Birthday Scavenger Hunt

Having a birthday scavenger hunt is a great way to get the younger generations excited and many of them can be tailored to whatever theme you are choosing for the party.  Scavenger hunts for younger children or teenagers will not only keep party attendees occupied, they are a great way to start some friendly and respectful competitive activity and have a lot of laughs.

The first step to planning your scavenger hunt is to choose the location that it will be held at or in. The awesome thing about these hunts is that you can virtually do them anywhere: at a local mall, indoors or in the backyard. Malls are a great idea if you are doing the scavenger hunt for teens, but parks or indoors may be better for youngsters as you can keep track of them easier.

Take into consideration the ages of the kids or teens that will be participating and then plan the scavenger hunt accordingly. For older kids written clues can be more detailed, while younger children will need a less complex version of the game.

Scavenger Hunt for Younger Kids

Here are some ideas for a scavenger hunt for kids that aren’t yet teens but still can read clues and be a little independent in the game.

Select/choose the designated area where things will be hidden or can be found and pass out the scavenger cards which should be a series of riddles or clues that will lead the participants to the items. These cards can be something as simple as “I am a few inches wide, with pointy arms and am green” if you want them to find a leaf, or “I am small and round, but an unexpected color” if you want them to find rocks. You will, of course have to paint some rocks ahead of time and place them within the area.

You can also create a list of items for them to find such as:

• Certain number of nails, paperclips or cotton balls
• A spool of thread
• One square of toilet paper
• A kitchen utensil other than a spoon, fork or knife
• Balloons (give them specific colors they need to collect)

For younger kid’s birthday scavenger hunts consider buying some plastic eggs and filling them with simple items such as pennies or nickels, tootsie rolls or another small candy, stickers or small figurines. Then hide them around the property or within certain rooms in the home, and on the word go, they can take off and search for as many eggs as they can find. This is a better idea for young ones that aren’t able to read or solve more difficult riddles, and they still have a blast finding things.

Scavenger Hunts for Teenagers

Teenagers are crafty and resourceful so the possibilities are endless for teenager scavenger hunts. The mall is a great place for a teenager scavenger hunt as they most likely know the layout well and feel comfortable there.

Create a scavenger list ahead of time for your teens and include such items as:

• Take out menus from mall restaurants
• Gift wrapping paper or boxes from a specific store
• Cologne or perfume samples from stores
• A certain  number of gum balls from the candy machines
• A hanger that a store no longer needs
• A coupon from a store

You can also require your teens to answer questions about the mall such as:

• How many women’s apparel stores are in the mall
• How many entrances are there
• Which shoe store has the best sale going on currently
• When was the mall built
• What are the top 5 selling CD’s in the music store

Online Scavenger Hunts

This is a great scavenger hunt for most ages, particularly if the weather does not permit traveling to another location or an outdoors hunt. For this type of scavenger hunts for kids you will need a laptop or two (however many divided by how many teams you have.) If they are attached to a printer, that is even more useful. Construct a series of questions and then have the hunters find specific things online such as:

• What is the capitol of Alaska
• What is New York City’s population
• Name one of Google’s top headlines for the day
• What did Snookie name her baby
• Who are the judges for this year’s American Idol
• Name a few things (input number here) that Wal-Mart plans to advertise for their Black Friday sales

Just be sure with an internet scavenger hunt that there is a nice mixture of regular trivia and pop culture so they all stay interested.

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