling generous you can also give each team some sticky tape! Set a time limit of five minutes. The team with the most covered ‘snowman’ wins. You can also award points for creativity and artistic merit. If you prefer, you can use old wrapping paper instead of toilet roll. If so, you’ll definitely need the sticky tape!
Shovelling snow
Where: indoors
Space needed: enough to run around
Number of children: 8+
Equipment: boxes, packaging chips, plastic buckets
If your house is anything like mine in December, it’ll be full of Amazon packages (other online retailers are available). Here’s a game that lets you reuse all those annoying packaging chips. Beforehand, collect up as many packaging chips as you can in a giant box. This will be the ‘snow’.
Split the children into teams of about five and station them around the edge of the room. Give each team a bucket and box, and place the giant box full of packaging chips in the middle. When you start, the first person in each team takes their bucket, runs up to the giant box and fills their bucket full of ‘snow’. They then return to their team and empty the snow into their box. They then pass the bucket on to the next person in their team, who goes and collects more snow, and so on. The winning team is the first to fill their box with snow, or gather the most snow within a time limit. It’s also worth awarding points for the first team to gather up all the loose ‘snow’ that’s spilt on to the floor!
Blind Christmas craft
Where: indoors
Space needed: not much
Number of children: 2+
Equipment: blindfolds, green card or paper, and a pen
The first variation of this game is to try and make a Christmas tree without looking. Blindfold each child (check they’re happy to be blindfolded) and then give them each a piece of green card. When you say go, they have to rip the card to make it into the shape of a Christmas tree. Give them a few minutes to do that, take the blindfolds off, then see who made the best Christmas tree.
The second variation involves drawing a snowman in a similar way. Blindfold each child and give them a pen and a piece of paper. Then tell them to draw two touching circles: a bigger circle on the bottom and smaller one on top. On the bottom circle draw three buttons down the middle. Draw a hat on the top circle. Inside the top circle draw two eyes and a carrot nose. Add stick hands to the bottom circle. Then remove the blindfold and see who has created the best drawing.
Wink Santa
Where: indoors
Space needed: enough to sit in a circle
Number of children: 6+
Equipment: none!
Get everyone to sit in a circle and choose one child to be the detective. It will be their job to guess who the Santa is. The detective leaves the room and while they’re gone, choose someone to be Santa before bringing the detective back. Santa has to wink at someone else in the circle and whoever Santa winks at should say, ‘Ho! Ho! Ho!’ The detective tries to guess who Santa is, aiming to guess in as few ‘Ho! Ho! Ho!s as possible. After the detective guesses who Santa is (or gives up!), choose another person to be detective and start again.
If all that isn’t enough, you can easily adapt these games from Premier Childrenswork website:
Unlucky colour: change the colours to Christmas symbols such as stars or sheep.
Dressing-up relay: swap for some more festive gear.
Chocolate game: winter is all about hats, scarves, gloves and chocolate!
Tea-tray memory game: make the objects things from the nativity story. Snowball fight: this seems Christmassy enough already to me!
Steve Mawhinney is the children’s worker for Barnsbury Parish, Islington
