It’s so smoky here! With fires burning throughout the west, our air quality isn’t good. In fact, warnings to stay indoors as much as possible have been issued due to the unhealthy air.
But, keeping eight kids entertained indoors isn’t always easy. Especially since most of them are used to moving and running and playing outdoors for a couple of hours each day.
Indoor hopscotch to the rescue! While brainstorming ways to safely get them moving indoors, I realized we had a nice wide area in the living room to utilize. We also had a couple of rolls of masking tape.
So we put those things together, and created this:
It’s a giant hopscotch course, going from 1-20.
How We Made Our Indoor Hopscotch Area
I made a square from a piece of computer paper to use as our template. In hindsight, I should have made it a bit bigger. The smaller kids are the perfect size for these squares, but the older kids and myself have a harder time keeping our big feet in the small boxes.
Once we had our template, we worked together to outline the paper with masking tape. We taped one box, then lifted up the paper and put it down again.
After we got a couple of boxes in, we used additional masking tape to create numbers in each box. My preschooler was fascinated, and kept asking which numbers were which. It didn’t take him long to give our indoor hopscotch course a try!
I was originally planning on stopping at ten, like traditional hopscotch. But, we still had a lot of room.
Since one of my kiddos is having a hard time getting the teen numbers correct, I decided this would be a fun way to practice. So we kept adding boxes until we reached 20.
How We Play with Our Indoor Hopscotch Course
Since installing our course last weekend, the kids have spent a lot of time jumping on it. Of course, we play the traditional hopscotch, using a bean bag in lieu of a rock.
We also:
- Try to toss the bag onto a specific number
- Do the course backwards, like a rocket countdown
- See how many numbers we can jump at once
- Use a fly swatter to hit the number I call out
- Roll a ball along the course
- Put on a song and see if we can keep hopping the whole time, going back and forth along the course
It’s been a great way to get some of our wiggles out indoors. While we’re all eager for the air quality to improve, our indoor hopscotch area has helped tremendously!
How’s It Hold Up?
After lots of play, the course is still intact on the floor. Some of the corners are starting to lift a bit (I think I caused the damage while sweeping…), so I’m sure it won’t take long for Owen to discover this and rip them up.
He’ll probably try to eat them, so when he starts showing interest, I’ll take the course up. The masking tape pulls up easily.
How’s the Air Where You Are
Are you as smoky as we are? If you’re stuck inside, try making your own hopscotch area. It’ll help your kids burn off some energy.
Need other active indoor ideas? Check this post out!
