A Roarrr-ing Good
Zoo Theme Birthday Party

** The zoo theme also makes a great idea for a 1st birthday party.

Zoo Theme Party Activities

Animal Hands Temporary Tattoos

Let the fun begin! A great idea for a zoo theme party is to visit your local zoo. Alternatively, you could hire a zoo keeper or local animal handler to come to your party and bring some animals for your guests to experience first hand. If those choices aren't an option, you can still have a fun zoo party in your home. Here are some ideas to keep your little animals busy!

• Face Painting -- Set up a face painting station and let your guests choose which zoo animal they would like to be for a day.

• Balloon Animals -- Do a little research before your party about making balloon animals . Then impress your guests by making each child an animal to take home.

• The Roar of the Jungle Patterned Reading Play -- Click Here for a great patterned reading script where the children at your party become noisy jungle animals as you read their names aloud in this fun Reader's Theater play.

• Monkey Knot --Have your group stand in a large circle. Have everyone reach out their right hand and grab the right hand of someone else (preferably not the person next to them). Now have everyone reach out their left hand and grab the left hand of someone new. Your group will be in a tangled monkey knot! Have them work together to untangle themselves without letting go of anyone's hand.

• What Animal am I? -- Write the names of different zoo animals on index cards and tape a card to each child's back (without them seeing what animal they are). Have them go around to the other party guests and ask yes or no questions to try and figure out what animal they are.

• Animal Tail Tag -- Give each child a "tail" made from a sock, a piece of fabric, or a long strip of construction paper. Have them stick these into the back of the waistband of their pants to look like a tail. The goal of this game is to grab the other players' tails without losing your own. The last animal with a tail is the winner.

• Elephant Race -- Divide your zoo party guests into two relay teams. Put half of each team on one end of your race course and the other half on the other. Have your first elephant race to her teammate. She should put her arm between her legs to make a trunk. The teammate should stand behind her and grab the end of her trunk. Together these two elephants should then race back to their next teammate, who should grab the second player's trunk to form an elephant chain of three. Keep going until all teammates are conneted. The team who has all its members back to the starting line (without ever breaking their chain) is the winner.

• Find the Escaped Zoo Animals -- Before your party, hide a number of small plastic zoo animals around your yard or party area (enough for every child to find at least three). Tell your guests that the animals have escaped from the zoo and it is their job to find them all. Then send them off on a zoo animal scavenger hunt.

• Play a Zoo Animal Movie -- You might choose to quiet things down by showing a zoo theme movie such as Madagascar, The Wild, or The Lion King. You could also run a movie as a background scene setter to your event.

Zoo Party Favors

Send your guests off with a special memory of the event. Here are some ideas for zoo party favors:

* Zoo Keeper Pith Helmets

* Toy Zoo Animals

* Boxes of Animal Crackers

* Bean Bag Zoo Animals

* Zoo Animal Lollipops

* Toy Binoculars

If you enjoyed these zoo party ideas, you might also enjoy these parties:

Jungle Party

Carnival Party

Monkey Party