So many kids love all thing animals, so we have rounded up some of our favorite animal inspired activities that your littles will love! Click on the title of any of the activities below to be linked to more detailed descriptions on Instagram.
Animal/Not an Animal Sort
Sorting is such an important early childhood skill. For this simple activity, gather up animal figurines as well as non-animal ones and put them in a big pile. Divide a piece of paper into two sections "animal" and "not an animal" and then let your child start sorting!
Play at Home Preschool Unit: Animals
This unit focuses on animals, their characteristics, similarities and differences, and a little about their habitats.The digital download includes 10 days of detailed, easy to follow lesson plans that will have your child engaged and learning. This 36 page unit is only $6!
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Giraffe ABCs
Draw a giraffe (or whatever animal your child likes) on a large piece of paper. Write out a bunch of letters on the spots of the giraffe and then write those same letters on dot stickers. Have your child place the dot stickers on the matching letter spot on the giraffe. You can modify this by doing capitals with lowercase, numbers, sight words, shapes, etc depending on what your child is working on right now.
Animal Parade
For this simple activity just draw a curved or zigzag line on the ground. If the weather isn't great where you live, you could use painters tape on the ground inside your house. Have your children line up the animals for a "parade". Encourage them to free play with the animals however they want after they are done. Here is a link to some of our new favorite animals (linked here and here).
My First Animal Words Book by: @teachtalkinspire
Our friend over @teachtalkinspire wrote this great book full of animal names and pictures that your little will love!
Jungle Animal Measurement
Help build your child’s understanding of the measurement process by introducing nonstandard units of measurement at an early age. This is simply “measuring” using an everyday object other than a ruler. Kids love to line objects and toys up anyway, so take it a step further and explore the length of different items! In this picture we used our favorite Magna-Tiles to measure with (linked here).
Dino Dot Art
Cut out a dinosaur (or any other animal you wish) and tape it down with painters tape. Dot all around the edge of the animal with dot markers (linked here) and all over the paper. Peel off the animal and admire your beautiful artwork.
Dinosaur Eggs by @entertainmytoddler
This cute idea is from @entertainmytoddler. She takes small dinosaur figures (other animals would be fine too) and hides them inside balls of play dough to make "dino eggs". Each one is a fun surprise for your child to open!
Dinosaur Activity Kit
Want some dinosaur activities that are ready to go? Download this super cute and engaging printable dinosaur activity kit created by Stay at Home Activity Mom. It comes with 6 activities for ONLY $3! You can't beat that deal!
ABC Fish
Cut out a fish (or any other animal) from a piece of cardboard. Write the alphabet around the edges of the fish. Then take ABC clothespins and have your child clip those to the matching letter on the cardboard. You can sometimes find these clips in the dollar section at Target, or you can easily make them yourself by writing on blank clothespins with a permanent marker. You can modify this activity in many ways such as matching uppercase and lowercase letters, shapes, or numbers.
Make a Pet
Make templates of common pets without faces or many details on them and then print them out. You could also just draw the outline of a pet with marker on a piece of paper. Then, put out watercolor paint, stickers, scissors, glue, googly eyes, pipe cleaners, and other random small craft supplies. Just use what you have! Have your kids create their own pets by decorating each one however they want. After decorating, they can name each pet and leave the pet out to dry before starting another one. Once dry, they can even cut out a few of the pets and tape them to craft sticks to have pet puppets.
Play at Home Preschool Unit: Pets
This unit focuses on different kinds of household pets, and responsibilities that come with having a pet. Preschoolers will learn, explore, and play using a variety of materials while working on essential preschool skills. The digital download includes 10 days of detailed, easy to follow lesson plans that will have your child engaged and learning. This 51 page unit is only $6!
Bear Colors
Draw some simple bear faces using a variety of colors (be sure to use colors that match the dot stickers you have). Have your child peel off the colored dot stickers and put them on the bears’ ears while matching the colors. When they finish, get markers out and have them color each bear the same matching color. After that, they can add more decorations around the blank spaces of the paper if they want! Simple, fun, and they will be working on sorting, colors, fine motor skills, and art!
We hope your animal loving kids will enjoy some of these activities! As always, tag us in anything you try at our Instagram account @stayathomeactivitymom. We always love to see what everyone is trying out.
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