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Activities for Daycare Children

Providing daycare for children is an essential service that your clients appreciate. Sometimes, however, children can have a difficult time adapting to a new daycare. When you have the kids under your wing, take the opportunity to engage them in fun activities that help them learn how to cooperate and interact with their young peers.

Colors of the World
- Gather the children in a sitting circle to try this activity. Start by picking a basic color, like blue. Select one child to come up with something made up of that color--for example, if you use blue, the child can say "sky" or "water." After the first kid states something, the player to his right has to come up with another item of the same color. Continue until everyone in the circle has a turn. Then pick another color, and work around the circle. End the game whenever you run out of familiar colors.
Freeze Dance
- If the little ones have too much energy for you to contain, try this activity to keep them somewhat orderly. Gather them in an open space. Turn on some music, and let them dance around however they like. When you turn the music off, however, all of the children have to instantly freeze in place. That means if their hands were up in the air when you turned the music off, they must keep their hands up in the air. Survey the room of still children for about 30 seconds as you try to catch the players moving from their positions. If a child does move, he gets eliminated from the game. Turn the music back on, and continue the game with several rounds. The last player remaining wins the game.
Do As I Say Not As I Do
- A classic game for young children, start by selecting one of the players to become the leader. Tell her that she should tell the children what to do while standing at the front of the room. However, she has to try to trick them by doing something other than what she tells her followers to do. Gather the kids in an open space, and let the leader begin. She can, for instance, tell the group to jump on one leg while she herself remains stationary as she rubs her stomach. The leader comes up with a new instruction every 10 seconds or so. The leader also surveys the group to see if any of the followers make the movements she's making and not the movements she told them to make. Children caught doing so get disqualified from the game. The last remaining child in the followers group becomes the new leader. Continue playing the game for as long as you like.

Kids Games