Wonderful sports day / athletic festival

[For 0-year-olds] Cute sports day themes: Ideas to make the event more fun

10 years as a kindergarten teacher / elementary school teacher / junior and senior high school teacher / childminderkepiko
Graduated from Kunitachi College of Music, Faculty of Music (now: Department of Music Culture and Education, Early Childhood Music Education major). In elementary school, my homeroom teacher was Jun Kusaba, a game researcher. After graduating from university, I worked for 10 years as a kindergarten teacher and for 7 years as an after-school childcare instructor, then took a post as a music teacher at an international school in Singapore. In addition to music education, I also engaged in activities that shared Japanese culture, traditional games, and recreational play, working with many children. Afterwards, through freelance writing, planning, and editing work at Shogakukan, I met many delightful adults and experienced the joy of communicating and conveying ideas. Leveraging the perspective cultivated in educational settings and my experience as an editor, I aim to deliver practical information—focusing on fields related to music and children—that values both input and output. Hobbies include instruments, singing, handcrafts, toys, drawing, traditional play, the outdoors, books, DIY, and crafts. Special skill: spinning-top tricks.
Deputy Editor of RAG MUSICsasashina
Deputy Editor of RAG MUSIC. JFC-certified fact-checker. I’m Sasashina, a mom currently raising an elementary schooler and a preschooler. During my student years at Kyoto College of Science and Technology, I studied a wide range of fields including sound, lighting, and video technology, building a foundation in comprehensive stage production and creative expression. After graduation, I joined a music production company, where I still work, consistently building experience in production and engaging in a variety of music-centered tasks. Currently, I mainly handle articles for children, drawing on what I’ve learned about parenting and what I feel and discover through daily interactions with my kids. I hope my work can be of help to you, even in a small way!

We’re introducing sports day themes perfect for 0-year-old classes, such as “picture books,” “nursery rhymes,” “anime,” and “vehicles”! For 0-year-olds, it’s still difficult to do activities all together like the older classes.

If you’re looking for ideas that babies can enjoy and that parents will love, creating a cohesive “world” or theme is probably the best approach.

Simply giving a theme to activities like crawling races, circuits, and parent-child interaction games will turn them into memorable, super fun times.

We also recommend dressing the children in costumes that match the theme!

[For 0-year-olds] Cute sports day themes: Ideas to make sports day more fun (21–30)

[Gymnastics] Animal Exercises

Tried dancing the Animal Exercise! [Dance] [1-year-olds] [Infants] [Daycare]

[Gymnastics] Animal Exercises

Animal Exercises is a routine where you act out various movements to match the animals mentioned in the song lyrics.

For one-year-olds and younger, simply clapping along to the music or swaying their bodies is more than enough to express it adorably.

The key for teachers is to demonstrate with big, clear movements.

Watching the children imitate in their own way naturally brings smiles to everyone observing.

To help them grow familiar with the song and flow, it seems like a good idea to make it part of the daily routine as practice.

These adorable zero-year-olds doing their exercises are a must-see!

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Olympics

If it’s an Olympic year, a sports day with an Olympic theme could be a lot of fun.

This event involves lighting the cauldron.

Each child holds a handmade torch and rides a trolley pulled by a parent to approach the cauldron.

Many children love riding on a trolley even outside of sports day.

For younger children, it’s important to create programs that focus more on enjoyable participation than on competition.

We hope you’ll make happy memories together.

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Hirakawa Masako (Bōkarisuto: Sakata Mizumako)

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In conclusion

Every theme was well thought out, and they all seemed perfect for parents and children to enjoy together! Using familiar materials like picture books and nursery rhymes might make it even more exciting. Making full costumes can be tough, but even just having hats would look great. I hope your first sports day turns out to be a wonderful time!