Marble Boat Challenge

Most parents or grown-ups charged with entertaining a child will agree - if in doubt, #justaddwater.

Whether the sea, a lake, pond, river, pool, bath or puddle - a body of water has the potential to provide fun and amusement for hours (as well as respite from heat). Though very little is needed to occupy children who have water as their entertainment, a challenge can provide a focus and something the whole family can get involved in.

It’s a great challenge - a relatively simple premise, but calling for ingenuity and creative problem-solving. It requires foraging for likely materials, some grasp of physics (learning on the job is perfectly acceptable), figuring our how to fasten bits of stuff together, trial and error and very probably a sense of humour. Younger children will need some help from the most qualified adult on the scene.

From the simple (a fortuitously boat-shaped piece of bark) to the ambitious (a raft of woven reeds), no boat will be the same and every one of them able to keep a marble afloat even for seconds will be a tremendous success - prompting that wonderful achievement-glow that a child gives off when they ‘do a thing’.

Why not give it a go? We’d love to see how you get on so do tag us on social media and share the fun! @denkitco

*this is up to you, entirely dependent upon the age of the child, the water source (tides/waves/current/hungry piranhas) etc. Our challenge had a start and finish line around 100 yards apart. It goes without saying - always supervise children around water.