Games for Valentines | Occupational Therapy Blog Post

VALENTINE FISHING:

 Cut out several several large heart-shaped fish cut out of card or craft foam. Spend some time decorating them with your children and stick a small craft magnet on the tips of their noses.

 You will also need some toy fishing poles with magnets on the end.

 Scatter your fish into an empty plastic tub or just on a rug on the floor. Give the kids a fishing rod and let them try to catch a fish.

- Write a number onto the underneath of each fish. The child who catches the highest number wins.

- Write a letter onto the underneath of each fish. The child whose fish has the letter closest to the beginning of the alphabet wins.

- Draw a heart on the underneath of one or two fishes. Only these special fish win a prize

VALENTINE RELAY:

 Divide into two teams. Give each team a heart cushion or a large heart cut out of cardboard.

 The first player must place the heart between their knees and run (or hobble!!) to a particular point without dropping the heart, then return to their team and pass the heart to the next player.

 The first team to pass the heart successfully along to each member of the team wins.

 If the heart drops at all, the player must pick it up and return to the front of their team to start again.

HEART SEQUENCES:

 Use your sorting hearts and divide the hearts between you and your child.

 Take turns placing different coloured and sized hearts in a pattern.

 Let your child copy your pattern.

 Make this more difficult by letting your child look at the pattern for ten seconds then covering it up. S/he must now copy your pattern from memory.

 Grade this game by using only a few hearts initially and gradually adding more hearts.

HEART TARGET GAME:

Cut some large hearts out of red or pink construction paper and scatter them around the room. Blow up balloons without knotting, and give them to your children to "set off" into the air - seeing if they can land any on a heart target. If you have more than one child playing, the winner is the child whose balloon lands closest to a target! For older kids you could number the targets and get them to keep score.

HEART BASKETBALL:

Cut a heart-shaped frame out of corrugated cardboard, paint it red or pink, and either suspend it from a doorway or prop it up diagonally between a chair and a wall - you might need to improvise! The children then try to bat their balloons through the heart to score a point.

VALENTINE BALLOON POP:

Pour a small amount of Valentine confetti into your balloons before inflating them and tying off. Give the children a pin and ask them to keep the balloons in the air until your signal, at which point they can start trying to pop them! You could also put a small piece of paper with a heart drawn on it into one or two balloons - and whoever retrieves those wins a prize.

WRAPPING A PRESENT:

This is a variation of the popular Halloween mummy game, but instead of wrapping a mummy, the kids are wrapping up a present for Valentine's Day! Give each pair of kids a roll of pink toilet paper and on your signal one of them wraps the other up. The team that finishes first gets to put a big red bow on their present!

CUPID SAYS:

This is a variation of “simon says”.

HEART NUMBER MATCH GAME:

 Let your child colour in the numbered hearts provided and then cut them out.

 Glue the dotted set of hearts randomly onto the inside of a file folder.

 Decorate with stickers or other decorations if you like.

 If you can laminate the other numbered set of hearts.

 Let your child count the dots on the file folder hearts and find the matching numbered heart, placing it on top

PAPER HEART LEI:

 Let your child draw hearts on red paper and cut them out.

 Cut straws into 2.5cm lengths.

 Use a paper punch to punch holes through the middle of each heart.

 Let your child threat string, alternating the hearts and straws to make a paper heart lei.

ANGRY LOVE BIRDS:

 Wrap pink yarn/wool around your index and middle fingers 40-50 times, depending on how big you want your pom-pom.

 Wrap 1/2 pipe cleaner around the whole bundle of yarn and twist it together tight.

 To make a heart at the top of the bird, twist and bend the pipe cleaner into a heart shape – for LOVE. If you don’t want a heart at the top, cut the pipe cleaner down to make the bird’s feathery hair or simply use yarn instead to do the tying of the bundle.

 Cut all the loops of the yarn.

 Glue on the googly eyes and small pieces of yarn/wool/pipe cleaner for the eyebrows.

 Cut a triangle out of cardboard and glue it on for the beak.

 Let this birdie dry and she is ready for launching!!

VALENTINES DAY RELAY 2:

 Place the paper hearts used during the sorting game on a table on one side of the room.

 Let all participants divide in two teams.

 The first player has to run to the table, pick up a paper heart by sucking on a 10cm straw and move back to his/her team without dropping the heart. If the heart drops the player has to “pick it up” using his/her straw only.

 The first team to have all their paper hearts in a box/container wins the game.

Lize Kubannek

Occupational Therapist

Tips & Toys | Games for Valentines

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