Screen-Free Activities for Kids: 60 Ideas for Ages 7-12

Here are 60 screen-free activities for kids aged 7 to 12, sorted by how long they take and how much energy they need, from five-minute games to projects that fill an afternoon. Almost all of them need nothing more than paper, a pencil and things you already have at home.

Most lists online are written for toddlers. These are for school-age children who can read a rule, keep score and want a real challenge.

How to choose the right activity

• Time. Ten minutes before tea is not a wet Saturday afternoon, so be clear how long you have.
• Energy. After school, many children need to move before they can sit down. In the evening, a calm activity goes down better.
• Alone or together. A child on their own needs a clear goal: a score, a record, something finished. With others, a simple rule is enough.
• What is to hand. A box with paper, pencils, sticky tape, string, round-ended scissors and some clean packaging covers nearly everything below.

Quick ones: 5 to 10 minutes

1. Colour hunt. Pick a colour and find 30 things of that colour around the house without counting any twice.
2. Beat-the-clock tower. Build the tallest tower possible in five minutes; it must stand for 10 seconds.
3. The floor is lava. Cross the room on cushions without touching the floor. No high or slippery furniture.
4. Lightning alphabet. An object in the room for every letter from A to Z, in five minutes.
5. Sound detective. Eyes closed for two minutes, then write down every sound heard.
6. Blind portrait. Draw your own face without looking at the paper or lifting the pencil.
7. The no-E sentence. Write a ten-word sentence without the letter E. Harder than it sounds.
8. Kim's game. Look at ten small objects for 30 seconds, cover them with a tea towel and list them from memory.
9. Shape hunt. Find five circles, five rectangles and five triangles in the room.
10. Ninja tidy-up. Put ten things back where they belong before the end of one song.

Creative projects and logic puzzles

Making and drawing: 20 to 40 minutes

1. Six-panel comic. Fold an A4 sheet into six boxes: two for the beginning, two for the problem, two for the ending.
2. The impossible animal. One animal for the head, one for the body, one for the legs. Name it and describe where it lives.
3. Postcard from the future. Your town in 100 years: flying buses, rooftop gardens, robot bin collectors.
4. The tiny museum. Five small objects on a shelf, each with a funny label and a made-up history.
5. Design your flag. Three colours and three symbols that say who you are.
6. Paper sculpture. One sheet of paper, no glue, and it has to stand up on its own.
7. Concertina book. A long strip folded six times, one picture per fold, telling a story.
8. Cardboard town. Cereal boxes and kitchen-roll tubes become houses, a shop, a park and a secret tunnel.
9. Kitchen orchestra. Four objects that tap, scrape, shake and jingle; compose a 20-second rhythm.
10. The household newspaper. A headline, the weather, an interview with a relative and a drawing on the front page.

Puzzles and logic: 10 to 20 minutes

1. The magic square. Put 1 to 9 in a 3 × 3 grid so every row, column and diagonal adds up to 15.
2. Symbol code. Give numbers to five symbols, then write secret sums for someone else to crack.
3. Twenty questions. Think of an animal or a person; the others have 20 yes-or-no questions.
4. Words in a word. How many words can you make from the letters of CHRISTMAS or ADVENTURE?
5. Draw a maze. An entrance, an exit, three dead ends and a treasure in the middle.
6. Mirror writing. Write a sentence that can only be read in a mirror.
7. Guess the rule. “Only things that roll can join my club.” The others test objects until they crack it.
8. Twelve pencils. Make a 2 × 2 grid of four squares, then move exactly three pencils to leave three squares.
9. Hand scales. Order six objects from lightest to heaviest by feel, then check on the kitchen scales.
10. The missing object. Eight objects in a row; close your eyes while someone takes one away.

Active games for a rainy day indoors

1. Animal walks. Cross the room as a crab, a frog, a bear, a snake and a flamingo.
2. Sock basketball. Rolled-up socks into a laundry basket from 1, 2 and 3 metres (about 3, 6 and 10 feet).
3. Musical statues. Dance while the music plays and freeze when it stops.
4. Home bowling. Six empty plastic bottles and a soft ball, three rounds. A little water in each bottle stops them toppling too easily.
5. Mirror moves. Face to face, one leads slowly, the other copies like a reflection.
6. Object relay. Carry five soft objects across the room without using your hands: on your head, between your knees.
7. Slow-motion mission. Put on a coat in slow motion for a full minute without laughing.
8. Tightrope. A line of masking tape on the floor; walk it heel to toe, then add a bend.
9. Living-room Olympics. Four events (balance, aim, a tidy-up race, sports mime) and a paper medal.
10. Blow football. Blow a scrunched paper ball across the table between two goals made of books.

Outdoors: garden, park or street

1. Nature bingo. Find something soft, round, prickly, yellow, shiny and noisy.
2. Twig house. Build a tiny house using only things that have already fallen.
3. Shadow tracing. On a sunny day, trace interesting shadows onto paper.
4. Explorer mission. On a route you know well, spot five details you had never noticed.
5. Leaf boat race. Blow two leaves across a puddle, with an adult nearby.
6. Land art. A big circle on the ground made of stones, leaves and twigs.
7. Cloud spotting. Watch the sky for ten minutes and draw three clouds and what they look like.
8. Bark rubbing. Paper, a wax crayon and five different textures.
9. Chalk trail. Draw arrows and symbols on the pavement (sidewalk, in the US) for someone else to follow.
10. Weather forecaster. Look at the sky and the wind, forecast the next two hours, then check.

Calm activities and games for two or more

Calm, on their own

1. Reading den. Cushions and a blanket over a sturdy chair, then fifteen minutes with a book.
2. A boredom jar. Write ten quick activities on slips of paper for the next bored day.
3. Five-word story. Pick five random words from a book and write a story that uses them all.
4. Surprise post. A kind note hidden where someone will find it.
5. Interview an object. Where does this old key come from, and what has it seen?

With a sibling, a friend or the family

1. Don't say yes or no. Five minutes of chat; trick questions allowed.
2. Consequences. Each person writes part of a sentence, folds the paper and passes it on.
3. One-word story. Take turns adding one word each and try to reach fifty.
4. Family quiz. Everyone writes three questions about their own tastes and memories.
5. The imaginary restaurant. A menu of impossible dishes, silly prices and a name.

Adapting the ideas by age

7 and 8: short rules, an adult nearby to read the instructions and get things started, 10 to 20 minutes per activity. 9 and 10: they can run an activity from start to finish, set a treasure hunt for a younger sibling or build a cardboard town over several days. 11 and 12: they want a real stake, such as a record to beat or a project to show, and they often enjoy organising the game more than playing it.

A challenge ready on every page

Many of the ideas above come from our book 100 Screen-Free Challenges for ages 7 to 12: one challenge per page, each with the time, the number of players, the materials and a level from 1 to 3 stars, sorted into 8 worlds (Express, Creative, Logic, Move, Outdoors, Calm, Together and Adventure). 68 of the challenges can be done alone, and a 28-page guide for adults gives a hint or an example for each one. It is a PDF that prints on A4 or US Letter, so you can print a page for each child. For journeys, the beach, the campsite and rainy days away, the holiday edition, 100 Screen-Free Holiday Challenges, has 100 other challenges in the same 8 worlds. You will find both books in our screen-free activities section.

The 100-challenge books

100 screen-free challenges for ages 7-12

€9.90

"I'm bored!" What if the answer fitted on one page?

100 screen-free holiday challenges for ages 7-12

€9.90

"I'm bored!" on holiday? Here are 100 answers, one per page

Frequently asked questions