A Summer ‘Chalk’ Full of Fun!

Chalk! Why chalk? One of my favourite Instagram accounts regularly posts carousels of play ideas focused around one resource that you can use in multiple ways.  She’s covered lots of resources from Duplo to Calpol syringes that I’ve found useful over the years.  I saved them and come back to them time and time again. I’m hoping you’ll be able to do that with this blog. I find it so much more helpful when people suggest play and learning ideas online that are actually based on resources we have at home already and which can be easily used for mark making!

When I told my husband the topic for this blog he thought I was bonkers until I pointed out how many different ways we use chalks with our kids to entertain them and help them make marks.  So, I thought I’d summarise our favourite activities and games that you can borrow and adapt to keep your little ones busy this summer holidays! Chalk is a brilliant tool for children of any age so if you have multiple children it can keep them all happily mark making for hours.

All of the ideas below can be adapted to any age and focus on different interests your child may have. I would consider in advance the type of chalk you want to use. There are some great ‘chunky’ egg style chalks that are great for little hands to grab (we sell them in our shop!) up to thinner, more traditional chalks that can help your pre-schoolers with their pincer grip when mark making.

So here are our top five favourite play ideas for chalk:

• Roads! My eldest loves drawing roads on our driveway. We add in roundabouts, traffic lights and much more. When he was going through a ‘volcano’ phase we even added one of those!  He loves to drive on the roads we create using his bikes, scooters and ride on toys so this is a great one for burning some energy.  If you haven’t got a big driveway, pavements or park paths work great too.
• Targets! This is especially great during hot weather. After I modelled drawing a target in our garden recently, my eldest quickly joined in and drew his circles, marks and numbers.  It just needs to be a simple circle with a number inside.  He even had a go at writing his own numbers, he cottoned on pretty quickly that the targets which were harder to reach should have a higher ‘score’.  He splashed the targets with water balloons and he used his water soakers/squirters too.  You could even switch the numbers to colours/letters you’d like your child to practise shouting out loud as they score.
• Obstacle courses/trails! There are some great examples of chalk trails/obstacles on Pinterest and Instagram.  You can draw them for your child to complete or they can draw their own.  Often if you model a few examples e.g. ‘ spin on the spiral’ or ‘star jump on the star’ they can then add to the trail making it even longer with their own mark making ideas.
• ‘Can you find?’ My eldest struggles with some speech sounds so when we’ve been practising our ‘f’ and ‘s’ sounds I’ve drawn images on the ground to match key words. When I shout them out he has to find and jump on them or wash them out.  He then had a go at drawing some for me.  You could easily swap pictures to numbers or letters or even spellings/key words you want your child to learn/recognise.
• Chalk paint! Chalk paint is so easy to make! If you have any old chalk or leftover stumps them put them in a ziplock bag and bash them up (I’m sure your kids will help!) then add a little water.  This is a great one for doing outside with paintbrushes.  Old cupcake baking trays make a great paint palette if you don’t have paint pots available.

I hope you find this blog useful. If you have fun with chalks this summer, then please tag me/send me your photos as I’d love to see them. I’m on Instagram @llwnorthants_kettering or Facebook. If you’re local to Northamptonshire then come and have some ‘chalky’ fun with us in class this Autumn! You can book here!