The preschool years are so much fun and so exhausting at the same time. They are soaking up knowledge and experiences and love to explore the world, and it can be a difficult to think of fun and challenging activities for them. There is a GREAT list at Homeschool-How-To that is available as a PDF download, and whether you’re homeschooling or not, you’ll appreciate this huge list of ideas:
101 Things to Do With Preschoolers
Some of our favorites fun preschooler (and bigger kids too) activities:
Uno is so awesome for teaching colors and numbers, and it’s especially nice if you have an older child to play along so you can help the younger one(s). We use these card holders to make it easy to manage all those cards and see them easily. Go Fish is another classic that the little ones love.
Play-Doh is an obvious one, but sometimes it’s hard to want to get it out when you know what a mess it will be to clean up! I have to keep reminding myself that it’s improving hand strength, dexterity, and motor skills, which are a big deal for getting ready to hold a pencil. You can even make your own!
This one isn’t listed in the 101 things, so here’s thing #102. Get out your colander and turn it upside down on the table, or even the floor. Give your little person some dry spaghetti (break in half, depending on the size of your colander) and show them how to poke the pasta through the holes and watch it disappear. My kids LOVE this. It keeps them busy for a really long time.
Check out Projects for Preschoolers for more ideas. What great ideas do you have for keeping preschoolers busy?
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I have a five year old son and he loves to play on my iPhone. When we are stuck in a grocery line or I need a small activity to keep him entertained for a bit, I let him play games on it. His favorite game is Evil Sushi Squish. It’s a really cute game, kind of like the bubble popper game but with cute characters and colorful ninjas. Also I found that there is an Evil Sushi website where you can print out coloring sheets of the characters or play tic tac toe, which he just learned how to play. The web page is http://www.evilsushisquish.com and the best part is: it is free.