10 Brain-Boosting Summer Road Trip Games
Picture this: You’re stuck in the car for hours on the way to your family vacation. What do you do? Do you fight over the music selection? Give everyone their own device? Queue up some shows? What if you could use your road trip time to connect as a family and play some fun brain-boosting games instead?
Why Play Road Trip Games?
Car time is often passive and something you just try to survive as a parent. But what if this time could be one where you connect, laugh together, AND exercise some brain skills?
We get that sometimes peace and quiet is worth a little screen time or some audiobooks, but here are some other ways that you can hone in on visual processing, processing speed, auditory processing, memory, attention, and more critical cognitive skills!
Here are Some Easy Summer Road Trip Games to Try on Your Next Family Vacation:
Alphabet Game
An oldie but a goodie, race to find all the letters of the alphabet in order from passing signs or license plates (and hope that you’re driving to Albuquerque when you get to the letter “Q”) ;).
This one is great for all ages, beginning with the youngest family members who are just beginning letter recognition!
Song Line String
One person starts to sing a song and then stops after a line, and it’s the next person’s job to sing a line of a different song that starts with that same word. This one is great if you’re traveling with teenagers!
Letter List Memory
Decide on a letter of the alphabet, and everybody thinks of a word that starts with that letter. Begin with one person and go around in a circle saying your word AND the words that came before you! Continue the circle around, adding a new word each time it’s your turn, growing your list until someone forgets. This is a great test of memory and attention skills!
20 Questions
Make your own guess-it game! One person thinks of a word, and the rest of the car has 20 questions to guess what it is. You can make it themed (animal, actor, famous person, something in nature, etc.) or have it be totally random! This game builds critical thinking skills and helps your child develop good strategies.
Word Tails
Take turns saying a word that begins with the last letter (or letters) of the person before you! So if the first player says “cat,” the next player could say “team” (starting with the last letter), “attack” (starting with the last 2 letters), or “catastrophe” (starting with all 3).
Another alternative is to use compound words or common phrases (i.e., football, ball pit, pitbull, bullfrog, etc.) Feel free to customize the rules to make it appropriately challenging for your family!
Alphabetical Categories
Decide on a category and work together to find something that starts with each letter of the alphabet in order. For example, if your category is food you could do: Apple, Banana, Cake, Donut, etc. (If someone says an option that’s a bit of a stretch, like “orange carrot” for O, the rest of the car gets to vote to see if it goes!)
Cows (or Something Else) on My Side
Have a child who gets easily carsick or want them to take in the scenery? Play Cows on My Side! In this easy game, players look out their window and look for the decided item. For example, if you choose cows, they would yell “Cows on my side!” for a point. If they see cows (or the other item) on the other side, they yell “Cows on your side.” If they call before that person, they steal an additional point from their score.
Obviously if you’re traveling in an urban area, cows are going to be few and far between (and they’ll probably lose focus pretty quickly). It can be palm trees, construction vehicles, or anything else you’ll see fairly frequently on your trip!
Name the Artist (or Title)
Put on a random playlist and guess the artist or song name! Maybe the person who gets the most points gets to pick the music selection for the next 30 minutes or hour of the trip.
Triple Tale
Take turns making up silly stories using 3 assigned (random) words. Take turns in both roles and see who can create the best story! For example, you could say “hippo,” “apple,” and “bottle” and the storyteller needs to use those 3 things as key elements of the story.
Next level: Make it 3 rhyming words that the storyteller needs to make into a short poem!
Name the Most
Decide on a category and a time limit and see who can name the most items! For example, you could set a 10 second limit and see who can name the most Disney princesses, construction vehicles, actors, things that are blue, or any other category that’s relevant to your family!
The Bottom Line
Getting your kids to engage with you during family road trips is a great way to keep their brains active and pass the time while you’re stuck in the car! For more tips on keeping your child’s brain active this summer, check out these other articles:
