Summer photo walk for kids #31daysofactivities

Getting the kids out of the house isn’t always easy. But it will surely be easier if you take them on a fun activity, like this summer photo walk for kids. This is the next activity idea in our #31daysofactivities series and is brought to you by Madeline from This Glorious Life.

Have you ever been on a photo walk before?

It’s really as simple as it sounds.  You take a camera with you when you head out for a family walk and take photos of the things you see.

You can use whatever camera you have for this activity.  It could be a point-and-shoot, the camera on your phone, or a kids camera if you have one.  As long as you’re happy with your child using it, go with whatever camera you want!

Photo walks are such a fun way to add some creativity to a walk in the park or the woods, and they’re brilliant for encouraging children to really see the world around them.

They’re also a great way to introduce younger children to photography and give older children a chance to improve their skills and see different photo opportunities.

You can keep the scope of your photo walk wide open and let the children take photos of anything and everything that catches their eye.

Or you can challenge them to stick to a theme or complete a photo scavenger hunt.

One of my family’s favourite themes for photo walks is ‘colours of the rainbow’.  So as you go about your walk you look out for things that are red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple and take photos of those things.

If you need something a bit less open to keep your children focused on your walk, then sticking with a photo scavenger hunt is a great idea.

We’ve created a printable list you can use with 14 things to look out for and take photos of.  Some of the items are more specific like ‘a yellow flower’, and others are more open to creativity like ‘something cold’.

Let your child get creative with how they interpret the prompts though.  The yellow flower could be a print on a dress, rather than an actual flower!

Remember that the whole point of a photo walk is just to have fun and to let the children get creative with photography while also encouraging them to pay more attention to the world around them.

After your photo walk you can put together a colourful photo collage with all your pictures.  Or you could do a few photo walks over the summer and then put all the photos together in a photo book as a reminder of all the fun you had as a family.

Here are a few quick tips for a successful summer photo walk with kids.

Set your children up for success

The main point of a photo walk is to have fun, so don’t make it too challenging.

Pick a theme for your photo walk that’s appropriate for both your child’s age and where you’ll be going on your walk.

Young children might do better with a really simple theme of just taking photos of things that are one particular colour, for example.

And if you’re planning on using our printable for your photo walk then you’ll need to head for somewhere like the local park where you’re more likely to see the items instead of, say, the beach where it might be harder to find everything.

Look up and look down

Take your time on your walk and encourage your child to look all around them to find things to take photos of.

Point out things that are above them and below them.  Get them to crouch down and see what different things they can see from that different perspective.

Encourage their creativity

Let your child take the lead and give them the freedom to take the photos that they want to take.

Encourage them to get creative with their photo composition by getting in close and changing their angles, and keep it fun by letting them lie down on the ground or climb on a bench to take a photo.

However you decide to go about it, we hope you enjoy going on a family photo walk as much as we do!

If your kids like photography, then these photography articles will help you have fun taking photos with your kids.

Here are more photography ideas from the web, too.

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See you for the next post,

Helen

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