Creative Brain Activities For Halloween
Halloween is most closely associated with kids wearing their favorite costumes and going trick-or-treating. But there’s no reason to limit the experience to a single night of fun and games. We can celebrate the spooky holiday all month long and exercise our brain while we’re at it. Here are three ways to add some creativity and fun to the Halloween season.
Arts and crafts
Halloween is the season of the imagination. Beyond kids imagining themselves as their favorite characters, we can encourage them to stretch their imagination muscles even more by getting crafty around the house. Maybe it’s getting creative with pumpkin carving or building fun decorations for the yard. Or maybe we can help them create their own costume by hand instead of buying a premade outfit from the store.
When we make paper mache ghosts or monsters out of egg crates––complete with googly-eyes, we activate different areas in our brain. It helps us focus, increases our attention span, improves hand-eye coordination, and helps with memory formation and retrieval. Crafts also help us relax, boosting our mood, and reducing stress. And when we complete crafts with friends and family, we bond and form memories, increasing our overall sense of well-being and happiness.
Create spooky treats
There are a ton of creative ways to add some Halloween flair to snacks and meals. We can turn bananas into ghosts, cut kiwi into sunflower-teethed monsters, or add pretzel legs to make spider sandwiches. And if we want to get super creative, there are a ton of recipes to make elaborate treats for goblins and ghouls of all ages.
Outside of stretching our creativity muscles, which is a good exercise for our brain in and of itself, cooking is an excellent way to strengthen our cognitive skills. When we look up recipes, plan meals or cooking plans, and execute the recipe, we are using our higher-level executive function cognitive processes. It promotes brain flexibility, helps us focus, improves concentration, and enhances our working memory.
Decorating
Whether we carve pumpkins and place them on the porch or design a mini-haunted house, decorating the home is a wonderful way to keep the entire family engaged in a creative endeavor. This is an activity that can be done both indoors and outside, and there is no right or wrong way to decorate.
The physical effort in placing decorations around the home or yard is a great way to get some physical exercise in. It’ll improve blood circulation which raises our oxygen levels in the brain. Figuring out where to place certain decorations helps with spatial awareness and can enhance problem-solving. And everyone can be given tasks appropriate for their age, skill set, and ability, which boosts confidence.
Conclusion
While Halloween night is the culmination of the season, it doesn’t have to be the only night full of fun, laughter, and games. We can add creative Halloween treats, fun arts and crafts, and get the entire family involved in decorating our space. No matter how big or small, there are any number of ways to creatively celebrate the season.
