🦁 Animal Bingo

How to play animal bingo

1. Pick which animals, how big a card, and how many cards. Every card is different.
2. Print the cards, one for each player, and the calling cards at the end. A crayon or a few buttons marks the squares.
3. The caller draws a calling card, or taps “Peabody calls them” and lets Peabody show and say each animal.
4. Find that animal on your card and mark it. On a big card the middle square is free.
5. A whole row marked, across, down or corner to corner (three squares on a little card, four on a middle one, five on a big one), and you shout “Bingo!”

Six kinds of animal bingo

• Zoo and safari bingo (32 animals): the savanna, the rainforest and the desert, from lions and giraffes to sloths and meerkats.
• Ocean animal bingo (31 animals): whales, sharks, octopuses and sea turtles from the ocean page.
• Backyard and woods bingo (32 animals): the ones you might really see on a walk, from robins and squirrels to deer.
• Rivers and ponds bingo (21 animals): frogs, beavers, ducks and fish.
• Dinosaur bingo (40 animals): every dinosaur, pterosaur and sea reptile in the dinosaur wing.
• Every animal (105 animals): the whole of Peabody’s animals, for older players and long games.

Take it outside: bingo at the zoo or on a walk

Print a zoo and safari card before a trip to the zoo, or an ocean card for the aquarium, and mark each animal when you see it. A backyard and woods card works on a walk round the block. Watch wild animals from a distance, and never pick one up or feed it: the best spotters are quiet and still.

For a classroom or a party

Print up to thirty different cards at once, so every child gets their own. Little cards (three by three) suit preschool and kindergarten, where pictures matter more than names; big cards (five by five, with a free middle) suit older children. Let the winner read the next animal’s fact from its page, or tap through to it and compare it with another animal.

Questions grown-ups ask

Is it free? Yes, with no ads and nothing to sign up for. Is anything sent anywhere? No: the cards are made in your browser, and the choices you make stay on this page. Can we play without a printer? Yes: each player can use a phone or tablet card, or the caller can show the animals on a big screen while players draw their own card on paper.