History Activities At Home: 5 Simple, Fun, and Cheap Ideas for Your Family

There are so many great ideas for history activities at home and so many free or low-cost resources available that it was hard to pick just five! In my time spent in libraries and historic sites and museums, I became aware of lots of resources available for families to use, and I want to share those with you.

These resources are designed to help busy families make the most of their time and money and to help families spend quality time together while learning something new. That philosophy helps me incorporate learning history into my family’s daily life, and it’s the philosophy I used to develop the following list.

Your family can do history activities at home simply by putting a little historical twist on things you’re probably doing anyway.

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5 Awesome Ideas for History Activities at Home

#1: Make Dinner

Or breakfast, or lunch, or snacks. You have to eat anyway. Make a family recipe together. Talk about your memories of eating it as a child and tell about the person who developed the recipe and how and why. Tell the stories you remember about times when your family ate that food together.

My Great-Aunt Kaye, a war bride from Bangor, Northern Ireland, often made pumpkin bread from her brother’s recipe. His name was Lyle Jackson. I never met him but I have eaten his pumpkin bread almost every autumn of my life, and now my children eat it too. Being a purist, I have never taken his suggestion for adding nuts, raisins, or dates. As we make it, I tell them about Aunt Kaye and we talk about how she and Uncle Jack met during World War II. This helps them begin to set reference points in their mental map of the past, a valuable practice because the past does not seem so far away when people you know are there.

If you want to take it further, learn a little bit about 9 of the Oldest Food Recipes From History Still in Use Today. You may have one or two of these recipes in regular rotation. Chatting about the history of the food you’re eating while you cook is a great way to spend time together, learn a little something, and get dinner on the table, all at the same time.

#2: Use that Streaming Service

Ah, yes, the siren song of screen time, both for the kids who love it and for the grown-ups who…also love it. It’s known around our house simply as *shows*–said with a giggle and a twinkle in the eye. The good news is that you can use that screen time to help your family learn history at home with this list of What to Stream Right Now for Kids Who Love History.

If your kids don’t love history when they start this list, they’re likely to by the time they finish it. These shows range from documentaries to fantasy, but they all provide at least an entry point into learning history.

Pro-tip: It’s great to discuss a show, but don’t quiz your kids on what they learned. That’s a great way to kill any burgeoning interest dead and take all the fun right out of it and make it stressful when it doesn’t need to be. We all have enough stress in our lives these days.

#3: Color

For a long time, by which I mean up until about three months ago, I didn’t love to color. Like ever, not even as a kid. However, I have recently discovered adult coloring books. Let me tell you, I am a convert. It’s such a stress reliever just to pick out colors and fill in the little sections and empty out your mind. Along with reading old books, it’s become part of my bedtime routine. I always struggled with focusing on prayer or meditation, but I discovered if I do it while I color it actually works! I can just let thoughts come and go in my mind and not fight them, and it’s great.

|Related: Can the Golden Age of Detective Fiction Help Us Get Better Sleep?

My elementary kiddo has recently decided that she’s too big for simple coloring sheets with large spaces, so she’s into images with lots of detail, while my toddler is scribble-scrabbling with zero regard for lines. Good thing there’s something for all of us on this list of 15 Free Historical Coloring Books and Pages to Download from the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

#4: Craft

Do you have crafty kids? Or are you crafty yourself? Check out A History of Your Favorite Crafts from Around the World. You can learn a little of the history behind your current projects and share it in conversations when the kiddos inevitably want to know what you’re doing.

The only needlecraft I’ve ever really gotten into is cross-stitching. I’m still working on the project I bought at the Museum of the American Revolution at Yorktown in March 2020 the literal week before everything shut down. I thought I would finish it by the time my now-toddler was born, but now I’m just hoping to finish it by the time he starts kindergarten. I’m kind of known for never actually finishing a needlecraft project, but counting those stitches sure is good for anxiety!

Many historic sites sell small craft projects in their gift shops that include most if not all of the supplies you need. It’s a relatively cheap way to learn a new skill, stave off boredom, get a souvenir, and learn some history at the same time. If a visit to a historic site isn’t in your near future, many historic sites do have online gift shops like this one. And if you have a painter, check out these kits from Art In History.

#5: Play

One thing that holds true for humans across time and space is that we love to play. It’s one of the things that comes most naturally to us, and we all know our kids need more playtime.

For those times when you need an indoor game, board games are awesome, and they have a rich history. You can print a copy of The Game of the Goose or Fox and Geese, two board games that are centuries old. Or if you’d rather play a modern game that helps you learn history, check these out.

If it’s more of an outside kind of day, check out this list of historical games that eventually became childhood staples. Introduce them to your kids and let them wear themselves out so they’ll sleep well tonight.

Have Fun Doing History Activities at Home!

There are so many fun ways to learn history at home with your family, and you can work many of them into your family’s life without spending much extra time or money. I hope you’ve found some good ones here.

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