This summer we went by car to a family camp in Greece. Before leaving, I thoroughly prepared, picked up a collection of word games, and also collected a travel chest full of interesting activities for the child.
I’ll tell you what I packed and how actively it was used on the road. I must say right away - we are not swayed at all. Maybe the dynamic gymnastics practiced with the child in infancy had an effect. Therefore, I boldly took with me a lot of different things that you can do with your hands. What can you take with you to entertain the child? It depends on his age, and you yourself know better than anyone what can please him and captivate him for a long time. I give a list for a boy of 6 years.
What to take with you in the car on a long journey
- New books. I took books with large print and interesting pictures to look at. I read, I read. I decided when. I sometimes gave wise advice, such as "read Pushkin's poems." In general, I spent no more than 2-3 times with books for 15 minutes a day.
- Books with tasks - creative, logical, mathematical. I took Zhenya Katz's notebooks, the set "We're going - we don't get bored" from the Labyrinth, finders, Tatyana Zadorozhnaya's book "How to draw any story." Zhenya and Nakhodilki opened little. I tried to draw according to Zadorozhnaya only once (it turned out cool!). The set from the Labyrinth enjoyed the greatest popularity.
- Painting. I put a clipboard and a lot of A4 sheets. I made a wonderful set of stationery in a box from Ikea (felt-tip pens, bright pens, compasses, pencils and a sharpener, erasers, simple and curly scissors, decorative tape, glue, eyes). I put in a new album with good paper and "Cars". I didn't draw much pictures. But he actively used paper: he folded planes, ships and hares, made and painted pizza. I came up with a game in the parcel and in the restaurant. He prepared (drawn) different dishes for us, cut them out and sent them to the front seat in a parcel (cardboard box). In general, sheets and a set of stationery were actively used. Pencils can be put not sharpened, complete with a good sharpener, let him work on the way.
- Notepad for travel notes. The dream of raising Paganel does not go out in me, although the artist is actively growing. I didn’t go: in three days, one inscription appeared in the notebook: “I liked sleeping in the hotel” ... Vanya has been reading since the age of 4, and began to write at 4.5 years old. And I didn't really teach him either. I learned by myself. I write about how this happens with children in the camp here.
- Plasticine. I created all the conditions: a new box, a set of cool stacks, a modeling board. Until it went at all. Perhaps it should have been given as a surprise at some point.
- Map for marking the route. I bought an erasable map of the world on a tip, but in fact it was not very convenient to erase it on the way. We completed the route upon arrival.
- Sheets for origami. This was the bomb! On the third day, as a surprise, I gave Vanya a book with schemes for folding planes and beautiful sheets. And after that 5 hours of travel, he only did what he designed. The planes strewn the entire cabin, we carried out their test tests on halts, some flew out of the windows. In general, origami captivated the child in earnest and brightened up more than one day of the journey! Asks now for new folding schemes.
- Compact games (magnetic and logical). They, like audio fairy tales, also showed themselves very well. I will tell about them in a separate article.
- Flashlight or glow sticks- it’s good to give out when it gets dark, if the child is still awake.
- Binoculars- to look around.
- A set of new yarn(weaving scarves and ropes) or rubber bands for weaving.
- Lego
How to give out surprises so that it is enough for 3 thousand kilometers?
For the surprise box to work, there are a few rules:
- The most important thing is not to dump it all in a crowd at once into some kind of “baby bag” that is available to him all the time. In this case, the value of gifts comes to naught. He will not be diligently poking around and choosing what he has not yet played. Checked. Initially, I had some of the books, games and creative kits in his special box in the public domain. It was a mistake. Because he watched it all in half an hour and lost interest.
- Each surprise should be wrapped as a gift before the trip. Many layers of paper. Or newspapers. A significant part of the path will be spent simply on unfolding. And, of course, in this form, the surprise has much more value.
- Give surprises one at a time, several times a day. So that the child has time to fully enjoy them, play enough, feel.
- Make the surprise box itself inaccessible for the child, so that he does not peep in advance what lies there. We didn’t have a place for her in the trunk, so she drove all the way next to Vanya. But he firmly knew that it was impossible to look into it, or all the surprises would go to gifts to others. I did not try to break the rule, I held on.
That's all the rules. With this box, we easily drove to Greece, never resorting to the saving help of a tablet.
I also wrote about such a mega-important component of the trip as
is a set of different interesting things: beads, stickers, books, pencils, puzzles, cars, dolls, travel finds that will help parents travel with their baby. The main idea of the creators of the project: time is priceless, and you should not spend it on shopping trips when you can go to the site, fill out an application in a minute and get an individual set. Indeed, many do not have time to collect such boxes on their own, and someone does not know what a child is interested in at a certain age.
Anna Maslennikova, author of the project: “The box is not a magic wand, small children still need to be looked after. For some reason, many people think that with the Box you can forget about the child. Until the age of three, I leave the information to everyone that you need to stay close to the child. And yes, the smallest ones are the hardest, because children have their own mood, so there are specially a lot of elements in the Box so that the child is definitely interested in something. When they ask me at what age I can use it, I answer that it is possible from 5-6 months.
The set is assembled based on three main parameters:
– age (from 0 to 13 years old)
- floor
- place of use.
There are three different sets, differing in the number and cost of elements, so that everyone can choose the most suitable Box in terms of cost and duration of the trip.
You can order a set on the website. After filling out the application, the project staff contact the client, send a short questionnaire with questions about the preferences of the child.
The cost of a box is from 1,400 to 2,500 rubles.
I came up with a project journalist and mother Anna Maslennikova: “As our son grew up, it became more difficult to keep him entertained on planes. Aeroflot has been giving out toys since the age of three, and my son was 9 months old. Yes, boxes with toys for development have existed for a long time and successfully. It's funny, but I found out about their existence after I decided to take my son's shoe box and put something there that could simply distract him.The idea came after an unsuccessful flight Moscow-Israel. Dima's husband, an entrepreneur, said that the idea was great and we should take it on.
I wrote on social networks that I need mothers with experience traveling with children, gathered 15 people and interviewed everyone. And then I made a list of those things that experienced mothers use. I added my life hacks and passed the Box around for testing. They wrote to me what worked, what didn’t, and I corrected everything in parallel.
Now I continue to travel, I bring the Box to other countries (Israel, America, Georgia, Italy, Norway). Recently, they have expanded in Russia, there were deliveries to Vladivostok, Arkhangelsk, Yekaterinburg, Kaliningrad, orders from St. Petersburg are going parallel to Moscow. Given a choice, the child will definitely put the iPad away for an hour and study the contents of the Box.”
babytravelboxThese are magical travel boxes. Why magical? Because when traveling with children, they will help you have fun on the road and on vacation, give you precious moments of peace, and your kids - a good mood and new knowledge. What toys to take with you on the road? Do not forget crayons and coloring books, a typewriter, and something else to read ... We tried to analyze the hobbies of our children and children of friends and put together the best set in which every kid will find a lot of interesting things. And you will not need to run around the shops and then shove it all into suitcases)
Our sets vary in content for kids of different ages, as well as for girls and boys. In each set you will find instructions for filling the set, we put each set in a convenient backpack that the baby can carry on his own.
Recently I wrote a post about traveling with children, but there I generally talked about how we managed to do it with three kids.
Today I would like to do useful a post for everyone who dared to travel with children.
Back from Anapa, we were shaking on the train for almost two days and we were not the only people on the train who were traveling with children.
The most popular and simplest entertainment is to put a cartoon on a laptop for a child and let him sit and watch.
Personally, I have nothing against cartoons, I myself show them to children, but it is obvious that a child of two years old is still extremely undesirable to watch more than forty minutes.
But what about the rest of the time? And is it possible to spend it with real benefit for the baby?
Let's put together a "magic suitcase of joy" for a child on a trip.
If I go somewhere with a child, I always prepare for the fact that I will have to entertain him, so I take toys with me.
The best option is to buy new toys and books for the trip and show them to the child only on the road.
What to take for a child six months to two years:
1. Slingobus with toys
A very handy thing for traveling, they take up space only on your neck.
Most of all I like beads, made up of tied beads with small knitted toys.
Small children love to chew on them and crush them in their little hands. You can order from any craftswoman you like on the Internet.
2. Children's book with waterproof pages
Now they make wonderful children's toy books for the little ones.
We had several such indestructible books with wonderful illustrations.
In the most beloved, the cardboard base is applied to the polymer base. From such material they still make warm floors in the nursery. It's very hard to screw this up. This is important for the parents of baby beavers, who gnaw at ordinary cardboard books furiously.
There are options made of fabric or completely waterproof. You need to choose something that will captivate your baby.
3. "Quiet" musical educational toy
Almost all children like light and music toys.
For example, a completely win-win form is a telephone with buttons and sounds. For kids, they are specially made quiet, so they will not disturb passengers.
I always take educational toys, on which there are a lot of all sorts of bells and whistles - rustlers, rattles, nozzles.
All these "treasures" can be put in a soft, bright backpack or a children's handbag with drawstrings. Toddlers are very fond of taking out and putting back different items, so the handbag can become a separate toy.
What to take for a child from two to five years:
There is more room for imagination here. The child can already be carried away by some soul-beneficial activities.
1. Coloring pages and washable crayons. Sticker books
Ideally, if the crayons are in some kind of plastic box. You can put them in a small food container.
Why not markers? It is possible, but even washable ones can leave marks that are too bright, and caps are very easily lost.
It is easier with crayons - they are soft and dry.
Another great form of entertainment is sticker books.
You can take a sticker book where you need to stick on assignments. And you can take separate stickers and an empty album.
Let the child make his own "collages".
2. Children's lotto and small puzzles
Here, too, there is a wide scope for imagination - I like wooden puzzles on a substrate most of all, from which you need to put together a picture.
In-ear puzzles are suitable for smaller children. It's easier - just pick the size.
On a trip, you can take a plastic loto with animals or vegetables and fruits.
Perhaps for an hour it will not be possible to occupy the child, but it is quite possible to sit for fifteen or twenty minutes at this exciting game.
3. Children's plasticine Playdo with some modeling kit
This plasticine, although it is probably more appropriate to call it modeling dough, is the coolest.
Recently I opened chic sets with which you can create all sorts of interesting things. A variety of molds, carved cutting knives and other artifacts will keep children entertained for a long time.
After the game, the plasticine is removed into plastic cups and, in general, all this wealth is compactly packed.
4. Tablet
Maybe someone will say a word against, but I do not see anything terrible in children's applications on the tablet.
There are incredibly beautiful and at the same time educational games. My children sometimes play at home too. True, no more than twenty minutes, as the great and terrible Komarovsky bequeathed.
I really like animated books and various alphabets.
Of course, all these methods work if the child is quite assiduous. I suppose that it will not be so easy for active specimens a la “shilo-pop” to sit at the folding of some lotto.
Active children are difficult to keep still. In this case, they can be carried away by the views from the window. You can tell some interesting stories about the places you pass. Yes, and no one has forbidden walks into neighboring cars.
During the day, passengers are usually very supportive of the kids, importantly striding back and forth along the corridor.
In general, it is important to alternate the child's mental activity with motor activity. Do not forcefully keep in place, give the opportunity to "walk", then imperceptibly captivate with some kind of game.
Probably more important is not so much the set of games as the mood of the parents themselves.
Children absorb our mood like sponges, so it is important to be relaxed and not worry too much about the upcoming trip.
When we traveled with kids, everything was pretty smooth. The older three-year-old mostly looked out the window, listened to a book, painted and watched cartoons from her neighbors.
And the twins liked to walk and stare at people more.
But I know that now, when I decide to go with older children, I will definitely collect for everyone "magic box of joy".
Although, perhaps, I will not go by train at all, but will go to Momondo and with a generous hand I will buy air tickets for the whole family. Who knows?
However, something tells me that maybe this summer I will decide on a similar trip with the whole cheerful family.
Much easier with older kids. They can read books on their own. And they can also be occupied with an interesting thing - the creation of a travel notebook. Let them write down some of their thoughts on the trip, collect tickets, unusual candy wrappers and paste them into a notebook.
They may try to sketch some road scenes. It's not scary if all this looks crooked and naive. After a while, the child will review his notebook and remember the trip.
By the way, instead of chocolates, you can take various milk and nut bars and children's cookies with you.
Another good thing - train hammock . With it, you can create a safe environment for the child on a narrow shelf, as well as visually isolate yourself from the rest of the space, especially if you are traveling in a reserved seat, not a compartment.
It looks like a kind of mosquito net on the belts, but it looks like you have to take it. The main plus is that you can not be afraid that the child will roll to the floor in a dream.
This concludes the list of items for comprehensive entertainment for children during long trips.
One way or another, a lot of people travel with children on trains. Yes, this experience is not always positive because all children are different. But in general, if there is a mood for the trip, the parents are mentally prepared and have collected the necessary entertainment features - everything should go smoothly.
Do not forget that everything is new for a child on a trip, and sometimes improvised materials become the best toys: spoons, mugs or an incredibly alluring mother's cosmetic bag.
Write in the comments what else you can take with you on the train for children?
What is an Activity Kit and why is it useful
Activity Kit is a travel compact set of various games and activities for children. Most importantly, it should be convenient to use when traveling with a child, which means:
- easy to fit in a bag, backpack, suitcase
- items must be safe and not get dirty
- parts should be light weight
Things to consider when creating a set:
1. Child's age
Think about how you will use certain items. According to the age of the child, will the entertainment and “developers” you have conceived be?
2. Interests and hobbies
Children have favorite characters or activities. So, a nature lover will suit a set of a young naturalist with a magnifying glass, a traveler - binoculars, a map and a compass, and an artist - a set of pencils and an album for drawing in nature. And of course, waiting for a flight at the airport becomes much more interesting in the company of robots, cars, fairies, paw patrol or Smurfs.
3. Way of travel
The size and scope of your kit depends on how you plan to travel with your baby - by car, train, plane or hiking. For some, a mini-set of a sensory box in a container or cards in a photo album that fits easily in a backpack is suitable. And someone will pick up a whole box of all sorts of items, which they will place in a car or the side compartment of a suitcase.
4. Destination
The sea, mountains, forests, different countries, road trips - for each voyage, you can choose thematic tasks. For example, cards with sights of cities or road, forest and sea "finds".
How to make an Activity Kit
If you look closely, most of the things to create an Activity Kit can be found at home. For example, there is a useful use for small Kinder toys, forgotten stickers, extra felt-tip pens and other trinkets. 
For the set you will need:
- clerical folder with a zipper or a button - for storing the entire set of tasks;
- thin album for photos 10x15 in size - for cards, paper assignments;
- stationery zip-envelopes - for games, books and cards;
- small plastic containers - for packing toys, healthy snacks, stationery.
The following games and tasks for little travelers can fit in this yellowish cheerful A4 folder:
- painting set
- set with plasticine
- mini sensory box (as Maria Montessori recommends)
- a set of word games on the road (instruction for parents)
- healthy snack set
- educational tasks and cards
- road finder
- bag for travel "treasures"
- outdoor play set.
activity kit. Examples of educational games in transport
PAINTING SET
Drawing while traveling is doubly more interesting! So many unusual things can be found - new cities, houses, monuments, beautiful landscapes, sights. To bring home a collection of "travel" masterpieces of a small artist, you need to prepare a convenient drawing kit in advance.
You will need:
- mini-sets for drawing - compact pencils, felt-tip pens, wax crayons;
- a small notebook with white sheets - preferably in a thick cover so that it is more convenient to draw on your knees.
To pack this set, you can choose to use: a pocket plastic container, a stationery zip bag, or tie pencils to strings to a notebook so that they do not get lost in transport. 
SET WITH PLASTILINE
Three classes at once:
- constructor
- easy craft for kids
- plasticineography
You will need:
- mini container
- plasticine stack
- pieces of plasticine (you can first cut the plasticine into cubes or roll into balls)
- toothpicks (you can fix it on the lid of the container with tape so as not to lose it).
Plasticine constructor
To make a simple plasticine road construction set, you just need to connect toothpicks with plasticine cubes. You can collect and study at the same time various shapes: rhombus, square, rectangle, triangle. Or design three-dimensional figures - houses, fences, cubes. 
Simple modeling for kids
From the same small squares of plasticine, you can sculpt the simplest figures with your child.
1. Butterfly 
2. Ladybug 
3. Rainbow caterpillar 
4. Bee 
Plasticineography, or drawing with plasticine
A few simple options for this creativity for children:
- plasticine can be glued to paper templates to get the whole picture (chicken, flower, cloud, sun, etc.);
- smear pieces of plasticine over the drawing with your fingers;
- twist spirals and flagella and stick to the picture.
When going on a trip, put printed templates for plasticineography or coloring with contours in advance in the photo album, on which the child can stick plasticine. 
MINI SENSOR BOX
Mini-worlds in boxes are a win-win game option for almost all occasions. For example, this is not the first time that the camping “world of dinosaurs” has been traveling with us. You can create such a box on any topic - fairies, knights, princesses, pirates, Indians, butterflies, gnomes, cars, animals - depending on what your child is interested in and what you have in your arsenal of toys. 
In this case, to create the box, we used:
- Mojo dinosaur minifigures;
- kinetic sand (can be replaced with modeling dough or homemade plasticine);
- pompoms and mini herringbone
- decorative pebbles
- background (I cut out a picture of the sky from a children's magazine and glued it on double-sided tape to the lid of the container);
- pocket plastic container.
For the sensory box, toys from kinder surprises, Lego figures and other children's designers or figures of animals, birds, insects, sea inhabitants are suitable.
POUCH FOR TRAVELING TREASURES
As it usually happens after a trip: "Maaam, where is my car-shaped stone that I found on the shore." Or it can be a souvenir from an excursion, a candy wrapper with some kind of "special picture" and other children's "treasures" that accumulate on a trip and then magically disappear somewhere. To save all this goodness, take a small bag with you. 
At the same time, on the way back, you can play with the whole family in "Guessing Game"- each participant puts his hand in the bag and tries to determine by touch what kind of object he got!
Developing tasks and cards 
SET OF WORD GAMES ON THE ROAD
A lot of developmental benefits for the child are hidden in the good old "word" games that did not let our parents get bored on the road even when there were no tablets and gadgets.
What are the advantages of such games for children:
- memory training
- vocabulary replenishment
- development of logic, observation and fantasy
- good mood that a child has when he plays with his parents
- and most importantly, they do not take up much space
To make this cheat sheet for parents convenient to store on the road, you need to make holes with a hole punch, seal it with wide transparent tape on top so that it does not get dirty, and attach it to the keychain ring. 
ROAD LABYRINTH
The game field "Road Maze" is a very convenient and compact game for traveling. You can draw it by hand or cut out a suitable picture from a children's magazine with a road and houses. 
PUZZLES
It is very easy to make a puzzle on the road. It is enough to cut sheets of colored cardboard into different parts, as in the photo above. You can pack it together with other "amusements" in a photo album. 
ROAD FINDER
“Find finder” is a form with “travel” pictures that you need to look for with your child on the way. And then mark your observations in the boxes. Through this task, the child:
- trains observation and memory
- develops a craving for research and logical thinking
- broadens the mind
- replenishes vocabulary
tic-tac-toe game
Favorite since childhood and a simple game to entertain the child on the road. I think everyone knows the rules! You can draw the playing field by hand or print out our ready-made template and take it with you on your trip.
activity kit. Examples of outdoor games
In addition to accessories for developing activities, the Activity Kit can hide several items that do not take up much space, but are useful for outdoor entertainment:
- children's watch
- children's camera: kids can take a toy camera, older children can take a real one. For example, a shockproof model or an inexpensive "soap box" that will teach a child to take pictures and notice interesting things around him. Then from these photos you can make a Travel Book about your trip
- compass
- small flashlight: allows you to come up with a lot of games for the child. For example, arrange a shadow theater on the wall
- binoculars or spyglass
- bubble
- air balloons.
Mini-books and ready-made children's sets for travelers