Sidewalk Stencils Make Sidewalks Fun!

Popular Sidewalk Stencils The primary function of a sidewalk is to provide pedestrians with a relatively safe area within which to traverse from one place to another, without having to endure the danger of being hit by a moving vehicle on the street.

For the outdoors-loving child, however, the sidewalk is a canvas of infinite possibility, a long, blank strip of concrete that can be used for painting all sorts of fanciful designs, as well as to host a wide variety of popular games. The imaginations of children would be limited only by the colors and the amount of street chalk that they would bring, and hours of fun could be had with little more than a few playmates and a slab of pavement to bring to life. Children today tend to be somewhat more sophisticated and demanding in their sidewalk conversion - no longer will the clumsy, crooked lines of hopscotch courts of yesteryear suffice for their playtime needs.
Kids these days require precision and design in their playthings.
To answer their call, stencil manufacturing companies have come up with a wide variety of fun and fanciful stencils geared mainly to provide re-usable, quick-paint entertainment.

Some of the more renowned stencil designs are: Hopscotch.
Easily one of the oldest and most loved playground games in the world, hopscotch is played with a variety of different grids, though the most common one is shaped like a tall nail with two sections jutting out, which is made up of numbered boxes.

A hopscotch grid stencil is a no-brainer for sidewalk play, requiring very little space for a game to commence. USA Map.
The map of the United States is an interesting playground addition, because it is mainly educational, but also offers a variety of play options.
Children can make a game out of naming or identifying the various states, or create rules that somehow involve the United States, such as with the detective geography game Where in the U.

S.
A.
is Carmen Sandiego (Look it up if you aren't familiar with this Broderbund classic).
World Map. The general idea for play purposes is the same as the U.
S. map, but on a larger scale.

A world map can be used to identify countries of the world and has more play variety potential because the whole planet is involved.
For older kids, a giant-sized game of Risk or some other map strategy endeavor may lead to hours of intense, concentrated outdoor play, though with less running around than you may want to encourage for children. Brick or Stone Patterns.
Sidewalks can be made to look very upscale when patterned sidewalk stencils are used to paint them.
Dress up your sidewalk to look like hand laid brick or stone.

There are a variety of patterns available, from natural stone, to basket-swirl brick.
4 Square. This game requires a wider sidewalk or an empty lot to be laid out and played properly. Nonetheless, it is a common adversarial game that only needs a ball for plenty of short, furious sessions.