Annual Nursery Rhyme Treasure Hunt

We held our Annual Nursery Rhyme treasure hunt today with the cousins. It was simple, but fun!

To start off, I made a treasure map which you can download here. After printing it off, I tore the edges of the paper to make it look worn, then brewed myself a cup of coffee, read a book while enjoying that cup of coffee and then used the grounds to rub on the paper making it look like a "real" treasure map.  I told the kids I was able to get the map from the pirates we ran into last week.

Photo Credit--Katie =)

I wrote the first clue on the treasure map and then all the rest were hidden based on the following nursery rhyme clues. These are some of the ones I used:

Old Mother Hubbard
Went to the cupboard,
To give the poor dog a bone:
When she came there,
The cupboard was bare,
And so the poor dog had none.

Ladybug ladybug fly away home,
Your house in on fire and your children are gone,
All except one and that's little Ann,
For she crept under the frying pan.

Photo Credit-Katie

Seesaw Margery Daw
Johnny shall have a new master
He shall earn but a penny a day
Because he can't work any faster

Mary, Mary quite contrary,

How does your garden grow?

With silver bells and cockleshells and pretty maids all in a row.

I hi-lited the clue word in red so that it would be a little easier for the kids to figure out where the next clue was (the kids are ages 6, 4 and 3). Since my oldest can read, he read the clues and the girls followed along to the next clue hiding spot.

We did this all in our backyard with the exception of the 2nd to last clue which was:

Mary had a little lamb it’s fleece was white as snow.

It followed her to school one day
school one day, school one day,
It followed her to school one day,
which was against the rules.

We then went to a nearby school to find the last clue which read:

I scream, you scream, we all scream for....

Ice Cream!

    Then we took all the kids to a local ice cream place and celebrated! Everyone seemed to have a fun time and we made some good memories. :)

Not sure what kind of looks these are...!

I love doing this with the kids because it's a fun family activity that you can invite family or friends to do and it promotes literacy for those that can read. They get a great opportunity to practice reading aloud, except they dont' even realize they're practicing. :) Plus, it exposes them to some nursery rhymes that they might not otherwise know about. Besides, you get some really cute pictures along the way. You should try it sometime! Let me know how it goes!