Laughing and Learning

• What: Mad Libs for Kids
• When: 7 years and up
• Why: Entertaining, compact, educational
• Where: Amazon

If you want to sneak in some education while keeping kids laughing, take a page from Mad Libs, those classic fill-in-the-blank stories. 

Best of Mad Libs on Amazon

Each Mad Libs book comes with pages that can be torn out and completed. Kids can take turns asking other people to supply certain parts of speech, like nouns, verbs, and adjectives, to complete the story. Once they fill in all the blanks without giving away the topic, they can read it out loud to the amusement of everyone. 

Here’s what happens when you let nine year olds supply words for Mad Libs. Oh well, at least they got the parts of speech mostly right.

Kids get great practice writing, learning parts of speech, and reading out loud, all without realizing it. The pages can easily be sent through the mail without spoiling the surprise. And kids can play alone, too. Each page includes a list of the types of words needed for the next story, so that a single person can select the words without knowing the context. Then they add them into the story on the following page and see what happens. This system also works well between pen pals and to go back and forth via mail to keep kids entertained and reaching out to friends and family.

Have a friend or family member supply words and write them in directly. Or use them solo by filling in the words on the top without reading the story.

You can get Mad Libs in a variety of themes, from unicorns to history to vacation. These notebooks work well for traveling by car or airplane to keep boredom at bay for older kids who can read and write. Or have a grown up help younger kids come up with words, and record them in the correct spaces to enjoy the hilarity with kids who can’t write. No matter how or when you choose to use them, the humor keeps everyone entertained.