Gardening with the kids for National Playday

Wednesday 3rd August is ‘Playday’, this is celebrated each year across the UK on the first Wednesday in August. This year’s theme is ‘All to play for – building play opportunities for all children’, which hopes to bring all aspects of play to every child, in every community.

It seems, especially in these modern times of mobile phone and computer screens, that play in its purest format, has been forgotten.

Play is beneficial to a child’s physical and mental wellbeing

Play offers the chance for children to forge friendships and have fun

Gardening is the perfect tool for bringing joy (and education) into the lives of young people. It does not matter whether you have a garden, a balcony or a windowsill, every child can grow something, even if it is an egg cup full of cress.

Playday ideas for children

Having fun doesn’t have to be expensive, something as simple as a Tug of War or making a den in the garden with old sheets can bring more enjoyment than any computer game! Here are just some ideas for your Playday!

Get children and their friends or siblings to make egg shell cress heads of their favourite characters from a book or TV show. Simple to do and loads of fun … and very quick results, the cress should start growing in a few days.

Draw a tomato on a plain A4 sheet of paper and do the same with a flower on a separate sheet. Place them on the ground a few feet away and get your children to throw a beanbag or small cushion towards these whilst blindfolded. If they get closer to the tomato they have to name 10 x vegetables, and if closer to the flower, 10 x flowers.

Go for a walk and gather some pebbles or stones. Wash them clean, dry them and use child friendly paints to paint happy pictures, flowers, lovely comments. Your child can give these to their friends, a lonely neighbour or anyone that they feel would need cheering up!

Of course, the old favourites of birthday parties from years gone by are very popular too! Musical Chairs, Musical Bumps and Musical Statues, never seem to go out of fashion! Many of these old school games can be updated for present day too. Pass The Parcel for example…

Lego Pass The Parcel

Grab all the Lego that you have in the house and put it in a container

You need 3 or more children to play

An adult must write a number of different things to make, one on each piece of paper and put them in a bag

Play the music, and when it stops at one of the children playing, they must take a piece of paper and make the subject written on the paper from Lego

This is great fun for adults too!

Make every day a ‘Playday’ for the well-being of all children!