7 Extracurricular Group Activities for Brainy Kids
Some kids outgrow team sports quickly. Some kids refuse to do them at all.
That’s unfortunate because group activities help children stay more engaged and focused while they develope essential interpersonal skills.
What can families do if their child isn’t into sports?
Fortunately, there are plenty of group activities for kids who’d rather stretch their synapses a little more than their quads.
Why group activities matter
Participation in team sports as a child coincides with lower rates of anxiety and depression, lower instances of substance abuse, and overall improved emotional well-being.
Even from a young age, working in teams is important. To have fun and be successful in life, kids need EQ (emotional quotient or intelligence) as much as they need IQ—if not more. Group activities get a child’s mind, body, and emotions working together. When kids collaborate with others in a wide range of activities, they develop multiple forms of intelligence all at once.
Kids’ group activities to try
Here are seven extracurricular group activities to try with your kids.
1. Robotics club
Many schools and community centers offer a robotics club. The kids might learn robotics with Arduino, ROBOTC, OzoBlockly, or Lego Mindstorms.
Why this activity is great for kids:
Diving into the world of robotics is not only useful for futuristic careers, but it can also show kids the result of their efforts in real time. Because kids can see and hear the toys respond to their code, robotics serve as a great introduction to the broader world of coding and contribute to a sense of accomplishment.
Where to find robotics clubs in your area:
Check out Robot Events, a Robotics Education and Competition Foundation where you can discover workshops, classes, and competitions. You can also check out FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology). FIRST encourages parents to contact their local schools and libraries to find nearby robotics teams. If none exist, the organization can assist you in launching your own team.
2. Problem-solving cohorts with Synthesis
Synthesis teaches kids ages six through 14 collaborative problem-solving. Students join cohorts and compete in tournaments with each other to solve big problems. On day one, they’re thrown into complex games with no rules. Kids have to work together to figure out the rules of the games and how to beat them as a team. Along the way, they test new hypotheses, reflect on their performance individually and collectively, and gain new confidence in their ability to speak up and work with others.
Why this activity is great for kids:
Traditional school environments tend to teach kids a set of curricula, placing guardrails and ceilings that limit their learning. Synthesis combines the excitement and open-ended learning that video games provide with the collaborative results of team sports to get kids working together to solve complex problems. Synthesis students stand out with their confidence, communication, and leadership skills.
How to join a Synthesis cohort:
Synthesis launches new cohorts once a month. Cohorts take place at a set time every week. Keep in mind that there is a waitlist of approximately three months. When you sign up, you’ll be notified when it’s time to select a cohort that works for your child’s schedule. Synthesis also offers additional events and learning opportunities for students. Learn more about Synthesis here.
3. Naturalist group hikes
You can organize an outdoor hike with your child’s friends, cousins, or neighbors. Think of one project that they’ll have to accomplish together on the hike. For example, you could write out a single list of items to spot. During the hike, the kids can pass around the list to check off items as they see them.
Kids can also collect sticks, pinecones, leaves, nuts, or whatever else might be lying around to create one large mandala design on the ground. This is a great way for kids to make art with natural materials without having to remove those items from nature.
Why this activity is great for kids:
Spending time outdoors has tons of physical and mental health benefits. Time outside even helps the brain function better. That’s why you might experience a jolt of clarity on an issue after a long walk.
Where to find easy hikes in your area:
Check out AllTrails to find trails around the world. Enter your location, and set the difficulty level and mileage level according to what your little hikers can handle.
4. Special interest summer camps
If you live in a remote area, it might be hard to find group activities for brainy kids. That’s where summer day camps and sleep-away camps come in to help.
There are many different types of camps. Here are some that your kids might enjoy:
- Astronomy
- Space
- Chemistry
- Coding
- Engineering
- Music
- Singing
- Art
- Acting
- Survival skills
Tip: Look for camps that offer group activities and team-building exercises, not just passive classes.
Why camps are great for kids:
Summer camps provide the opportunity for hands-on learning, collaboration, and deep focus on a specific task or area of study. Camps can be challenging too, especially for shy students, so start with a day camp instead of an overnight camp as a trial run.
Where to find summer camps in your area:
The American Camp Association aggregates thousands of camps and programs into one database. For a global search, check out World Camps.
5. Domino toppling
Need an idea for your next play date or hangout? Creating domino designs is a fun and easy activity because you can make them as simple or complicated as you want to, depending on how much time you have and how many kids will be working together.
Why this activity is great for kids:
Building a domino design allows kids to practice multiple skills at once: strategic planning, their understanding of the laws of physics, and communication and collaboration with the other kids involved.
Where to find domino sets:
You can find wooden domino sets with over 1,000 pieces on Amazon for a pretty good price. Big domino sets are cool, but children don’t even have to use actual dominos. Instead, they could set up plastic cups, books, and toys across the living room floor and try to get them all to fall down just by setting the first one in motion. Or, they can combine cause-and-effect elements with dominos for a cool and complicated topple.
6. Craft or science projects as a team
If there are no organized group activities in your area that your child is interested in, you can create your own. Invite two or more of your child’s friends over and set them up with an activity.
You could purchase a craft or science kit from your local craft or toy store. Here are some fun examples of commonly found kits:
- Chemistry sets with experiment instructions
- Snap Circuits toys
- Birdhouse kits
Why this activity is great for kids:
Too often, kids are given individual tasks to complete. At school and even at home, adults tend to give kids their own artwork or project, rather than grouping kids together. To give your kids more opportunities to learn collaboration and team-building skills, all you need to do is take an individual project and turn it into a group activity.
To make it more of a team exercise, set them up with something that they’re supposed to complete together. For example, you might encourage them to use a Snap Circuit set to create a cohesive mechanism, with all the parts working together.
Where to find team activity kits:
Your local craft store or toy store is the way to go. Just make sure as you’re shopping to imagine whether or not the kids can create one big project together. Use that as your vetting criteria, and pick what you think the kids will enjoy the most.
7. LEGO events
If you don’t have thousands of bricks in your home collection, you can attend LEGO events where your kids will have the opportunity to meet other kids and build something bigger and better together.
Just keep in mind that it’s better for kids’ creativity to come up with their own design, rather than just follow instructions in a LEGO kit.
Why this activity is great for kids:
LEGO offers many benefits for kids’ development: hand-eye coordination, strategic planning, and communication and collaboration when building as a team.
Where to find Lego events:
The LEGO Ambassador Network is the best place to discover in-person events in your area as well as virtual challenges and tutorials in your time zone. You can also find groups and clubs that meet regularly. These are called Recognized Communities by the LEGO brand.
Many libraries also have a massive LEGO collection and host LEGO building sessions for kids and families, so check your local library too.
Test these ideas out with your kid, and if one activity doesn’t light them up, try another.
Learn more about Synthesis, a fun, collaborative-program solving program for kids.
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Synthesis Tutor is built on research by DARPA—the government agency behind GPS, the Internet, and early self-driving cars.
DARPA sought to create a digital learning system as good as the classroom, but they accidentally made something far better. In fact, their average student performed better than 99.99% of students who learned in a classroom.
But the DARPA students didn’t only outperform the classroom, they also outperformed 99.9% of Navy technicians with an average of ten years of experience. This shows us that there is a way to teach concepts—even advanced concepts—in a way that’s far more efficient and empowering.
To achieve those results, the DARPA team created software that mimicked the way experts tutored their students. Unlike human tutors, software never gets tired, frustrated, or impatient. It never has an off-day or fumbles an explanation. If a student misunderstands a concept, the digital tutor always provides just the right guidance. This, it turns out, is critical.
Most importantly, the students felt like they were learning from a real person. The tutor was digital, but it had soul. Its care, intentionality, encouragement, and patients built unbreakable trust with students. They relied upon the digital tutor, shared their struggles, and treated it like you’d treat your favorite teacher. It’s hard to believe, but the digital tutor created a bond with the students—a bond that acted like fuel for unimaginably deep, fast, and joyful learning.
To test its effectiveness, DARPA set up a competition between three groups:
- Navy technicians with an average of 10 years of experience
- Students who learned in a classroom for 36 weeks
- Students who learned with the DARPA digital tutor for 16 weeks
The DARPA students outperformed both groups by huge margins. In only 16 weeks, they were better than 99.9% of Navy technicians and 99.99% of classroom students.
No other way of learning has ever achieved anything close to these results.
If you want to get close to the DARPA results, you’ll need to hire a world-class tutor to work with your child one-on-one. But even then, research shows those students won’t perform as well as the DARPA program.
Simply put, the DARPA program is the greatest way to learn in the history of humanity. It’s a big statement—we know. But it’s inexpensive to try it and to quickly discover this for yourself.
Synthesis partnered with the team that created the original DARPA program. We expanded upon their research, tailor-made a platform for kids ages 7-10, and extended what they achieved with modern AI tools.
For the first time, any kid with an internet connection can receive the best education in the world—no matter where they are.
If you’d like to dig deeper, you can read this study conducted by the Institute for Defense Analysis.
Or check out this helpful summary of the results.