Beyond I Spy: Games On The Go
“I spy with my little eye…. one bored Mommy.”
I can’t help it. There’s something about I Spy which makes my eyes glaze over faster than they can, well… spy. I’m all for activities that distract and entertain children for long periods of time (our personal record: 2 
blissful hours in an Edinburgh pub thanks to Hangman and our then 5-year-old’s determined, yet slightly unreliable, spelling efforts). But I was simply not cut out to Spy, and so our family has had to get a little more creative in our time wasting over the years.
The Letter Game (my husband’s creation) has long been our default activity when waiting for a meal or an airplane or a roller coaster ride. One player thinks of a word, but says only its first letter. Each participant then has a chance to guess the word. If no one gets it right, the last letter of the word is revealed in Round Two. Round Three involves providing a strategic hint.
This game is terrifically scalable to the ages and stages of the kids you’re with. When we began playing it, our kids were young enough that thinking of a word beginning with B was a challenge in and of itself. Now that they’re older, we frequently up the ante, requiring all of the words to be part of a specific category (i.e. things we’ve seen on our vacation). We also have a geography version, although no one can ever top my 4-year-old’s triumph in that one. His clues: first letter is T, last letter is O and the hint is that it’s in Europe.
(The answer, when we gave up 15 head scratching moments later, was The Republics of Serbia and Montenegro. Thank you, Leapfrog Explorer Globe.)
When The Word Game gets old (and nothing gets old faster than being outsmarted by a preschooler), we’ve taken to letting our kids invent new games. My daughter loves the Number Game, in which you name a number and the other players must guess what set it represents (i.e. 4 members of our family or 8 pictures on the wall). My son is fond of the Guess Which Painting I’m In game (“I’m floating in water right now…”). Me? I just like it when everyone is quietly engaged until I Spy the waitress coming with our food.
Do you have favorite on-the-go games? Please share your ideas!
October 30th, 2008 | by Rebecca Tompkins 9 comments
1. Elizabeth on October 31st, 2008
My family (two parents, four kids, usually another cousin or two) used to drive from Michigan to Coahuila, Mexico, at least once a year. That’s a loooong drive. One of our favorite games was to find a song and then sing it using only one vowel. We would also try to see who could sleep the longest. Whoever managed to sleep through Texas was the obvious winner.
2. Caitlin (Roaming Tales) on October 31st, 2008
I thought it was TOLEDO. I have Spain on the brain!
3. Jamie Pearson on October 31st, 2008
@Elizabeth: The sleeping game! That is devious. And I can see why you would have all needed it after that crazy vowel business.
My own mother is the evil creator of “the quiet game”. It used to really piss us off to be manipulated like that, but we were too competitive to blow it off completely.
4. Michelle D on October 31st, 2008
We do the letter game too – in a myriad of combinations with hints or no hints, twenty questions or yes-no questions.
And lots and lots of hangman.
We also play another game which is like pictionary only with words. I’ve no idea if my madcap 8-yr-old came up with this by himself or it’s an adaptation of a playground game. Essentially you’re telling a story word-by-word with everyone adding words in turn. As in:
BigB: Guppies
Dad: love
CAM: smelling
Mom: feet.
It is essentially endless and full of opportunities for kid-humor (i.e. throwing in body parts and body burp words at inopportune moments).
And here’s a puzzle for your Leapfrog Explorer Globe guy: there are five countries in the world the name of which starts and ends with the same letter (excluding A). What are they ?
Enjoy!
5. Jamie Pearson on November 1st, 2008
Michelle: I have no idea, despite sitting here staring off into space for a long time. Thanks for getting that in my head! But I thought of another T-O country: Trinidad and Tobago.
Rebecca: Ask your son if that counts. It even works if you don’t drop, “The Republic of”.
6. Debbie Dubrow on November 2nd, 2008
We used to play the typical “car bingo” game — but with one very special rule. The kid who spotted a police car behind us (without lights flashing) got instant bingo and a dollar!
7. wandermom on November 3rd, 2008
If anyone wants the solution, shoot me an email.
8. Rebecca on November 7th, 2008
Wandermom, we totally give up over here! We came up with 5 that begin and end with A, but only one that begins and ends with a different letter (and that — Central African Republic — was admittedly a bit of a stretch). Help a geographically challenged family out… what’s the answer?!
9. missionarymomma on October 8th, 2010
We play, “I’ve Got a Memory.” It is so actualy fun, and I love how it hels the children own our travel. Someone, starts by saying,”I’ve got a memory.” Then, we can only ask yes and no questions. For example, “Was it in Japan? Were we all there? Is it fod related? Such fun too see what the children cme up with, and how much the do remember.
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