Children love board games. Not only are they entertaining, but board games are great for helping children to improve their concentration, memory, social skills and language.

You can make a board game that combines your child’s love of play with some of the subjects they are learning at school – and the wonderful thing is it is fun for the whole family!

What you will need:

• A large piece of paper or cardboard
• A die
• Some coloured counters
• Thirty to 40 small cards
• Felt-tipped markers

Method:

• Work with your child to design a simple game map, with a starting line, a finishing line and progress squares in between.
• Sit down with your child and decide on three or four different topics that will form the basis for the questions in the game.
• Next, get your child to fill in each square on the game map with a word or symbol representing each of the topics.
• Now, without your child seeing, write 10 questions that cover each topic on the small cards. If you have younger children, it is a good idea to make some cards with easier questions to allow them to participate and feel included.
• Now it’s time to play! Encourage everyone in your family to join in the fun.
• Each player has a turn at rolling the die, and the person who gets the highest number goes first. That player then rolls the die, and using their counter, moves forward along the board to the corresponding square.
• The person to the player’s left then picks the top question card from the corresponding topic pile and reads it out aloud.
• If the player answers the question correctly, they remain on their square until their next go. If the answer is not right, they must move back one space.
• The winner of the game is the first to cross the finish line.