With the recent release of Minecraft Dungeons, my kids have been reinvigorated in activities around the iconic game. I’ve been playing Minecraft Dungeons with them when I get the chance and it’s a really fun game. Still has the look and feel of Minecraft but with enhanced graphics and more of a quest adventure, it’s something me and my kids can all have fun playing together.
Needless to say, we broke out some old Minecraft toys and our activity book and set out to have a little fun this week. Alex, Steve and Zombie joined us in our little adventure and they got to have some fun with us.
The first activity we chose was LAB 17: Fire Away in our Minecraft Lab For Kids book (I’ll share the link at the end of the post).
Steve, Alex and Zombie were already arguing about who was going to be the best shot in our game of “Fire Away”. Each one thought they could get it the farthest or the closest to the bullseye. After getting everyone focused on the task at hand, making the bow and arrow, tensions subsided and we all sat down and figured out what materials we were going to need and what we would be doing to make our own bow and arrows for target practice.
I, the Mom, settled into the kitchen and soaked the Popsicle sticks in hot water so they would be ready for bending into a bow. Once they had soaked long enough, I notched little indents on both sides of the stick and on both ends of the stick. This was going to be used for wrapping the string (household floss) around.
Only an adult should be doing the notching as it requires a sharp knife and can be dangerous.
Finally, we were ready to string our bows, but I pulled a little too hard on the first one and accidentally snapped the stick in half! I felt terrible that I didn’t wait long enough for the sticks to soften. Thankfully, I still had one to work with and set out not to mess this one up!
The sticks need to soak for about an hour in really hot water so they bend easily and don’t snap like the way mine did.
Success! We had a finished bow for shooting and just needed to make some little Q-Tip arrows. I quickly snipped off a bunch of fuzzy ends from some Q-Tip’s and now our team was ready for practice shooting! We got all the supplies over to the archery team and every one lined up ready to go!
Alex was the first to line up, she is an amazing shot and she knows it, too. Steve and Zombie sat back and let her go first. She hit every target she aimed at and they all had a good time playing and shooting. Team work and having a fun time are elements of this activity that really bring a lot more joy to it. Kids learn how to work together, share and have fun.
We did find that everything was so little that it was hard at times to get the Q-Tip lined up on the string to shoot, but we enjoyed this project a lot. My son enjoyed getting his toys out and having a little Minecraft activity hour. Incorporating play time and learning time are essential for young kids to retain information and learn from the things they do. We used to worry that our kids were spending too much time on video games, but once we got this book, it helped us incorporate real-world activities with their video games. This provided a much more rounded activity time and family bonding.
Family activities are an essential piece of our household and I hope that this one gave you all some ideas of things you or someone you know can do as well. Stay tuned for Part II where we will build an archery in our Minecraft world on PS4!
What are some things you like to do as a family that incorporates multiple elements like this?
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Adventures in Literature 
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