Summer is quickly approaching, which means that it's time to start preparing to keep your kids busy over the hot months ahead.
Today's post is for kids ages 8 to 12 who are creative and inquiring. Check out this list of excellent activity books for long car trips, lounging by the pool, airplane rides, or simple staycations.
This post contains Amazon affiliate links. See my sidebar for more information.
A daily journal to help kids ages 8 to 12 explore who they are.
Do you want to get to know yourself a little better? This question a day journal is bursting with amazing prompts for you to answer. What is your favorite kind of music? How would you use different superpowers? Is there anything that makes you nervous? Answer questions like these every day for a whole year!
Discover a question a day journal that offers:
- 365 Prompts―Find out how much fun journaling can be by answering a brand new prompt every day.
- Kid-friendly questions―Explore questions perfect for young writers like you.
- A positive approach―Feel great when you write about your hopes, share what you’re good at, and more.
The 3 Minute Gratitude Journal is a guide to cultivate an attitude of gratitude for children. It is a self exploration journal designed to focus on being thankful for what we have, the big things in life, as well as the simple joys. Each well designed and kid-friendly daily spread contains space to list out three things you are thankful for, a person who brought you joy and how you felt about your day. If you start each day by writing down three things you are thankful for - a family, a favorite teacher, starting a good book - you begin each day on the right note. Do it daily and make it a habit to focus on the blessings you have been given! Grab a copy for a friend and share the journey together!
Mindfulness can help kids overcome challenges, take care of big feelings, and learn from their experiences and the world around them. This book about mindfulness for kids provides fun exercises and easy strategies to help your child find focus, develop coping skills, and handle tough situations.
Kids will start their mindfulness journey with practical tools that help them act with kindness toward themselves and others, live with greater positivity and joy, and deal with common issues like impulsiveness, anxiety, and concentration.
Really Fun Travel Activity Book
Whether you have some downtime on holiday or need a boredom-beater for the car these carefully selected fun colouring images, mazes, jokes, riddles, quizzes & puzzles are perfect to keep kids entertained for hours.
Ideal for both girls & boys each page is easy to follow, introducing suitably challenging activities for your child. From confidence boosting easy starters to tricky brain ticklers these fun exercises help develop concentration, imagination and problem solving skills.
Highlights Book of Things to Do
This highly visual, hands-on activity book shows kids some of the best ways to do great things--from practicing the lost arts of knot-tying, building campfires, connecting circuits, playing jump rope, drawing maps, and writing letters, to learning how to empower themselves socially, emotionally, and in their communities. The final chapter, Do Great Things, inspires kids become caring individuals, confident problem solvers, and thoughtful people who can change the world.
This activity book contains more than 50 activities include crosswords, word searches, Sudoku, mazes, logic puzzles, codeword puzzles, jokes, and more. It will provide children with hours of brain stimulation and challenges. Ideal for a break from the screens during a long journey or on a rainy day.
The perfect companion for vacation, this collection contains more than 90 puzzles, including memory, word, and number workouts; codes; battleships; and mind-bending spot-the-differences. There are hours of fun to be had with Japanese puzzles, including hanjie, kakuro, hitori, sudoku, and lots more. Let the brain games begin.
Decode a secret message using the phases of the moon, wind your way through a pizza maze, find hidden presidents, borrow some drachmas, unscramble an invention time line, play super duper tic-tac-toe, classic hangman, match up snowflakes, and more with The Everything Kids’ Puzzle Book!
From complex crosswords to crazy mazes, this complete puzzle book for kids ages 9-12 delivers hours of mind-bending entertainment for budding brainiacs. You can play alone or play with a friend in the games-for-two section. There’s even an answer key in the back of the book if you get stuck!
Everything Kids Games and Puzzles Book
What's not to love about puzzles? Unlocking answers, solving mysteries, breaking codes--you're practically a super-spy and you haven't even left your house. Not to mention how puzzles prove what a superior brain you have! The Everything Kids' Games and Puzzles Book is chock-full of more than 100 challenging and satisfying word games, logic puzzles, and brain teasers.
The Brainiest Insaniest Puzzle Book
An outrageously clever and colorful bonanza of more than 250 mind-teasing mazes, word games, visual puzzles, and much more.
Wind your way through the twisted cemetery gates in Dead End. Match sunburned kids to their beach gear by examining their Hot Lines. In It's Astro-Logical, figure out which astronaut is asleep on the job. Decipher the words that are shimmering underwater in All Wet. And discover puzzles within puzzles, like Crunch Time: rearrange every letter in a finished crossword to solve a riddle.
101 Awesome Bible Puzzles for Kids
Parents, here's a fun and safe way to let your kids try out their detective skills. This entertaining collection of Bible puzzles provides ample opportunities for your kids, ages 8 to 12, to challenge themselves or match wits with a friend as they search for hidden words, find their way through mazes, and solve riddles.
In this fascinating, interactive book -- a companion to the National Geographic Channel hit show ? kids explore the parts of the brain and how it all works, brainy news nuggets from a neuroscientist, plus fun facts and crazy challenges.
Big Brain Teasers Book for Kids
This huge book of brain teaser puzzles for kids is perfect for ages 9 - 12 and up. Keep your kids busy and engaged for hours of fun away from their screens! Included are long time family favorite mind teasers such as hidden pictures, cryptograms, math squares, logic grid puzzles, picross and matchsticks. Also included are cool Japanese puzzles like sudoku, maysu, slitherlink, and numberlink.
Puzzles and brain games are a great way for kids to exercise their minds while having a blast! Perfectly Logical! helps inquisitive kids develop logical reasoning skills with a mix of 100 challenging puzzles that get more difficult as they progress.
Calling all fans of the Brain Games TV show! Exercise your mental muscle with awesome challenges, wacky logic puzzles, optical illusions, and brain-busting riddles. Write-in pages include both games and short explanations of the neuroscience at work. Have fun and challenge yourself as you unleash your inner creativity and become the genius we all know you are.
The puzzling experts at Highlights have assembled a brand-new, 256-page collection of our most challenging--and most rewarding--puzzles yet. Created for puzzle-loving kids who are ready to up their puzzle game, the book is bursting with a wide variety of mind-bending, super-challenging visual puzzles and clever word puzzles, all infused with a sense of playful humor that will make kids want to keep on puzzling. With a full-color interior of engaging illustrations and brilliant photos, this puzzle collection is sure to please the most discerning of puzzle-loving kids.
Perfect for budding artists and kids who have never drawn before, this beginner drawing book will teach your kid how to draw cool things in no time! Author and professional artist Alli Koch's kid friendly, mini drawing lessons will help your child practice their basic art skills and teach them how to draw with confidence. This book is perfect for kids 8-12, but kids 5-7 with an interest in art will be able to easily follow along as well. From cupcakes, to unicorns, to cars, and cats, your kid will be drawing all sorts of things that they'll want to show off to their friends, or color afterward and hang on their room! No experience required!
Learning to draw has never been easier! The How to Draw Book for Kids uses simple step-by-step guides to teach kids of all ages how to draw cute and silly things. Choose from five super fun themes, including: Cute Creatures (hello, llama!), Fairytale Fun, Under the Sea, Outer Space, and Tasty Treats. You've never seen a cute donut or a sweeter rocket ship. Add drawings to a composition with fun colors and kids will have their very own piece of art to enjoy or gift!
Kids love making their own cartoons and comics and, this Blank Comic Book for Kids is the book you need. Filled with comic book templates of various styles, with 150 pages, this book will keep budding artists busy for hours. This is a big comic book, 8.5" x 11", so lots of room for them to immerse themselves in their own creativity. Also, fun games at the end of the book make kids even happier.
Math, Art, and Drawing Games for Kids
In Math Art and Drawing Games for Kids, you’ll find an amazing collection of more than 40 hands-on art activities that make learning about math fun!
Difficult Riddles for Smart Kids
This kids book is a collection of 300 brain teasing riddles and puzzles. Their purpose is to encourage children to think and stretch their minds. They are designed to test logic, lateral thinking as well as memory and to engage the brain in seeing patterns and connections between different things and circumstances.
Fun Riddles and Trick Questions
300+ brain-teasing riddles creatively designed to not only get your kids laughing and exploring their goofy side, but also to promote functional problem solving.
Based on one of the most popular features on the National Geographic Kids website, this collection of themed quizzes, true-and-false questions, and photo-driven quizzes, will include questions about animals, weather, countries, and lots more. This compact book is just he right size to toss into a backpack and will make car trips, dentists' waiting rooms, even visits to the mall enjoyable experiences for all.
Laugh and learn with 160+ questions designed to make kids giggle, think, and figure out who's the wittiest (and silliest) of all! Would You Rather? Made You Think! Edition provides endless hours of fun for eight- to twelve-year-olds who love a challenge--and a good laugh.
Become a word sleuth! You’ll find tons of hidden words (and clues that lead to other puzzles) in The Kids’ Word Search Puzzle and Activity Book.
With our expertly designed word search puzzles, you can find words in all places (upside down, reverse, overlapping, and many more!). Your child will also experience fun themes while word searching such as planets, animals, food, and other cool stuff!
Here are 32 simple projects that are a snap for beginners! There are illustrations and instructions for folding a hat, cup, and pinwheel. There are even more difficult models such as a penguin, pelican, and piano.
Feeling bored on a rainy day? Now you can pick a project, gather your supplies and let the magic happen. Try far-out science experiments like making Shaving Cream Rain Clouds or Lava Lamps. Make math-time snack-time with delicious Cream-Filled Cookie Fractions. Unlock boundless creativity with art projects like Marbled Paper or Monster Bugs. With seasonal activities like the Pool Noodle Obstacle Course and Erupting Pumpkins, there are games to love year-round.
The Big, Fun Kids Cookbook from Food Network Magazine gives young food lovers everything they need to succeed in the kitchen. Each recipe is totally foolproof and easy to follow, with color photos and tips to help beginners get excited about cooking. The book includes recipes for breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks and dessert—all from the trusted chefs in Food Network’s test kitchen.
