We’ve all probably had a little bit more home time in the past six months. And screen time is likely up a bit as well, too. But something our family really is loving is game time. We have three boys, ages 10, 7, and 5, and although their abilities vary, we have found some family board games we can play together.
Our time around the table has been precious and fun. Playing games together builds patience, literacy, number skills, and manners. It’s been so good!
Here are some games we love. Some may be ones you already know, but maybe it will bring them to mind again to encourage you to pull them out of the closet, or maybe you will find a new family board game you want to try.
Best Family Board Games
Uno This is a classic. Kids can learn this one pretty young as long as they know their numbers and colors. Our youngest who is a Kindergartener this year loves Uno. He loves to stick a draw two to ya and it has really helped him solidify his numbers. There is also a newer version of Uno that lets you to create add-in cards. Our oldest loved writing ideas out like, “Everyone draws four!” and ” Draw four to someone, you pick!” We have also made up our own family rule that a green eight is known as a, “grenade,” and the next person has to draw two!
Sushi Go We learned this game from a friend, and it is a fun, quick-paced card passing game where you try to assemble different sushi combo cards. The game is recommended for ages eight and up, but our five year old was able to learn it and really enjoys it. There are a lot of different strategies to the game and it has been fun seeing our kids pick their favorite sushi to collect. It’s also a great game to work on math with adding up different points for the scores. We also started playing the dice game version called Sushi Roll.
Monopoly Junior Let’s be honest, the real game of Monopoly takes FOREVER, so I really appreciate the Junior version. It’s simple and only deals with $1 bills so counting is easy for the little ones. The chance cards do require the ability to read, so our younger two need some help, but they really love this game and it plays quickly.
Go Fish This is another quick game that always leads to some friendly competition around the table. I picked up this set of card games that also included Memory for our youngest for Christmas last year and it has been a hit!
Left, Center, Right This game is a quick chip and dice game that almost anyone can play. And you get practice with your lefts and rights, which I actually need sometimes! LOL! Each player starts with three chips and takes turns rolling dice that have symbols on them to pass a chip left, pass a chip right, put it in the center, or keep. The last player standing with chips wins and everyone stays at the table even when they’re out of chips because you never know when one will be passed your way. This is a great one to keep in your purse for restaurants, too!
Ticket to Ride First Journey If you have ever played the adult version of this game, you know it is pretty simple. You collect trains to build train routes across the country on the game board. The junior version is more simplistic and our kids really enjoy it!
Catan Junior This is the kid’s version of Settlers of Catan. It is a simplistic game of the original, and our kids caught on to it really fast. The gist of the game is you use resources to build settlements around a landscape. It’s really different than your traditional board games, so it’s worth getting to change things up a bit!
Boggle We started playing Boggle when we were home in April. We modified the rules so each member of the family could play. We encouraged our youngest who was four at the time to just write down letters he recognized. Our first grader could write down any word he found including two-letter words. Our fourth grader needed to find three or more letter words, and my husband and I stuck with four or more letter words. It works out for everyone!
Robot Turtles This is an introduction to coding game that works on kids developing their knowledge of commands in a sequence. The boys enjoy playing this many times and it requires some good thinking skills.
Candyland You probably already know about this game, but I just have to remind you it’s a classic! I love that you can get different cartoon versions of it, too.
Spot It This is a circular card game where each card has exactly one thing the same as each other card in the deck. You race your competition to see who can spot the similarity with their card the quickest. Anyone can play and it comes in a handy metal tin that is great for throwing in your purse. We took it to baseball games this summer to help the little brothers pass the time.
What are your favorite family board games?
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