Fun activity for hiking kids: Connections

How is this leaf connected to a twig?

Generally, exploring and discovery is enough for kids, but sometimes even they can grow bored with that and become restless. Remember that they naturally have shorter attention spans than adults.

Fortunately, there are lots of tried and true activities you can do on the trail that’ll keep kids from getting bored. Among them is Connections.

While the children are walking, have them collect up to five different objects. At a rest break, ask them to make a connection between each object.

For example, suppose the children found a stick, pine needles, a pine cone, an ant, and tree sap. They might say that the pine cone sits at the end of a stick, which sports needles that collects sunlight , providing the tree with energy in the form of sap, which an ant eats.

This game can help children understand various cycles in nature as well as how everything in nature is interconnected.

Materials: Found objects on trail

Ages: 10 and up

Learn about more than a hundred other hiking diversions for kids in Hikes with Tykes: Games and Activities.