An Easy Story Starter Game for Kids (and Adults)

We love our story cubes, which are a set of dice with different pictures on each side. You roll them and then tell a story based on the images you see.

This printable story starter game from Growing Book by Book is even easier and better for little kids because the pictures are bigger and simpler. The pages also provide a structure for the story so you aren’t starting with nothing.

Just print out the pages, laminate or slip them in a protective cover if you like, grab some dice and roll to discover your characters, setting and the problem they are trying to solve.

This is a free download but you have to provide your email address.

This looks like a lot of fun and I’m definitely printing some out to take on our next road trip!

[Photo: Growing Book by Book.]

When my daughter was younger I would spend a lot of time trying to come up with activities she could do in the car on long road trips and things to entertain her when we were waiting at restaurants and things that didn’t involve screens.

But it turns out there are a lot of great activities you can do with just a piece of paper and a pen.

What Do We Do All Day has a great collection of pen and paper games, including some that can be done with just one person, though they’re all more fun if you have at least two.

There are some classics on here like hangman and dots and boxes, but there are also quite a few I hadn’t heard of before.

I don’t want to spoil the whole list for you because you should definitely click over there and look around, but I will share about the one that you see pictured above.

This game is called Bridges, and you start by making the big random shape and the dividing it into a bunch of sections (the post says 30-50 sections is ideal but I think this one is smaller than that).

Each player gets their own color marker and you take turns drawing bridges from one space to another, crossing a third. Once there’s a bridge, no other bridges can start, end or cross in those spaces. Keep going until no more bridges can be built, and the person who makes the last bridge wins.

Check out the post over at What We Do All Day for more great ideas for no or almost-no prep games you can play with your kids or that kids can play together. I’d love to know if you have a favorite paper and pen game, whether it’s on this list or a different one.

[Photo: What We Do All Day]

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