I don’t know maybe it’s the homeschool mom in me but I am always looking for an opportunity to teach my children. On our recent road trip north, traveling through 11 states – 3,011 miles to be exact with 5 children in the car I knew there was going to be several opportunities to teach them about the states we would be traveling though.
It had to be fun though. I did not just want to read facts about each state but wanted it to be ways they would remember what they learned. So how? Here’s how:
First
Invest a few dollars in learning materials such as state books, flash cards, etc. If you do not want to spend the money maybe borrow from friends or the library.
My materials are:
Fandex Family Field Guides 50 States
Time For Learning States Interactive Book
Second
I printed out a map. I gave them boards with the map on it and markers or crayons. The map had each state listed on the map and as we traveling through that state they colored it. They knew we were going form Florida to New York so they visually could see on the map how many states we had left to travel through to reach our destination.
Third
Games! Such as (even perfect for little ones):
I-Spy
License Plate Games:
Find a license plate from each state
Make up words in the license plate letters.
Find the furthest state away license plate.
Add up the numbers in the license plate and see who can add the numbers the fastest.
Other suggestions:
Have an Atlas in the car? Have the children find unusual cites and towns.
Stop at the visitor centers for each state and take their photo’s.
Collect post cards from each state and have the kids fill them out in the car for family or friends.
If you do not have the Carschooling book, I highly recommend you picking it up. Perfect for travel!
Mama to 5 Blessings is also linking this post at:
Tuesday: Linda’s Lunacy, // Thursday: Enchanted Homeschooling Mom // Friday: Living Life Intentionally, Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers,Homeschool Creations // Saturday: I Can Teach My Child
You thought of a lot of great ways for the kids to learn. I always loved licence plate games when I was a kid.
Same here Robin, We play this with the kids all the time. great learning opportunity!
Awesome! While I don’t plan on homeschooling, I love enrichment activities- especially because we do travel a few thosand miles a year. I think I am going to print out some maps and pictures to play with my toddler the next time we’re driving… it will make being stuck in NY that much easier!
Such a great way to have fun while learning. We enjoy traveling so will give these a try
Great tips. I make everything a learning experience with my kids.
My in-laws live in a 5th wheel and travel across the country now that they have retired. THIS is such an awesome way to learn/teach!! My kids spent a summer with them doing exactly this!!
While driving or riding in a car I’ve always paid a lot of attention to other cars and their license plates. It’s kind of fun to see how far people have traveled to get to our state.
Love these ideas! One of my biggest goals with my kids is to travel to each state before they’re 18. We’ve already crossed 10 off our list.
I want to do this, too!
Love Your Tips & Advice For Making It Fun On Road Trips & They Learn Too. I Will Be Using Down The Road Thank You!!
These are great ideas! If you had other families in your life who are working on learning about states, you could have a postcard swap set up so everyone would be sending and receiving post cards, and learning about those states.
Such a fun experience! My goal is to homeschool when my son hits 2nd or 3rd grade. He is a lot for me to handle, but it is experiences like this that make me want to offer him more than a brick and mortar education. 🙂
Great post, I’m always looking for ways to teach while traveling, there’s so many opportunities!
we don’t homeschool but we love doing games and learning activities no matter where we are. and as someone who never learned all the states in school- well, i’d not mind knowing more!
We went on a long road trip this summer, too! I had the kids follow along with a national geographic kids atlas that was awesome!
That is so much better than reading about it from a book. Kids learn and have fun.
I Totally Agree It’s Much More Fun For The Kids I Will Be Playing These Games On Our Next Road Trip!
Love it! It’s like homeschooling in the car. I find that when we take the time to research a place we get so much more out of our experience and out of our trip!
Love the maps!
I really should make one for my kids!
Great way to even learn the geography just around your own home!
These are really great ideas. It’s always nice when you can add an element of learning to anything.
I’m an adult and I still play the travel license game! It’s great that thee ideas help turn the ordinary task of traveling to a fun vacation or destination into an educational one.
Such great ideas! We have done some long driving trips when we were in the military. We did a few of these ideas and it helped to pass the time and helped the kids to learn more about where we were going.
We are just starting to learn about the states, so this was a great post for me. Thank you for the recommendations on the books! I just ordered 3!
Great games! We are in Arizona and have only traveled to California, but this will definitely be something we do if we travel a bit farther from home.
These are great ideas. Anytime you can make learning fun, you’re ahead of the game.
I love these ideas. I always play a game with car plates when my daughter is in the car. I have her look for certain letters or numbers.
These are all great ideas. It’s always great to make learning fun. You’ve got to keep the kids interested.
Awesome ideas! I need to get some state books for my son since we don’t have any.
great tips. traveling with kids can be fun. the state book is a great idea.
I love how creative you are. Great games and I love the idea of colouring a map as you travel through the states. What a great way to teach kids about geography.
As a child we played the license plate game too. We play it now with the kids as well as spot certain words/letters on signs. It really gets the kids to pay attention
I always loved coming up with fun games to play in the car for the kids. Heck, I still do! I even play them with the boyfriend.
Great games to keep the kids entertained!!! I remember playing the state game in the past on road trips!
Great list. We love I Spy in the car! We are always trying to sing and play games when the rides are long ones!
What an amazing list! Thanks so much,these will help me tons!
We love playing license plate games, and they can keep kids occupied for hours in the car!
I’m printing out a map for my kids so they can keep track of all the states they have been in!
LOVE this post! So important to take EVERY opportunity to learn (or teach). We travel a lot so I’m pinning this!
I loved all your tips and ideas and you kids will probably remember this great experience even better now that they got to reinforce it with learning too.
Before the GPS, it was so exciting for the kids to have a map. It was EVEN exciting (sometimes) to get lost. 😉 I like the map you gave them, and we always play games in the car too. 🙂
I have a friend planning a big road trip next spring. I will share your ideas with her. It looks and sounds like a wonderful and fun time of learning.