PULTEVENT
Noon Year's Eve: 6 things to put on the screen before the midday countdown
A community center in Ohio, eleven forty in the morning. Twenty-two children under six, most of them in party hats that have already been chewed, sit on a carpet in front of a projector screen. A boy in dinosaur pajamas is standing because he refuses to sit. Behind them, parents hold paper cups of coffee and phones. The screen shows a clock and a big number: 20 minutes. Somebody's toddler points at it and shouts "Twelve," which is not correct yet but close enough.
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Noon Year's Eve exists because small children cannot stay up until midnight and parents are not about to let them try. You move the countdown to twelve o'clock in the day, keep all the noise and the confetti, and have everyone home for a nap by half past one. Libraries, preschools, children's museums and a lot of living rooms have been doing it for years.
The whole party points toward one moment, so the countdown on the screen matters more than any craft table. I build mine in PULTEVENT: a laptop runs the host console in the browser, the TV or projector shows a timer to noon, and between now and then there are short games the kids watch on the big screen while a grown-up plays on a phone. Phones scan a QR code and need internet; nobody installs anything.
6 screen moments for a Noon Year's Eve morning
1 The welcome splash with every child's name
As families arrive, the screen shows a welcome picture with a caption you typed: "Happy Noon Year, Bluebird Room." You can swap in a slideshow of the children's photos from the year while people take off coats.
How to run it. Ask parents to send one photo each the week before. Kids who see their own face on a big screen settle down faster.
It gives the room something to look at while latecomers arrive, and it tells every child they are expected.
2 The Aquarium
Each phone adds a fish to a big underwater scene on the screen. Children tell the grown-up which fish they want and watch it swim in with the others.
How to run it. Do this first, before anything with points. Say the fish colors out loud as they appear so the smallest kids can find theirs.
It is calm, it has no losers, and it shows every parent how to join from a phone before the busier games.
3 Decorate the Tree, one ornament each
A plain tree on the screen, and each family sends up baubles and lights from a phone until it is covered. The last thing on it is a star, and a child gets to choose who places it.
How to run it. Announce the star in advance so it becomes a small ceremony. Pick the child who waited most patiently during the Aquarium.
Toddlers understand trees and stars without any explanation, which is not true of most party games.
4 Freeze dance-off
Music plays, kids dance on the carpet, the music stops and everyone freezes. Parents vote from their phones for the best dancer in each round, and the bars grow on screen.
How to run it. Make the vote categories silly and plentiful: best spin, best freeze, best hat. Every child should win something.
Twenty minutes before noon is exactly when a three-year-old's legs need somewhere to go.
5 The guest wheel for helpers
Children's names go on a colored wheel on the screen. Spin it to pick who rings the bell, who holds the balloon, who counts down with you at the microphone.
How to run it. Only put in the names of children whose parents are happy for them to have a turn at the front. Shy ones can pass their job to a parent.
It turns "Can I do it?" from twenty voices into one fair spin that everyone watched.
6 The countdown to twelve
The timer runs down the last minute in big digits. Everyone counts the final ten out loud, and at zero the room photo appears with fireworks, confetti and a fanfare on top.
How to run it. Set the timer to the actual clock. Start gathering the kids on the carpet at 11:55, not 11:59.
Young children have seen grown-ups count down on TV. Doing it themselves, at a time they are awake for, is a big deal to them.
A timer they can see
Minutes to noon on the screen all morning, so the question "Is it now?" answers itself.
Parents hold the phones
Little ones point and shout; the grown-up beside them taps. Every game still counts as theirs.
Confetti without the vacuum
At zero, fireworks and confetti effects play over a photo of the room. Nothing to sweep up.
Home before the nap
The whole party fits in ninety minutes, with the countdown landing exactly at twelve.
A timetable that ends at noon
Doors at 10:45. Welcome splash and snacks until 11:05. The Aquarium, then Decorate the Tree, then a story or a craft for fifteen minutes. Freeze dance-off around 11:40, the helper wheel at 11:50, carpet at 11:55, countdown at noon. Juice toast, goodbye song, out by 12:20.
That is it. Ninety minutes is plenty. Every Noon Year's Eve I have seen go wrong went wrong by trying to fit in one more activity after the countdown, when the room had already peaked.
Why a big-screen timer changes the morning
Small children have almost no sense of how long twenty minutes is. A number that gets smaller on a wall, with a clock face beside it, does the explaining for you. You can point at it during every transition: "When it says ten, we do the dancing."
The event timing section also has break screens, so the room can see what comes next while you set up. It sounds like a detail. With thirty toddlers, it saves your voice.
Phones in grown-up hands
No child at a Noon Year's Eve party needs their own phone, and most parents would not want them to have one. The games are designed so one adult phone plays for one family. The child chooses the fish or the ornament; the adult does the tap.
Each phone needs internet. In a library or a school, check the guest Wi-Fi the week before and print the password on a card by the door. If the connection in the room is weak, the splash screen, the dance-off and the countdown still run from the laptop, and you can do the voting with cheering instead.
Running it at home for three or four kids
You do not need a hall. A living room TV, a laptop and a cable is the same setup at a smaller size. Fewer children means you can let each one have a turn at spinning the wheel and placing the star, and you can put the family photo on the splash screen for the moment of noon.
"Is it the real New Year?"
"It is the noon one. The real one is while you are asleep."
Some families add a video call with grandparents at twelve; share the stage window and they see the countdown too.
Mixed-language rooms
International preschools and expat playgroups often have a dozen home languages in one room. The host console is available in English, and the screens on the parents' phones follow each phone's own language settings, so a Spanish-speaking dad and a Korean-speaking grandmother both see instructions they can read. The host can turn that off if needed.
Trying it before the 31st
Start the free 3-day demo a few days early. No card is needed. Load the children's photos, set the timer to a test time and run the countdown once in the empty room to hear how loud the fanfare is. The full version is a one-time licence, not a subscription, and the price is listed on pultevent.ru/en.
About the author
PULTEVENT was built by Ruslan Barashkin, who has hosted weddings, birthdays and office parties since 2014: over 500 events, best host of Moscow 2024 and of Saint Petersburg 2023 at the TOP 100 Awards. He made it for his own nights first. The rest is at pultevent.ru/en.
How to host a Noon Year's Eve countdown on the big screen
- 1
A week before, collect one photo per child and check the Wi-Fi in the room.
- 2
Build the welcome splash with a caption and a slideshow of the photos.
- 3
Set the event timer so it reaches zero exactly at 12:00 noon.
- 4
At arrival, show the QR code so each family joins on one grown-up's phone.
- 5
Run the Aquarium, Decorate the Tree and the freeze dance-off, then spin the helper wheel.
- 6
Gather everyone at 11:55, count the last ten seconds together and let the effects play at zero.
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