Bingo

For kids' parties make cards with animal pictures or symbols that might be easier for young children to find than numbers. Don’t make it too hard, perhaps just have 6 pictures or symbols per card for each child to find. Have an adult pick the symbols or pictures out of a hat and call them one by one for the kids to mark off. The first child with all their symbols or pictures marked off wins.

Charades

With small children the best way to play charades is to ask them to impersonate an animal or vehicle using sounds and their body and get the other children to guess what it is. Older children might like to act out song, book or movie titles.

Chinese whispers

Get the kids to sit in a circle and pass a message around via whispering and wait and see how close the end message is to the original. No prizes involved but a great ice-breaker.

Duck, duck, goose

Have all the children sit down in a circle. They are now the "Ducks". Pick one child to be the Fox.
The Fox slowly walks around the outside of the circle, gently tapping the other players heads while saying "Duck" each time he/she taps.
After a few times around the circle, the Fox selects a "Goose" by tapping
a players head and calling "Goose!". The Goose quickly jumps up and chases the Fox around the circle, trying to tag him before he can get to
the spot where the Goose was just sitting. If the Fox succeeds in taking the Goose's place he is now safe and the Goose becomes the Fox.
If however the Fox is tagged while running from the Goose, he must
start the game again.

Egg and spoon race

A test of balance for slightly older children. Each child is given a spoon and an egg to balance on it and whoever reached the finish line the fastest without dropping their egg wins. Mess can be avoided by hard boiling the eggs.

Eye spy

For school age children with an understanding of the alphabet. Each child secretly selects an object and whispers it to the adult supervising. The child then announces: “I spy with my little eye something beginning with..” and states the first letter of the selected object (eg “T” for table). Each child then takes a guess at what the object might be. The winner then gets the next turn or a small prize.

Face painting

A crafty adult can create some fun animal or character faces on the children.

Guessing competitions

Count out jelly beans into a jar and make a note of the number. Ask each child to make a guess at the amount in the jar and whoever guesses the closest wins the jar of jelly beans. You could use any sweet you liked in the jar.

Hokey pokey

Find a recording of the popular song and get all the kids to dance along and see who gets all the body parts right.

Limbo

Two adults hold up a pole and let the kids pass underneath one by one by bending over backwards…this continues as the pole is lowered and the most flexible or smallest player wins.

Musical chairs

To begin with a chair for each child except one is placed back to back in the centre of the room. Music is played and the children walk around the chairs until the music stops, when they all scramble to claim a chair. The child who misses out is out of the game. Each round another chair is removed until there is just one chair and one child left.

Pass the parcel

Wrap a prize in many layers of paper with small prizes hidden in the layers. The parcel is passed around the circle of children whilst the music is played. When the music stops whoever has the parcel unwraps a layer, getting closer to revealing and winning the prize. With many small prizes won along the way, this game is always a hit.

Pin the tail on the donkey

The child is blindfolded and turned around once or twice before they try to pin the tail in the right position on the donkey. The one who gets closest wins. Vary the donkey theme to suit your party…maybe wands on fairies, ears on rabbits, tails on monkeys, eye patches on parrots, tiaras on princesses, the possibilities are endless.

Piñata

Piñata’s can be made or purchased. The papier-mache shape is suspended high enough for the children to take turns swinging a stick at it to break open the shell and release the treats inside for all the children to share.

Red light, green light

Two lines are established at opposite ends of the playing area. One line is the goal line; the other is the starting line. One player is
"It" and stands on the goal line."It" shuts his eyes and counts to 10 a number of times. At the end of the count to 10, he calls out, "Green light" or any other color light. While he is counting, the players advance toward the goal line. When "It" calls "Red light," he opens his eyes and all of the players & must stop moving. Any player who "It" catches in motion must return to the starting line. Players can continue moving if any color other than "Red light" is called. The suspense of the game occurs as the players wonder what color will be called. The first player to reach the goal wins. The last one is "It" 
for the next game.

Relays

Simple relay  races can be done by dividing the kids into teams and racing with a prizes for the winning team members.

Sack race

Line the kids up standing in cloth or Hessian sacks then let them jump to the finish line and see who can do it fastest without falling over.

Simon says

Statues

Play some music for the kids to dance around to and when the music is stopped they all have to freeze and be “statues”. Whoever keeps moving is out of the game. The game continues until only the best statues remain.

Three legged race

The kids pair off and have one leg each tied together, then they race to see who works together best.

Toilet roll mummy wrap

The kids pair up and have a limited time period to create the best and most creative mummy.

Treasure hunt

Raid your local junk shop for interesting prizes to hide or simply use small packaged sweets (eg lollipops, wrapped sweets) and place them in semi hidden spots around the yard or house. For smaller children, remember that they will need the items to be fairly obvious or maybe create a trail for them to follow using tape on the ground or string. You can also use small brightly coloured markers to indicate that a prize is hidden somewhere in that area to help the hunters along.