

Outdoor play can inspire creativity and imagination, as well as teach youngsters social skills such as team work.



Make a butterfly feeder

One of the cheapest ways to do this is with a piece of string, a paper plate and some mushy fruit.

Just cut holes into the four compass points of the plate and thread a piece of string through all four points and knot underneath. Bring the string up and tie together to create a hanging plate.

The add mushy fruit and see which flavour, or which colour fruit, your butterflies prefer.

Mud volcano

A real crowd pleaser, all you need for this is some mud, some baking soda and some vinegar.

Make a mound of mud or damp soil and make a hole in the middle of it. Then add a couple of spoons of baking soda. Pour vinegar over the top and watch it erupt!

You can also use a jam jar in the middle if you want to try and do more experiments.

Go on a rainbow search

Take a walk through your neighbourhood, garden or local park, and task your child with finding something natural that is one of the colours of the rainbow.

Take A Smell Walk

What smells surround you when you’re outside? Make a note of all the different things you can smell on your walk in the park or garden, such as fresh cut grass, moist soil, flowers and rain.

Do a nature alphabet

Who needs pens when you can use twigs, leaves and feathers?

Find an outside place with trees and plants. What can you find and use to make letters with?

Big sticks, little sticks, leaves and long grass are all great. Get creative and try to make each letter of the alphabet.

Maybe you can create a word or message for people or animals to find, or just write your name.

Build a fairy house

Bring a bit of magic to the end of your garden and build your very own fairy house.

All you need to do is find an out-of-the-way place such as at the base of a tree or in a corner of the garden, and search for things to build and furnish the house.

Sticks can become fairy brooms, flowers can be fairy hats and feathers, fairy fans. Use your imagination to find fairy uses for all the items that you discover.

Rain paintings

Even if the weather is bad, grab some paints and head outside.

Set up in a suitably rainy spot and start creating. The wet weather will do the rest. See how drops of rain affect your pictures. Try to include them in your composition. Watch the colours swirl, run and drip off the page.

When you’re done, bring them inside to dry and hang them up.

Make a tree person

Using mud and other decorations from nature’s dress-up cupboard, why not play the tree faces game.

Grab some mud and start making eyes, ears, noses and other facial features to stick on a tree.

You can also use leaves and grass for hair, moustaches and beards, and twigs and anything else you find for decoration, or jewellery.

Play conkers

This may be a traditional game but never fails to keep kids entertained.

All you need to do is gather up some conkers and thread through a piece of string.

Children can then play against each other - taking it in turns to hit the other’s conker using their own. One player lets the conker dangle on the full length of the string while the other player swings their conker and hits.

The conker eventually breaking the other’s conker is the winner.

Decorate umbrellas

Buy cheap umbrellas from the pound shop or charity shop and grab some waterproof paints (or acrylic pens) from the supermarket or arts and crafts retailer.

Go outside and paint nature patterns, leaves, or animals, for example. The brighter the better.

All these ideas have come from Persil’s Wild Explorers’ app - a new free app with over 100 ideas to encourage children to play, learn and go outside.

It includes activities for different locations and weather conditions.

The Persil Wild Explorers app is available to download now on iOS and Android.