Duplicate a favorite board game you have at home like "Trouble," "Candyland" or "Shoots and Ladders" in a form for the road. Use a square of white cloth like calico to make the board. Draw the squares and images on the board with permanent markers or acrylic paints. Cover a large matchbox in felt or other material to act as the container for the game. Make the play pieces by gluing together 15-millimeter wooden square beads for the bodies and smaller round beads for the heads. Glue googley-eyes on and curly wire hair sticking out of the bead holes to finish the little characters. Fold the board into the box, lay the pieces on top, and the children are ready for the road with their own colorful game.
Before the trip, buy a pack of index cards and ask your children to draw pictures of 50 things they might see on the road. Help them brainstorm. You could see trees, various car models, signs with specific figures or food on them, mountains, cities, shapes in the clouds, lakes and rivers. Use the cards on the road trip as a car scavenger hunt. The children compete to see who can see the most things that match the items they drew on the cards.
Make the class game by taking a 3-inch by four-inch block of wood and drilling nine holes equal distance from each other on the block. Use two different colors of golf tees as the pieces. Allow your children to paint the wood before the trip to make it their own. Play Tic-Tac-Toe on the road between two players by taking turns placing the tees in the holes until one player is able to get a row of three in their color.
Create this game on the road. Give the children paper and markers and have them fold a piece of paper into three sections. The first player should draw the head of an animal or make-believe creature, then fold the paper so the head isn't visible. The second player will draw the main section or torso of the body and fold the paper again, and the third person will draw the legs. Unfold the paper and view the new critter.
