Making a Kid’s Indoor Golf Course

Preschool teachers have many good suggestions for making child care easier for parents and grandparents. They recommend alternating short active and quiet activities between meals, nutritious snacks, naps, and reading. Quiet activities are easy indoors, but active ones can be easy, also, when weather is inclement.  Almost any sport can be adapted for indoor play with recycled materials.
Indoor Mini Golf
  To make an indoor miniature golf course collect small boxes, plastic containers, small rugs, cardboard tubes and pieces, duct tape, paint stir sticks, cups, stuffed animals, and small balls.
  Conversation and planning together are so important while creating the obstacles for a miniature golf course. If children have never been to one, search on You Tube or Google images for miniature golf courses. Make a list of obstacles. Then think of ones you can create with materials around the house. If you make the obstacles in small modules they can be stored in a few bins and taken out again later.
Construction Plan
  Design your course together and make a map of your plan. You’re teaching children that a plan is needed whenever they do a project. Do children want a theme of princesses, teddy bears, Star Wars, or cars? What is the course’s name?
  Real miniature golf courses often have obstacles with an entry and an exit.  Children can choose boxes, decorate, and plan placement while adults cut the openings. An empty oatmeal cylinder makes a good tunnel.
  Courses often have ramps. These can be made with blocks or small boxes and a wide strip of cardboard or wood.  Look among the toys.  Perhaps children can make Lego or large block bridges and ramps. The construction time is another means to create time for family discussion and vocabulary building.
   Talk about gravity and ramp height. While making ramps, add cardboard and duct tape fences along the edges to keep the ball on the ramp. The toy box might also have plastic train parts that can be curved ramps for the ball.  Some ramps might lead to nowhere with a cup at the end.
  Stuffed animals, dolls, and action figures are excellent for guiding the ball’s path and decorating the course.  Each section can be named for a character.
  Courses also have rough areas. Use a rug and make small bumps. Stuff newspapers or small blankets under rugs or sheets to make the curves and hills. The difficulty can easily be adjusted.
  Golf clubs may be a small hockey stick or a paint stick with a rolled newspaper or cardboard attached with duct tape. Balls can be made from newspaper surrounded by tape.
The last step of playtime is cleaning up so toys can be found again.
Photo: Fran Darling; Sketch: Nowicki
More Ideas and Activities....See the authors’ book “Learning Through the Seasons” at area bookstores and grandparentsteachtoo.org. For more help to prepare young children for success in school see the authors’ web site: www.grandparentsteachtoo.org. Also check our audio Podcasts WNMU Radio 90; Youtube video activities; and join us on Pinterest