The holiday season is a time for festivities, joy, and creating cherished memories.
For teenagers, a Christmas-themed scavenger hunt is the perfect blend of tradition and technology, making it an interactive and exciting way to celebrate.
This memorable and fun-filled Christmas Scavenger hunt caters to the interests of tech-savvy teens.
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Preparing For A Christmas Scavenger Hunt
Duration: Approximately 2-3 hours, depending on the number of clues and participants.
Materials Needed
- A smartphone
- A list of clues and challenges
- Prizes for the winning team
- Santa hats or other festive attire for added fun
Make Teams
To begin, divide the participants into teams of 3-5, ensuring that each team has a charged smartphone or digital camera to document their found clues.
Holiday Scavenger Hunt Clues
Create a list of Christmas-themed clues and challenges that involve both physical and digital tasks. Here are some examples:
Santa Selfie: Teams must take a creative selfie with a stranger dressed as Santa Claus or any Santa-related decoration or display.
Caroling Challenge: Each team must record a video of themselves singing a Christmas carol to a stranger, who must give them a thumbs-up or a smile.
Ornament Hunt: Provide a clue to find a hidden ornament at a designated location in your area. Once found, they must take a picture of it.
Emoji Puzzle: Share a series of emojis representing a famous Christmas movie title. Teams must decipher the puzzle and take a picture or video acting out a scene from the movie.
- ❄️🚂🍬🍫🍭🔔( Polar Express)
- ⛄❄️🎩(Frosty)
- 💰👼🔔(It’s A Wonderful Life)
- ✈️🏠💔(Home Alone)
- 🎅🎄📖🦵🤓(A Christmas Story)
- 👵🦌(Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer)
Variation: Holiday Movie Hunt: Create a list of holiday movie scenes or quotes. Teams must visit various locations and recreate the quotes through photos and videos.
For example, they might reenact a famous scene from “Home Alone” or quote a line from “Elf.” It’s a unique way to combine movie trivia and a scavenger hunt for a cinematic holiday adventure!
Scavenger Selfie: Each team must take a selfie with a stranger wearing a Christmas-themed sweater. Bonus points for particularly extravagant sweaters!
Holiday Yard Decor Hunt: Teams embark on a festive journey to find specific holiday items, such as candy canes, Santas, and more, cleverly incorporated within dazzling yard displays of Christmas decorations.
Food Drive Challenge: Encourage the spirit of giving by asking teams to visit a local food bank or shelter and take a photo while dropping off a donation.
Elfie Selfie: Teams must find someone dressed as an elf and take a festive selfie with them.
DIY Craft Challenge: Provide teams with a list of crafting supplies and a set of instructions to create a specific holiday-themed craft. Teams must find the supplies and create the craft within a time limit. Judges can evaluate the creativity and quality of each team’s creation.
Christmas Tree Time: Teams must take a group photo in front of the tallest Christmas tree they can find.
Gingerbread House Hunt: Create a riddle that leads to a hidden gingerbread house somewhere in your location. The first team to find it wins a bonus prize.
Holiday Lights Spectacle: Teams must visit a local street known for its dazzling holiday lights display and capture the most beautifully decorated house.
Holiday Recipe Scavenger Hunt: Teams receive a list of ingredients for a classic holiday recipe (e.g., gingerbread cookies, hot chocolate) and clues that lead them to different stores or locations where they can find these ingredients. The goal is to gather all the ingredients within a time limit and return to the starting point to bake the holiday treat together.
Reindeer Relay: Create a series of challenges or tasks related to Santa’s reindeer (e.g., Dasher’s Dash – a sprint, Prancer’s Puzzle – a riddle to solve). Teams must complete these challenges and collect clues that lead to the final treasure.
For tech-savvy adults, make it a Snapchat Scavenger Hunt: This is the same idea but has players or teams send a snap each time they find or complete an item or post a video before receiving the next clue.
Need more Christmas scavenger hunt ideas or help?
RiddleMe: From setting up the event, creating invitations, creating the activities, and even printing thank you cards, Riddle Me brings you through the whole scavenger party process.
Enter the details for your event such as, how many guests, the average age, a theme, and a few other details. The site does the rest, including a printable list of items, clues, or challenges. Use your own clues or choose preset ones. With over 7000 scavenger hunt riddles, you can use the site again and again. See their demo video here.
Wrapping Up A Christmas Scavenger Hunt
Scoring
To keep the game exciting, assign point values to each task based on difficulty and creativity. You can also offer bonus points for the quickest team to complete all the tasks.
Social Media Sharing
Encourage teams to document their scavenger hunt journey on social media, using a specific hashtag to share their pictures and videos.
Review and Winner Announcement
After the scavenger hunt, gather all the teams back at your starting point.
Go through their photos and videos, tally the points, and declare the winning team.
Award fun and festive prizes like holiday-themed mugs, gift cards, or even a trophy.
12 Cocoas of Grinchmas Holiday Hot Cocoa Variety Pack
Share the Fun
To wrap up the event, host a little party with hot chocolate, snacks, and shareable holiday treats.
Share guests’ favorite photos and videos.
A Christmas-themed scavenger hunt is a fun addition to a Secret Santa party, family celebration, or other teen group event to create lasting memories. Happy hunting!
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