7 Fun Word Games for 5 Year Olds

Now I’m saying ‘7 fun word games for 5 year olds’ because my girl is 5 and loves all of these, but really they’re great games for 5 and up, as I like playing them, too, and I’m a lot older than that!

Boo likes to play word games in moments of downtime, and I like to use them to create moments of downtime.

They’re handy as they need no preparation whatsoever, no tools, no having to move to get things, so can be entirely impromptu and played wherever you are.

Now that Boo has started school, she loves games that draw on her learning of phonics and reading, too, so we play things that build on that, memory recall and creativity. But most of all, we just have fun!

7 Fun Word Games For 5 Year Olds

These are some of our favourites:

1. I Spy with My Little Eye

A classic. Just in case you’ve not played this before (everyone has, surely?!) you look around and choose something you can see (for example, a sofa), keep it to yourself, then say to the other player ‘I Spy with my little eye something beginning with ‘S”.

Players then have to guess things they see beginning with S until they get it right. Now that Boo’s pretty good with her phonics, she does know what letter things begin with and she’s also at the stage where she doesn’t blatantly stare at the item she’s trying to get you to guess!

2. Name that Book

This one relies on your memory skills as much as your child’s. You need to quote a line from one of their books and they need to guess which book it is from. If you’re anything like me, you’ll have read many of these books dozens of times, and you may surprise yourself by how much you can recall when required!

3. Rhyme It

A good one to play, to develop this ability. As simple as name a word, and then take it in turns to see how many other words you can rhyme with it. Go for simple things like Mat, Rug, Log, Rake and so on, rather than Orange!

4. Who Am I?

We tend to go for book, TV and film characters for this one. I’ve noticed when I’m guessing who Boo is that Disney Princesses and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles characters come up a lot!

If you don’t know this one, it’s a game where you decide who you’ll be, and the other player asks you questions to uncover your identity, which can only be answered with a ‘yes’ or ‘no’. This can lead to some very random questions and interesting interpretations.

5. Tell Me About…

This one is all about creativity and imagination. We make up lands together, where anything goes. So ‘tell me about…. Gooble Goo land, what’s it look like there? What do people eat there? What games do the children play there? What do the homes look like?

You get the idea. A great one for encouraging imagination, developing vocabulary, and always guaranteed to make you giggle, too.

6. The Alphabet Game.

Choose any subject you like, and then take it in turns to name things alphabetically. For example, ‘food’, so we’d have A for apple, B for bread and so on. Really simple with infinite possibilities.

7. When I Went To Market

This one is a brilliant memory game, and Boo adores it.

I remember playing this one when I was little, and always enjoyed it, too. Someone begins with ‘When I went to market I bought…(insert whatever you bought here) and then play passes to the next player for them to recite what you bought and then add their own on.

It then continues with you each taking it in turns to recall the items purchased so far and add your own. Boo’s freakishly good at this one, and we like to add in totally random acquisitions, too. Last time ‘we went to market’ we had a carpet, a spaceship, a pig, a baby and a snowman. Standard shopping list in anyone’s house, I feel.

Hours of fun here! What do you like to play?

You might also enjoy Brilliant Books for 5 Year Old Girls.

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