Easy Carnival Games for Kids

This afternoon we were at our church picnic. For the last several years, I have been in charge of the kids games. We want our games to be individual games that can easily be adapted for kids in a wide age range. Our games are free and our goal is to have the kids all walk away with a prize.

Anytime you are running carnival games, you can either give prizes at each game or give tickets that can be combined at a prize table. While the prize table allows you to have nicer prizes, it also requires additional volunteers and additional effort in distributing prizes across various ticket ranges. For simplicity, we have decided to offer a prize for each game.

By far, the most popular game today was Block Balancing. I developed the game 2 years ago by adapting it from one that I found on the Minute to Win It website. Rather than set a time limit, I set a tower height for the kids to achieve.

Block Balancing - Paper/Plastic plate, letter blocks - Kids balance the plate on their fingertips and try to stack the blocks on it. I used my daughter's wooden letter blocks (~1" diameter). I had candy as the prize and gave kids 1 piece for 5 blocks and 2 pieces for 10 blocks. This works best when you can setup at a table so the next blocks are easily accessible. 

The kids could not stay away from this game. There were some kids I saw at this table for most of the afternoon. They didn't even care about the candy, it was definitely trying to beat their own record or their friends. We had 48 blocks and 4 plates, so several kids could play at the same time.

Another popular game is the pencil drop which is a game that my parents used to have us play at birthday parties when I was young.

Pencil Drop - Stool, Water bottle, pencils - Kids stand on the stool, hold a pencil waist high and try to drop it into the bottle. Smaller kids don't need to stand on the stool. They win the pencil as a prize. 

The Pencil Drop project is easily transitioned to match your party theme. By swapping the type of pencils and decorating your container, you can have a game that matches any theme.

When I was searching for prizes, I found foam gliders. I decided to incorporate the glider into the game.

Airplane Flight - Hula Hoop, Rope, Tree, Gliders - Hang the Hula Hoop from a tree branch (or other post) and assemble gliders. The goal is to fly your glider through the hoop. You can either let them keep the glider they use, or give them an unassembled glider and keep a few assembled ones for use. If you have the room, you can use two hoops at different heights for different ages.

When I took over the games, I was provided with the materials for three games:

Duck Pond - Plastic sided pool and 24 rubber ducks. Fill the pool about 1/2 way with water and float the ducks. You have a few options for numbering your ducks: individual numbers, equally distributed numbers (i.e.. 8 each of 1, 2, and 3), or the rare number (ie 15 1s, 6-2s, and 3-3s). Our ducks were already equally distributed as 1, 2, or 3. With the rare number method, you could have a better prize for the rare number. Personally, I am not a fan of the individual numbers as you would need to many prizes.

Treasure Chest - Treasure chest, play sand, pennies, fish net. Our treasure chest is a cooler that has been painted to resemble a pirate's chest. Hide pennies in the sand and have the kids take a scoop with a fish net or a plastic container with holes poked in the bottom. The kids can keep the pennies. You can also add a few larger denomination coins or fake coins that are traded for a prize. You could use fake coins as the prize, but I have found that pennies are considerably cheaper.

Bean Bag Toss - Bean bags, 3 pails. Kids stand at a distance and try to toss the bean bags into the pails. Adjust the starting line for younger kids to be closer. You can give additional or larger prizes for multiple pails. We found taping the pails together kept them from tipping as easily.

Also, we provide a craft area. The crafts are fairly simple, but my favorite craft for a carnival style party is:

Paper Bag Decorating - plain brown lunch bags, crayons, markers, stickers, and stamps. Let the kids decorate a bag. You can use the fancy colored bags, but they are typically coated and crayons, markers, and stamps will not work as well. 

Trust me, the parents who are tasked with holding their kids winnings will thank you for the bags.

I also learned the hard way that small foam stickers are not a great choice for outside because the backings blow away. When we do have activities that generate trash, I have found that a plastic container with a lid is a great temporary trash can.

This year we did Face Painting since there were volunteers who wanted to face paint. In previous years, we have used temporary tattoos since they are quick and easy. We are still using the extra temporary tattoos as game prizes.

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