Ramadhan activities help to encourage children to fast during Ramadhan

1. creating a 99 names of Allah (SWT) challenge
2. participating in Ramadhan Quran'-a-thon
3. making ramadhan crafts

4. Encourage charitable activities, for example:

(a) We distribute donated gifts and create packages for the Summer Islamic Reading Challenge participants and mail them out together during Ramadan (stuffing envelopes, picking the awards, etc.).

(b) Donate perishable foods to a food pantry.

(c) Donate clothes and linens to charitable organizations, ideally a masjid.
(d) Keep a Sadaqah bank, and encourage giving during the last ten days of Ramadan for extra rewards, instead of on Eid.
(e) Create something of sadaqah jariyah (on-going charity) in words together, such as this list that will help other Muslims and their families. My girls and I are writing this together right now while we’re fasting.
(f) Find out if poor families live near or around you, and make Eid/Ramadan goody bags for each of their family members. Deliver zakat al-fitr as a family.
(g) Slaughter as a family, and give the meat you slaughtered to the poor.
(h) Make random donations to the poor, and let your kids go with you. Remind them that any charity offered during Ramadan is multiplied.
(i) By following your example, your kids will start making their own random donations, such as allowance that would normally be used for candy would become a donation.
(j) Volunteer as much as possible together, ideally for Muslim organizations, but don’t discount needs in your community, e.g., we volunteer a great deal of time to homeschool organizations, public libraries, etc.
(k) Offer to organize a fundraiser for your local masjid, or run one virtually online.
(l) Volunteer to hold an Islamic contest, and have your kids participate.
(m) Head or assist in running a Qur’an competition, and encourage your kids to compete.

Tips to help kids fast (part 2)

Make wudu once you get out of bed because it will fully awaken you. Allow yourself to air dry. Do not towel dry your wudu. Allow wudu to be refreshing.

Make suhoor/Fajr routines as a family, especially if the actions are sunnah. 

For example: We take turns reciting Qur’an between suhoor and Fajr and just sip glasses of water until the adhan, Pray Fajr on time, Do not rush through the two rakas of Fajr, Watch Mekkah live on the internet, Read Qur’an until shurook and share the hadith about staying in the same position you prayed fajr until you pray sunrise prayer.

Let the kids sleep in a little, such as 9 – 10am. Do not let the kids sleep in late, for example, until Dhuhr or mid-day.

Pray all prayers on-time together, as a family.

Have kids pick iftaar meal.

Have kids help make iftaar meal with you, and make a surprise side dish.

Do not have kids help in the kitchen near food if you know they can’t resist tasting the food. For example, one of our daughters loves making salads because she loves eating fresh vegetables. When she was younger, she made innocent mistakes and took intentional snacks. We worked hard to preoccupy her during food preparation until she was old enough to resist this temptation.

Have kids pick iftaar dessert.




Have kids help make iftaar dessert with you, and set aside a tiny sweet surprise.
Encourage kids to walk away from tempting situations involving food (i.e., snack bars at stores, cafeterias, restaurants, etc.)

Encourage kids to walk away from confrontation with others (especially siblings) by saying “I’m fasting” in a kind, gentle way and walk away politely. Do not allow kids to pass it off as a brash excuse to be rude.

Learn Qur’anic Arabic together with rules of Tajweed. Remember it is an obligation upon every Muslim to read and recite the Qur’an. The talent to memorize is a gift.

Memorize Qur’an together. Set a personal and family goal as to number of lines, ayats, surahs, pages, etc. for the month and work each day to meet this goal.

Encourage kids to have private reflexive time to contemplate a given chore: tafsir, reflecting on the poor, etc

10 tips to help kids fast during ramadhan (Part 1)

1. Discuss honestly in open the importance of setting one’s intentions to fast for the sake and pleasure of Allah subhanallahu wa Ta’ala, and Him alone. Share all the Islamic principles of this one selfless act and the grave rewards towards the giving of oneself purely as a devout servant of God. These strong deep intentions much be at the root of their fast and must proceed the physical action of fasting. Since the intention of fasting must be made the night before, make the intentions together as a family each night.
2. Create an atmosphere that encourages your children to want to fast. As minors, children must ask and seek permission from their parents to fast. While making intentions together the night before fasting in Ramadan, permission should be sought at the same time. This able request must be sincere and come from the child, not a forced action from the parent to the child. Our girls started asking to fulfill this mature undertaken at two and three years old because they witnessed my husband and I embrace our beloved month of fast and saw the rewards of our actions. Their choice to emulate us was effortless and pure, mashaAllah.
3. The mental, emotional, moral, and Islamic habits of fasting are much more important than the act of fasting from worldly things like food and drink. Break your children’s fast if they pout, have a bad attitude, or argue. We give our girls 3-strikes in their attitudes, or we force them to eat and drink.
4. Pick what you want to eat for suhoor together the night before.
5. Study the nutrition and sunnah of suhoor and create the most simplistic meal to withhold a full day’s fast.
6. Prepare suhoor together before you go to sleep. Have ingredients out, fruits pre-cut, foods defrosting, etc.
7. Go to sleep right after Ishaa prayer.
8. Better yet, go to sleep after Maghrib, and wake up kids for Ishaa, Taraweeh, and Qiyaam al-Layl.
9. Share the sunnah of suhoor. Kids will ache and rush to wake up for suhoor, simply because there’s great reward for eating suhoor; rather then brushing it off as unnecessary or unimportant.
10. Wake up for suhoor at least one-hour before the adhan for Fajr, and use the time to reflect, pray the late night prayer and critical du’a. Don’t wake up to eat and pray half-asleep. Waking up a few minutes before Fajr to eat a big suhoor meal quickly is not healthy as it shocks the body with food, and it is bad for metabolism if you sleep immediately after a drowsy and meaningless prayer. Slow waking, slow eating (ideally half-hour before fajr), and slow praying is more recommended.