POLOKWANE – The festive season is usually a time where children find themselves with little to do during the holiday.
“With the long holiday looming, parents dread the age-old questions from their younger offspring complaining “what can I do? ” or “I have nothing to do.”
“With this in mind we urge parents to look at building an obstacle course in their own backyard,” a teacher at a local pre-primary school, Judy Mashamba, told Review.
Mashamba said that while the schools are in progress, children have a release for their excess energy by taking part in activities and this changes when the holiday starts.
“Apart from having children hanging around the house all day, it is expensive to keep taking them to a movie, or sending them to friends, which has you worrying if they will be fine,” she said.
She said that building an outdoor obstacle course will give them hours of fun and need not break the bank.
Here are some simple but fun obstacle ideas designed around common objects found in and around the house:
Balancing obstacles:
• Have them walk across a balance beam while balancing a book or bean bag on their head.
• Balance an egg on a spoon and weave through a series of cones or lawn chairs.
• Walk across a balance beam backward or hopping on one foot.
Hopping and skipping:
• Lay a wooden ladder on the ground and have kids bunny hop through the rungs or hop on one foot.
• Place a series of hula hoops on the ground several feet from each other.
Have the kids jump, leap or hop from one hoop to the next.
• Jump rope while counting to 20.
Strength and fitness:
• Incorporate a series of monkey bars or have kids do three pull-ups.
• Have them do cartwheels or forward rolls across a long distance.
• Teach them how to do high knee-style running in place, and do it for a count of 30.
Teamwork:
• Make a sponge bucket brigade. Fill one bucket with water and give each child a large sponge.
Have them work together to soak up the water from the bucket and squeeze it out into another bucket.
• Play “stepping stones.”
Give a group of three kids four pieces of paper.
Have them cross the backyard by only stepping on the pieces of paper.
They have to work together to pass the free piece of paper to the front.
Water fun:
• If you have a small wading pool, you can have the kids “fish” for metal objects with magnets on a string or bob for apples.
“Keeping children active while helping them learn to balance and work with their motoring skills helps them develop into stronger learners when going to school and in the long run make for better and more successful people,” Mashamba concluded.
riana@nmgroup.co.za
