Thread: Help with a kid friendly haunted house.

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Hi, my daughters school is doing a fall/halloween party, and I volunteered to help. One thing I would like to do for the party is a haunted house. However all of the ideas I can think of would be too scary. The school runs K through 8th grade. Does anyone have experience with this sort of thing? Thanks in advance.

My grade school used to do a haunted house every year for their Halloween party, it was fairly scary I think, but no one complained... I loved it when I was a kid.
Some things I remember they did was a maze of "bloody" sheets, a scene with witches stirring a cauldron, a spider room, a cemetery scene with a guy dressed as the Grim Reaper and someone jumping out of a coffin (the person didn't jump out right next to the kids).
Another option is to do a "Dead Man's Brains" type thing where you have the kids stick their hand in different containers of food in the dark and you tell them it's eyeballs and stuff. It's gross but not too scary.

Hi, thanks for the reply. I used to help with a haunted house at the church that my scout troop used to meet at when I was a kid, but that was long ago and I don't really remember what we did. I like the spider room, and the cemetery idea. I want to do an octagon room made of mirrors, with a clown. And I was thinking about a hallway that they had to go through with things sticking out that would feel like hands that they would have to push past, then one would be a real hand that would grab them.

Your "dead mans brains" idea sounds like a game that I want to do where they have to try and fish out a token from different bowels of gross stuff. Then a prize would be awarded based on what token was picked.

One thing you can add for the spider room, or leading up to it, is threads hanging down from the ceiling. I've been to several haunted houses where they had that and it really feels like spider webs or something are touching you.

how about a peppers ghost? set it up in the cafeteria kitchen, it will explain where the mystery meat comes from

My yearbook staffs used to do a haunted house at the annual Halloween carnival. We held it in the old basement of one of the buildings. The carnival was for K-12, but we went scary. Even a lot of little kids came through. We were always compliment and told ours was as good or better than the big haunted house. One thing that I think added a lot was having a guide to take small groups through. We made sure they were really costumed out---Vampire, Lady Vamp, or something very well done. This person sort of wove a tale as they walked through. They learned to improvise through the night and it was great.

we do one for that exact age group, ours is all ages. I can help you with specific questions if you have any. I'd suggest #1 priority be safety- nothing that can fall, tip, break, etc. Nothing on the floor, no change in floor levels, nothing hanging from the ceiling that can get around their necks.

After that, it's ALL about the use of light and sound. You can get by with very little props. Have other parents volunteer, make a "no touch" rule and make it a hair scarier than you think. One thing about kids, they either will think it's fun or lame. A half scare will get you eye rolls. We give dollar store lanterns to groups with small kids- this is the clue to the workers that these kids need a more mild experience.

Distorted mirrors -- sheets of mylar
Hall of Hands -- they paint their hands and put on walls, but when the lights go out, the hands glow.
Mirror "Maze" -- outline a path on the ceiling with masking tape. Kids have to hold a mirror and follow the line, looking only in the mirror.
Outer Space room -- basically a dot room, but easier. Shake and slice open a standard-issue cyalume (light stick). Whirl it around the room, getting splashes on walls, ceilng, floor, etc. Looks like they're walking through space, and I've never had the fluid stain.
Cardboard box maze. Moving boxes, refrigerator cartons, etc. Cut holes in them and tape them together. Kids crawl through, one at a time.
Witch stirring her cauldron, but gives out apple cider or candy.
DCH

How about making some Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin cut outs (painted) from wood or large corregated cardboard, to use as decorations that won't scare the younger kids. Kids can have their pictures taken with Charlie Brown, Lucy, Snoopy, Linus and Sally in the pumpkin patch. If you want, some (or all of the characters) could be headless or have holes cut in their faces, so little kids can put their faces/heads in there for the picture....but be sure the displays won't tip over while kids are leaning on them

Adding to diajoh's idea of the distored mirrors.....make sure that any pictures hanging on the wall have been tilted so that they are hanging crookedly, and have spiderwebs hanging on them.

Martha Stewart had a spider sillouette pattern that you can print out, and trace on to black construction paper or black poster board, to make various sized spider cut outs and put them on the wall. Make a bunch of them and have a whole wall of spiders.....use black thread attached behind the spider cut outs running straight up the wall all the way to the ceiling to add to the effect....it's a pretty cool, and an inexpensive decoration.