What's in the Bag?

A wonderful activity guaranteed to spark curiosity in any child! Children shake, listen, smell, feel, and wiggle the bag trying their best to guess what's inside.

Age

Toddler, Preschool, School-age, Tweens, Teens

Number of Players

20+, As many as you can handle!

Prep Time

5 - 10 minutes

Time Length

15 - 30 minutes

Difficulty

Easy peasy (fun and simple)

Indoor/Outdoor

Either

Space Needed

Small (a clearable open space the size of a 1-car garage)

Noise Level

Quiet

Mess Factor

Clean and tidy

Supplies

Plastic or paper bag (that is not clear)

Multiple items to place in the bag. (These can be gifts or random objects)

Setup

1. Have a box of items ready to be placed in the bag. The items can be random objects such as a stuffed animal, tape dispenser, telephone, spray can, etc. Or, they can be party favors. In either case, select objects that are intricate to touch or misleading in shape.
2. Select the first item and place it in the bag without anyone seeing what you have selected.
3. Gather the children in a circle around you.

How to Play

1. Pick a child to go first.
2. This child will take a hold of the bag and use their senses to feel around the object. Their goal is to try and guess what's inside without being able to see it.
3. They have three guesses to name the object before it is the next person's turn. After their three guesses, they remove the item from the bag for all to see.
4. A new object should be placed in the bag for the next person to play.

Tips

1. If you are going to use this activity as a gift-giving game, make sure all the gifts you buy are similar. Or, allow the children the opportunity to trade at the end. You wouldn't want to end up with a group of children that feel some gifts were "better" than others.

Educational

1. This is a wonderful activity to start a sensory writing project. You can have each object in a different bag, one for each child, or one for two children to share. They can write about what they feel, hear, smell, while trying to guess what the object is. Once the object is revealed they can write about that experience as well. Comparing the two experiences on paper will allow the students to concentrate on sensory writing with similes and metaphors.