Contest Details
Each proposed game should be created and played by kids age 6-12. There doesn’t need to be any fancy equipment, just basic things like balls and hula-hoops. What we really need is your creativity! This is your chance to invent the game that kids will play for hours all over the country!
No entries will be received after June 17, 2012. The top 6 finalists will be notified by email or phone on or before June 30, 2012, and then flown to San Francisco in July 2012 where they will present their games to the judges.
Game Ideas
Here are some winning game ideas to help you get inspired!
Sponge Ball Fill-Up
Sponge Ball Fill-Up
Soak up the fun and stay cool in this team water race.
Alligator Tail
Alligator Tail
Kids show off their fancy footwork and throwing skills in this light-hearted reptile chase.
Eagle's Nest
Eagle's Nest
Kids' imaginations take flight with this strategic tag game.
Meet Our Backyard Game Expert!
Richard Louv is the author of eight books about the connections between family, nature and community. His new book, THE NATURE PRINCIPLE: Reconnecting with Life in a Virtual Age, offers a new vision of the future, in which our lives are as immersed in nature as they are in technology to better our psychological, physical and spiritual health.
His bestselling book, LAST CHILD IN THE WOODS: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder, stimulated an international movement to reconnect kids and nature. Co-founder of the Children & Nature Network, an organization helping build the movement to connect today's children and future generations to the natural world, Louv coined the term Nature–Deficit Disorder® to define this important issue. In 2008, he received the Audubon Medal.
"New research suggests that children are more likely to invent their own games in green play spaces than they are on flat cement or playing fields. Kids are healthier, happier and more creative when they spend more time outdoors. I'm excited to be a partner with CLIF Kid in its terrific effort to encourage kids and their families to reconnect with nature and invent their own games — beginning in their own back yards!"
— Richard Louv, author of The Nature Principle and Last Child in the Woods
Prizes
The CLIF Kid Backyard Game of the Year Contest wants you to get outside and dream up a fun backyard game for you and your friends to play. You could totally win big!
You could win a new bike, a $10,000 scholarship, or a trip to SF!