Holiday and Recreational Activities
Humboldt-Universität regularly offers holiday activities for the children of its students and employees. Various other institutions in Berlin have holiday programmes for children of different ages.
Apart from that, there are many family centres and recreational facilities that offer activities for children throughout Berlin.
Humboldt-Universität activities
Humboldt-Universität regularly offers holiday activities for the children of its students and employees. This can be especially helpful to parents who are left without childcare when school and Kita holidays overlap with the university lecture period.
HU Sport and Recreation holiday programme: Watersports Week for HU Kids
Since 2017, HU Sport and Recreation (HU Hochschulsport) has offered Watersports Week for HU Kids at the Schmöckwitz Watersports Centre during the summer holidays. In a comprehensive and closely supervised programme, children have the opportunity to try out a wide variety of activities offered by the centre: stand-up paddleboarding, kayaking, raft building, sailing, climbing… The children are brought to and from the centre by bus from the main building. In 2018, the programme was expanded to include a windsurfing week.
During the 2019 summer holidays, the Institute for Sports Science at HU’s Campus Nord hosted its first edition of the summer sport weeks.
For more information on all the different programmes, see the HU Sport and Recreation website.
Family courses offered by HU Berlin Sport and Recreation
HU Berlin Sport and Recreation offers a number of courses meant specifically for families, new mums and women. The programme has courses with childcare as well as special athletic activities for women after pregnancy.
Non-HU activities
Holiday programmes
Countless Berlin institutions offer holiday activities and programmes with a cultural, creative, athletic or academic focus. The following is a selection of activities and programmes we can vouch for:
• Cabuwazi: Holidays at the circus
• Die gelbe Villa: Kreative holiday workshops
• Domäne Dahlem: Holidays on an organic farm
• Fußballschule Berlin: Soccer camps
• Jugend im Museum e. V.: Creative holidays
• Jugend in Berliner Wäldern e. V.: Holiday programme by the Spandau und Zehlendorf forest schools
• Mein bewegter Sommer: Athletic activities for primary school children during the summer holidays
• Mittelhof e. V.: Holidays at the multigenerational house Phoenix
• Museumsdorf Düppel: Find out what life was like in the Middle Ages
• Naturschutzzentrum Ökowerk: Holidays in the great outdoors
• Sports Island: Holiday camps for children aged 8 to 12
• Staatliche Museen zu Berlin: Workshops for children aged 6 to 12
• Stiftung Planetarium Berlin: Space explorer holidays for primary school children
You can find more activities on the Berlin Senate website, with pointers for your autumn and summer holidays, among other things. We also recommend the Super-Ferien-Pass (literally “super holidays pass”), available for children and adolescents up to age 18.
Family centres and activities for children and adolescents
Berlin’s family centres are a place where parents and families can meet, learn and build communities. They are places where you can talk with other parents, attend parent and toddler groups and take courses (e.g. in physical activities or music). On top of that, family centres offer a number of easily accessible consulting services (e.g. parenting, financial, health or nutritional advice). Many family centres also offer language classes for parents who do not speak German.
In addition to family centres, there are also institutions dedicated exclusively to children and adolescents (Kinder- und Jugendfreizeiteinrichtungen). They offer after-school activities open to all children or, in some cases, activities during school holidays. An overview of the majority of children's and youth leisure facilities in Berlin, sorted by district, can be found on the Berlin Senate website.
Playgrounds
Berlin is full of playgrounds for children of all different ages. You can find a district-by-district overview of the city’s playgrounds on the Berlin Senate website.