---
title: "Tie a square knot and a bowline"
status: "Idea, not yet tested"
published: "2026-10-14"
updated: "2026-10-14"
author: "Dad Field Manual editors (drafted with AI help)"
time: "30 min"
cost: "$0"
ages: "5 and up"
where: "A kitchen table, a porch, or a picnic table."
topics: ["indoor"]
print: "https://dadfieldmanual.com/print?p=knots"
url: "https://dadfieldmanual.com/plans/knots/"
---

# Tie a square knot and a bowline

> Thirty minutes at the kitchen table with two pieces of rope. Three knots, in the order kids can learn them, and when to use each one.

**Tested on:** not yet. When a dad tries this, his name, the date, the place, and the kids' ages will be added here.

## What you need

- Two pieces of soft rope or cord about an arm's length each, two colors if you have them (have / $5)
- A chair leg or a broom handle to tie around (have)
- A small bundle to tie up: sticks, pencils or a rolled towel (have)

## Rope safety: read this first

- **Nothing around necks,** ever, not even as a joke. Rope stays on chair legs, broomsticks and bundles.
- **These are practice knots.** Nothing in this plan holds a person, climbs, or lifts anything heavy.
- **Don't join two ropes with a square knot** to hold weight. It's a binding knot for bundles and bandages, and it can slip loose under load.

## Steps

1. **Warm up with an overhand knot** (Kid) Make a loop in one rope and pass the end through it. That's the overhand knot, the one most people tie without thinking. Tie three in a row along the rope.
2. **Square knot: right over left** (Dad shows, Kid copies) Hold one end in each hand. Cross the right end over the left and tuck it under, like the first step of tying a shoe.
3. **Then left over right** (Dad shows, Kid copies) Now cross the left end over the right and tuck it under, and pull both ends. A square knot lies flat, and each end comes out beside its own loop. If it twists and looks crooked, it's a granny knot: untie it and do the second half the other way.
4. **Use it for what it's for** (Kid) Tie the square knot around the bundle of sticks or the rolled towel. This is its job: tying up a bundle or a bandage. Then push the two loops toward each other and watch it spill open. That's why it's not for holding weight.
5. **Bowline: the rabbit and the tree** (Dad shows) Make a small loop in the rope (the rabbit hole), with the long part (the tree) above it. The rabbit comes up out of the hole, goes around behind the tree, and goes back down the hole. Pull it snug. You get a loop that won't slip smaller and still unties easily later. Try it around a chair leg.
6. **Race and blindfold round** (Kid) Each knot five times, fastest wins. Then try the square knot with eyes closed. When they can tie it without help, sign their field card.


## Variations

- **Ages 3–5:** Just the overhand knot, tied around a broom handle. Then untying knots Dad tied, which is harder than it sounds.
- **Ages 6–9:** Overhand and square knot. Save the bowline for when the square knot is easy.
- **Ages 10+:** All three, then the bowline around their own waist over a jacket, tied without looking, as sailors learn it. Practice only: nothing hangs from it.
- **Rain:** This is the rainy-day plan. Kitchen table.
- **Cold:** Same as rain: indoors, or a porch with gloves off just to tie.
- **Hot:** Shade and a picnic table. Wet rope is harder to tie, which makes a good challenge.


## Sources

- **The knots.** Clifford W. Ashley, *The Ashley Book of Knots* (1944): the reef or square knot (#1204), which Ashley classes as a binding knot and warns against using to join two ropes, and the bowline (#1010).