6 Easy Family Games to Pass Time on a Road Trip

How many of you just threw a device to your kiddos for a long car ride? Sometimes this can be awesome- a quiet car ride where you can drive along with your own thoughts!!! But when you always choose this path you miss out on some awesome time you can use to connect with, talk with, and even teach your kids. Car rides are also wonderful organic ways to model for your kids some delayed gratification. If you want to learn more about Delayed Gratification read this! In this post, you will find a collection of my top 6 Easy Family Games to Pass the Time on your next Road Trip.

I have been or can be if you click on a link and make a purchase, compensated via a cash payment, gift, or something else of value for writing this post. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will be good for my readers. Please read my full disclosure for more information.

License Plate Game

This game is classic! Search the license plates of passing cars and record the States as you notice them. You can write the names down or color in the state on a map. My mom used to write the list on a scrap of paper in the car. I created a few other ways you can record your states. Color in the shapes on the map! There is a blank map as well as one with the names of the states (easier for younger kids to match). My second grader has been learning the State capitals with his dad. A bonus way to play this game would be to think of the capital that goes with the state as you check them off your list. Learn while you are riding, make connections, and teach about delayed gratification all in one road trip car game!

Road Trip Bingo

Here we are with another classic road trip game! Bingo grids that have photos, pictures, or words on them. You can cross the items off as you stop them during the ride. Road trips can take you to many different types of places. Here are a few different sets of bingo cards to choose from depending on the local of your travel and destination. This game encourages kids to take in the world around them as they are traveling and to be on the lookout for sights that can be expected during the trip.

Car or Vehicle Type Tally Game

Make a list of all the car or vehicle types you may see on your ride. Practice making a tally mark each time you see a new one. Make sure to model how every 5th tally mark is a slash across. Then you can practice counting by 5s! There is a list of cars by types page and one by style. You could also make the marks with stamps or stickers to jazz things up. This is a great early math skill to get you kids engaged as you are road tripping.

ABC Category Game

First, you choose a category- animals, girls’ names, dinner foods, etc. Then you take turns listing items in that category alphabetically. For example, if you choose Animals it would be, A- alpaca, B-bird, C-cat, D- dog, etc. A Sweet list of categories is ready for download when you subscribe! I also recommend using a set of alphabet flashcards when you first start this game to help your kiddos remember which letter is next! There are all kinds of themed alphabet flashcards ready to print in my Busy Box Download Library!

Bonus: You can also look for the letters as you drive. There are signs everywhere. It would be fun to hunt for the letters out of the window! Give your kiddo the stack of flashcards and have them pass the letters to you as they spot them.

Play That Instrument

Music is always apart of good car ride entertainment. With this particular game, you and your kiddos will need a little pre-knowledge of some basic instruments. My Kiddos loved to watch Disney’s Little Einsteins. They learned a lot about different instruments watching the tv show. You can also check out this YouTube Video below.

Or you can learn about the instruments with this book I bought from Amazon!

Next, you will want to curate a fun music playlist with some songs featuring these instruments you learned about. When they hear a certain instrument playing they pretend play- air guitar and air drums are FUN! There are some printable instrument flashcards in my busy box library to hold up and help cue your new musicians into what they need to be playing in the beginning. Once you model and do this a few times your kiddos should totally be able to play this game on their own as you drive. You can even assign different people to different instruments. Here is a musical playlist you can try out!

• Bohemian Rhapsody – Queen (piano, drums, guitar)
• Layla – Eric Clapton– (piano, drums, guitar)
• Into the Unknown- Frozen 2– (piano, strings, percussion)
• Penny Lane- The Beatles– (brass, piano, drums, guitar)
• Winter Winds- Mumford and Sons– (brass, guitar, drums)

Favorite Song Game

Everyone in my family has a favorite song. We listen to them often and know a lot of the words. For this game, you need to create another playlist with each rider’s favorite song. You can enjoy riding and singing together! Here are some favorites from our family. We use Prime Music to create our car ride playlist! They have an awesome feature where you can download the music and listen offline so you aren’t chowing down data as your travel.

My Families Favorites:

• Dad: Styx- Mr. Roboto
• Mom: Andy Grammer- My Own Hero
• Brother: AC/DC- Thunderstruck
• Sister: Trolls- Can’t Stop This Feeling

I hope you enjoyed these 6 Easy Family Games to Pass Time on the next Road Trip! Be sure to subscribe to get access to all the printables or check out the Teacher Pay Teacher Store! I would love to hear some other games you enjoy with your kiddos in the car. Please share a comment below!