Quick and Easy Games to Play While Waiting in Line with Children

Teaching Children How to Wait

Waiting can be hard for people of all ages but everyone has to do it. Whether it is waiting in line for a roller coaster or waiting to buy food at the grocery store, there are many places where people are expected to wait at. For children, waiting can be very difficult. There are two reasons to explain this. First, they have not had much experience waiting for things, and second, they have much lower attention spans than adults. The average attention span of a 5-6-year-old is only 12-18 minutes while the average attention span in those 16 years and older is around 32-50 minutes. This can make long lines much harder for children to sit through than adults. This article will teach you some games to play in line with your children to help pass time. 

Games to Play 

I Spy 

I Spy is a classic game to play with kids of all ages. How the game works is you pick a player to go first and they find something around the room they want to describe. The player then says “I spy with my little eye something _” and fills in the blank with a description of the item. The description could be the item’s color, size, texture, or shape. Once a description has been given, the other players take turns trying to guess what the item is. 

The Alphabet Game 

This is a great game to play with children who are learning the alphabet. The rules of the game are for each letter of the alphabet, the child has to pick something that starts with the letter. For example, the letter A stands for apple. Help your child go through the whole alphabet, labeling each letter with a person, place, or thing. 

The Memorization Game 

Playing memorization games with your child can help improve brain functions and can be fun. While waiting in line with your child, start the game by saying “I am going on a trip and I am bringing _” then fill in the blank with something you would bring. It can be as silly as you want. Once you have listed the first thing you are bringing, make your child repeat the sentence with what you are bringing and allow them to add on another item such as a baseball. For example, if you said “I am going on a trip and I am bringing a kangaroo” then your child would say “ I am going on a trip and I am bringing a kangaroo and a baseball”. Continue going back and forth adding things to the list until someone cannot remember all of the items. 

20 Questions  

In this game, designate one person to pick a person, place, or thing. Once they pick the topic, allow other players to guess what it is by asking 20 yes or no questions. For example, if someone picked ice cream as the topic then if someone asked “is it a food?” the person would say yes. However, if someone asked “can you play with it?” the person would say no. Once 20 questions have been asked, each player gets an opportunity to guess what the item is. Whoever gets the answer right gets to pick the next topic.

Make a Story 

Use your imagination and make a silly story with your child. To do this, you first need to create a character and decide on the setting. Once you and your child have agreed on the character and setting, you can start telling the story. Each of you will take turns adding a sentence to the story. For example, your story may be about a princess who lives on a farm. The first person might start the story by saying “there once was a princess who lived on a farm”. The second person might add “On the farm, her favorite animal was a chicken named Tommy”. Continue going back and forth adding more sentences until your story ends. 

Rock, Paper, Scissors 

This is a two-person game that anyone can play. The game is played by using hand symbols. The symbol for rock is your hands clenched up, the simple for paper is your hand laid flat, and the symbol for scissors is your index and middle finger. The basic rules are that rock beats scissors, paper beats rock, and scissor beats paper. To play, face your opponent and clench one hand into a ball and have the other hand flat out below it to use as the base. Then you and your opponent say out loud “rock, paper, scissors, shoot!” Once you both say shoot, either make the symbol for rock, paper, or scissors. Based on the rules, one player’s symbol will beat the other one’s symbol. If you both have the same symbol, then that is considered a tie and you play again. 

The Quiet Game 

The quiet game is a great way to help strengthen your child’s patience. Patience can help children learn how to manage their emotions calmly and are a skill that will benefit them throughout their life. To play the quiet game, you and your child pick an amount of time that you cannot make any noises. A good time to start is five minutes. Set a timer and see if you and your child can wait until the clock runs out to make a noise. If one of you makes noise before the time goes out, they lose. 

Rewards for Waiting 

If your child is exhibiting good behavior while waiting in line, reward them with something small once the line ends. Some examples of rewards you can give them are a small piece of candy, a later bedtime, a sticker, extra electronics time, or anything else you think they may enjoy. This will give them an incentive to behave well in long lines in the future. 

To learn more fun games you can play with your child while waiting in line, visit The Learning Experience’s YouTube Channel here!