Outdoor Activities for 5 Year Olds: 18 Games and Missions

Five is a strange age to search for ideas. Your child is too big for the toddler lists and not quite old enough for the proper adventures, and the results for outdoor activities for 5 year olds tend to assume a garden full of equipment and a parent with a laminator.

Our eldest is three, so five is still ahead of us and I am not going to pretend I have a five-year-old's opinions on any of this. What I can do is take what a five-year-old is able to do, which is a great deal, and match it to games that need nothing but wellies. Eighteen ideas, sorted by what has changed since four.

What changes at five

A five-year-old can follow rules with more than one step, keep score (and argue about it), play a longer game, and carry on for much longer before getting bored. If you are coming from four, outdoor activities for 4 year olds is the one to read first, because most of those games grow up well and this list builds on them.

The guidance changes at five too. The NHS says children and young people aged 5 to 18 should aim for an average of at least 60 minutes of moderate or vigorous activity a day across the week. Its test for moderate is that you can still talk but not sing. It also asks for activity that strengthens muscles and bones, and for long stretches of sitting to be broken up. Climbing, hopping, swinging and running all count, which is rather convenient. Read the full page on the NHS physical activity guidelines for children and young people.

Games with proper rules

1. Tag with a twist. Shadow tag, tree tag (touching a tree makes you safe), freeze tag. Let them decide which twist applies each round, because five-year-olds love amending the rules.
2. Grandmother's footsteps. One person faces away, everyone else creeps forward, and the first to touch the leader wins. The freezing is half the comedy.
3. Capture the flag, small version. A scarf for each team and a line down the middle of the garden or field. It works with two players and it works with six.
4. The obstacle course they design. Round the tree, over the log, under the bench, ten jumps. Time them, then let them time you. You will be much worse at this than you expect.
5. Kerb rules. Walk the whole street balancing on the kerb, with a rule such as never touching the road. Needs no kit, and works on the school run.

Big, puffing, bone-strengthening things

These are the games that tick the NHS box without anyone noticing, because the aim is to have fun and the exercise is just what happens along the way.

6. The 20-second sprint. "To that tree before I count to twenty." They make it. "Again, backwards." Also yes. Five-year-olds can run flat out for a bit and then collapse happily.
7. Hopping races. Left leg, right leg, then both. Hopping is harder than it looks and is very funny to watch an adult attempt.
8. Tree climbing, the low kind. A tree with a good low branch and a grown-up standing nearby is a proper adventure. Stay close, and pick the branch, not the child.
9. Hill rolling, then hill running. Roll down, run up, count how many goes before somebody falls over. Four is a normal number.
10. Stick throw walk. Everyone throws a stick as far as they can, walks to the furthest, and throws again. You cover a surprising distance with no complaints at all.
11. Puddle long jump. A standing start, measured in wellies. British weather provides the equipment.

Missions, jobs and projects

A five-year-old likes being useful, and likes it even more when the job is important. This is the age to hand over real responsibility.

12. Chief navigator. They choose every turn. You go where they say, and you do not get a veto. You will end up somewhere odd.
13. The den project. Sticks, a fallen branch, a sheet if you have one. Over an hour, a den will appear. It will not keep the rain out and it does not need to.
14. The nature record. Photograph the best three finds of the walk, or draw them later at home. Our family nature journal guide has the system.
15. The bird or bug count. Pick a spot, sit for ten minutes and tally every bird or bug. Five-year-olds can keep a score, so give them the pen.
16. Litter patrol. Gloves, a bag, ten pieces. Five-year-olds can be quite fierce about litter, and the park deserves it. Wash hands afterwards.
17. The map. Draw the street, the park or the garden together, with landmarks, then follow it. Maps with a treasure at the end are the best kind.

Making it work around school

Many five-year-olds are at school by now, and that changes the shape of the day. By the time they come out they have been sitting, queueing and following instructions for hours, and the NHS asks for sitting to be broken up, so the walk home is a good place to start. Let them run the last stretch, balance on the kerb, or lead the way home by a route of their own choosing.

At weekends, the longer projects come into their own. A den, a map, a bird count or an obstacle course can take a whole morning when the child is in charge of it, and that is a proper chunk of the day's activity without a clock in sight. Keep the first ten minutes loose and let them find what they want to do. The best games at five are the ones they have invented themselves, and the grown-up's job is to turn up, hold the stopwatch and lose graciously.

When five says no

Five can also be a stubborn age, with a very clear view of what is and is not worth putting wellies on for. If the walk is the problem, make it a mission, or reach for a spoken hunt from toddler scavenger hunt ideas and make it harder for their age.

For the whole library, sorted by garden, park, street and woods, start with outdoor activities for toddlers. The games there are written for younger children, but most of them stretch to five with a few extra rules.

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