Make a Lego Sundial

Kids are usually impressed by the idea that we can tell time using the sun, and making a sundial is a great summer activity that doesn’t have to involve being outside for too long (though it helps if you can go out and check it every hour for a few hours to see the difference as time goes on).

There are some really simple ways to make sundials, such as with a paper plate and a straw (Ontario Science Centre), using a printable clock face (Paging Supermom) or using a cardboard tube (Learn Play Imagine). I like that this one adds the engineering aspect of building the sundial out of Legos.

If you have multiple kids each one can make their own sundial and compare the lengths of the shadows they make at different times of day. They could also place them in different spots where there is more or less sun to illustrate that your sundial needs to be in the sun for you to be able to read it.

You can get all the details on how to build and mark the time on your Lego sundial from MomBrite. And if you want to turn it into a full-on science lesson, you can explain why a sundial works with a little help from Britannica Kids:

The surface of a sundial has markings for each hour of daylight. As the Sun moves across the sky, another part of the sundial casts a shadow on these markings. The position of the shadow shows what time it is.

The post also notes that ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Muslims all used sundials to tell time. And a fun fact for the word nerds: the part of the sun dials that sticks up is called a gnomon. I didn’t know that!

[Photo: MomBrite]

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Make a Human Sundial with Shadows

Learn about Time for Daylight Saving Time

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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