Cheap thrills for small people (Inexpensive Home Made Toys and Activity Ideas)

Member Name: frannyfortune

Product:	Inexpensive Home Made Toys and Activity Ideas
Date:	30/06/01 (1035 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: free, fun, messy

Disadvantages: mentions Britney Spears, possibly educational :-), but probably not

As some of you already know, people pay me to mess around with their children. Hold on, sit back down there – I mean, I work as a nanny. And the messing about bit is the part I love best. Mucking about is brilliant. It's what kids like best, too. And it's free (or at least very, very cheap). If you end up paying large amounts of money for your children to fool about, it's Just Not Proper Messing Around. For the purposes of this op, I'll define it as anything which is lots and lots of fun, but virtually free. I apologise if anything slightly educational creeps in by accident. I'm sure you and your family have your favourite ways to do it already, but here are some of the ways me and 'my' kids like the best.

When We Were Very Young… (age 2 – 5)

1) Cornflour. Get a packet of cornflour, put it in a bowl, and add a little bit of water very slowly, stirring as you go. Drop by drop, in fact, because you don't want to go too far and ruin it. You'll know when you’ve got it right, because very odd things start to happen. You get a sort of alien substance which defies the laws of physics, seeming to be solid and liquid at the same time. It forms a sort of chalky lump, but when you pick it up it drips in a terribly fascinating way. I'm not making this up, honest. Small children are very interested in it, and adults (if they're the sort of people who like that sort of thing) are usually enraptured. You have to try it to appreciate its charm. It's nice and messy and sticky and odd and it washes off very easily.

2) Feely Trays. In nurseries these are called 'sensory tables' and quite probably do all sorts of things for the child’s development. In my book they are called 'feely trays' and quite definitely make a lot of mess. But it's summer. Do it in the garden and forget about clearing up.

Basically, get one big container such as a washing up bowl
or a bucket, and put some stuff in it. Choose one of the following : water with some food colouring in, pasta, oats, rice (you can buy a 'sack' of this type of food for a couple of quid from a supermarket and re-use it just for playing), sand, bubbles (made by squirting washing-up liquid in your sink with the plug in, turning the taps on hard and scooping the bubbles out with your hands), stale cornflakes, shredded paper; anything you can think of, or have to hand, that feels interesting.

Then get some smaller containers (margarine tubs, jam jars etc.) and any spoons, ladles or jugs you can find, and introduce one or more small children to the feely tray. Stand well back, because it won't be pretty, but they will spoon, pour, ladle, throw, measure, spill, feel and mess to their heart's content. Cooked spaghetti is a wonderful thing to use for the 'uurk!' factor when they first touch it. It helps if the child understands the stuff is for playing with, not eating, and I'm sure I don't need to say this, really, but always assume that they will take a taste or two, whatever it is and don't use raw kidney beans or anything else harmful.

And if you need half an hour on your own…

3) Dens. DENS. *DENNNNNS!* Oh come on, you remember what it was like. Dens can be made from all sorts of things, but I suggest chairs, tables and blankets or similar to start with. Older children will make their own dens, but at this age, a bit of help is necessary. However, once the den is assembled to their satisfaction, I always assume there is a 'Keep Out' sign over the door. This can work to your advantage. Small rucksacks to take in, filled with apples (or whatever your child likes) and toys, will keep them happy for a long time, hidden away from all those mean old grown-ups. Go and have a cup of tea. They won't be out for ages. If you’re invited in at any point, treat it as the honour it is, and take m
ore apples.

Now We Are Six (age 6 - 11)

4) Sleeping Lions. I'm sure you all know this game, but I wanted to include it anyway, because it is such a massive favourite with the older children who are sad enough to let me play with them. I like to think they have taken a fairly prosaic game and turned it into something rich and strange. The basic premise is that everybody has to lie still – very still, no twitching (breathing is allowed, just about) – while the Master of Ceremonies (you take it in turns, obviously) tries to get everyone out by making them move. I don't know what the standard rules are, but when I play, there’s no touching allowed, mostly because I’m hideously ticklish and don't like losing. Other than that, anything goes.

The way they interpret this is usually to start riffing in a comedy stylee. Or say rude and crude or very surreal things until someone laughs (usually me, after about 10 seconds, so I lose anyway, but hey! I didn’t get my feet tickled). It gives them all a chance to show off and find out what makes people laugh out loud against their will.

5) Reading Aloud. This may seem an obvious way to amuse children, but I think it’s easily neglected when they get to the age when they can read happily for hours by themselves. I have always seen sharing books with a child as a big treat for both of us, and I hope this is paying off now as they get older. There are usually five of us after school, and as part of my job (and that lovely 'home/school agreement'), I listen to the two youngest read for about ten or fifteen minutes. Well, we used to do that, anyway. We used to go off into a room by ourselves and ask the others to play quietly so it didn't disturb the reader (who wanted to be out with the others, of course). But after a while, the older children would creep in more and more often, to just sit quietly listening, or to silently read their own b
ook.

Nowadays, anyone who wants to can come in the front room, at about half past four, as long as they want books. We all take turns to read bits from our own books if we feel like it (including me, if I'm reading something that I think will interest them), or read quietly, and we chat about what we’re reading, and I know it doesn’t sound much like fun or messing about, but it usually ends up in a lot of giggles and silliness and we have to go off and watch Blue Peter to get a grip on things.

And don't be like me and underestimate what they can take in. When Emily was 5, I read a bit of 'The Wizard of Oz' aloud to her every day. Too complex a book for a child that age to get everything, I thought, but she'll enjoy the story even if she doesn’t understand every word. Her sister Sarah who was 3, played happily in the corner with her dolls. Two years later, Sarah saw the film and said "It’s all wrong – that didn't happen in the book…"

And if you need half an hour on your own…:

6) Make Up a Dance. Send them off to their bedroom with a tape or CD player and their favourite music. Tell them you will watch their performance when they have rehearsed it and got it perfect. They can mime and dance to a song (just like their heroes, hmm), or even sing and perform the whole thing. Let them do themselves up in whatever way is fashionable this fortnight. This takes ages. Have a cup of tea. Just don't let them get you to join in, no matter how tempted you are, because someone *will* knock on the door, and you *will* have to answer it wearing glitter eyeshadow and a scarf wrapped around you in lieu of a boob tube. Trust me.

I hope this has been helpful. I would love to be able to tell you what to do with them once they get beyond 11, but I don't think anyone knows. At this stage, they can almost certainly mess around all by, and with, themselves for
quite a while. My suggestion would be, lock them in their room with a Britney Spears CD and the complete works of Shakespeare. Lose the key for 4 or 5 years. At the end of it, they’ll find both of them boring, but they might have learnt something. :-)

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