Your little one is preparing to meet the world and explore so many new experiences. Those exciting moments will be even sweeter when your child has a solid foundation knowledge of their body parts 🧠.
These body part activities will help preschoolers understand their bodies and increase their fine motor skills, color recognition 👁️, and hand-eye coordination by focusing on each body part separately.
As they learn about the different systems in their bodies and how they work together, they’ll develop an intrinsic understanding crucial for later learning and understanding cause and effect relationships. In other words, these activities will make them smarter sooner than you think 💡!
Body Parts Activities for Kids
Stickers on Body Parts Activity (2-4 Years)
This activity is great for young children learning about different body parts. It combines fun and education by using colorful stickers to identify and label various parts of the body on a doll or a picture.
Materials: A doll or a printed picture of a person, sheets of colorful stickers, and optionally, a list of body parts to label.
How to Do:
- Start by pointing out different body parts on the doll or picture.
- Choose a sticker and name the body part you’re going to place it on (like an arm, leg, ear, etc.).
- Stick the sticker onto the correct body part.
- Repeat the process with different stickers and body parts.
Body Parts Puzzle Activity (3-5 Years)
This activity is a hands-on way for kids to learn about the human body and identify where different parts belong. By assembling a puzzle, children improve their understanding of anatomy in an engaging and interactive manner.
Materials: A printed sheet with an image of a body and separate body parts sheet too, child-safe scissors, and glue or adhesive for sticking pieces.
How to Do:
- Carefully cut out the body parts along the dotted lines.
- Identify each body part and discuss where it should go on the body.
- One by one, glue the pieces in the correct places on the body image sheet to complete the picture.
Label the Body Activity (4-6 Years)
This is a fun and educational activity that helps children identify and place names with various parts of the body. They can learn about everything from their head to their toes!
Materials: A worksheet with an illustrated person and blank labels for body parts or use our printable, glue for attaching labels, and crayons/markers for coloring post-labeling.
How to Do:
- Start by reviewing the names of the body parts provided on the cut-outs or stickers.
- Match each label to the corresponding part on the illustration.
- Stick or glue the labels to the correct spot on the worksheet.
- Discuss the function of each body part as you go along, making it a more in-depth learning experience.
Body Parts Coloring Activity (2-5 Years)
Coloring is a fantastic activity for children to develop fine motor skills and learn about their bodies.
Materials Used: Coloring sheets featuring various body parts, a set of colored pencils, crayons, or markers, and optionally, reference pictures or books to ensure accuracy in color selection.
How to Do:
- Distribute the coloring sheets and coloring materials to the children.
- Let them select the colors they want to use for each body part.
- Encourage them to color within the lines for practice in precision.
- While coloring, engage them by discussing each body part and its function.
Hand and Foot Printing Activity (2-5 Years)
This craft involves using handprints and footprints to make art. It’s a hands on, messy, and super fun way for kids to express themselves and make unique pieces.
Materials: Construction paper in various colors, non-toxic paint, markers or crayons for additional details, googly eyes, and glue for attaching extra pieces.
How to Do:
- Decide on what you want to create with the handprints and footprints.
- Apply paint to the child’s hands or feet.
- Press the painted hands or feet onto paper to make prints.
- Once the prints dry, use markers or crayons to add details and turn the prints into art, like the turkey’s features.
- Glue on any decoration like googly eyes or feathers.
Body Parts Bingo Activity (3-5 Years)
Bingo is always a hit, and when it’s themed around body parts, it’s not only entertaining but also informative. Children will match pictures of body parts on their bingo cards with the ones called out, learning as they play.
Materials: Bingo cards featuring images of various body parts or you can use our printable, Bingo chips or markers, Caller cards with corresponding body parts.
How to Do:
- Give each participant a bingo card with different body part images.
- Give them bingo chips or markers.
- Choose one participant to be the caller.
- The caller picks a card and says the body part.
- Players cover that part on their cards.
- Keep going until someone gets bingo.
- Check the winning card & give a prize to the winner. Play again if you want.
Coloring the Eyes Activity (2-4 Years)
This activity invites children to explore the different colors that human eyes can be. They’ll get to color in various sets of eyes, learning about shades and how to carefully color within the lines.
Materials: A coloring sheet with various pairs of eyes, colored pencils or crayons in shades like blue, brown, green, and grey, and optionally, a color chart or pictures of eyes for real-life reference.
How to Do:
- Look at each pair of eyes and read the color label below them.
- Choose the colored pencil or crayon that matches the label.
- Carefully color in the iris of each eye, trying to match the shade as closely as possible.
- Fill in each set of eyes on the page, using the correct colors.
How our Hand Work Activity (4-6 Years)
This interactive craft shows how the tendons in our hands work to control our fingers. It’s a simple model that uses common materials to demonstrate a complex biological process in an understandable way.
Materials: Cardstock or construction paper for cutting out hand shapes, straws cut into small pieces to mimic finger bones, yarn or string to represent tendons, and beads or small tubes to keep the yarn in place, acting as pulleys.
How to Do:
- Trace and cut out a hand from the cardstock.
- Glue pieces of straw onto each finger as segments.
- Thread yarn through the straws, tying a bead at the end of each to keep it in place.
- When the yarn is pulled, it should cause the finger to bend, just like tendons do in a real hand.
Lungs Model Activity (6-9 Years)
This activity provides a hands on experience for kids to understand how lungs work. By creating a model, they can see how lungs inflate and deflate with the breath, helping them grasp the basics of breathing and lung function.
Materials: Red and pink construction paper for representing the lungs and the inside of the chest, balloons to mimic the lungs, straws to act as the trachea and bronchial tubes, and yarn or string to outline the branches of the respiratory tract.
How to Do:
- Cut out the lung shapes from the pink paper and lay them on the red background.
- Attach the balloons to the straws to represent how the lungs attach to the airways.
- Spread out the yarn to mimic the bronchial tree branching out into the lungs.
- Demonstrate how the model works by inflating the balloons, which simulates how the lungs fill with air.
Test of Taste Activity (2-4 Years)
Tasting activities are a tasty approach to educate kids about the variety of flavors that our taste buds can detect. By trying different foods, they can learn about sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and umami tastes.
Materials: A muffin tin or several small bowls, a variety of foods representing different tastes such as sweets, crisps, fruits, sour candies, salty snacks, and more, spoons or picks for hygienic tasting, and water for rinsing between tastes.
How to Do:
- Fill each section of the muffin tin with a different type of food.
- Guide the children to taste from each section, one at a time.
- Discuss the taste they experience and categorize it as sweet, salty, sour, or bitter.
- Encourage them to cleanse their palate with water between each taste test.
- You can watch the reel for better understanding.
Picasso Art Activity (6-8 Years)
Pablo Picasso was famous for his unique approach to art, especially during the Cubist period, where he played with dimensions and perspectives. This activity allows kids to explore their creativity by making their own Picasso-inspired faces with bold colors and shapes.
Materials: White paper or canvas for the background, markers, crayons, or paints in various bold colors, and optionally, reference images of Picasso’s art for inspiration.
How to Do:
- Start by discussing Picasso’s style and his approach to faces and shapes.
- Draw or have pre-printed face templates with different facial features scattered in various orientations on the page.
- Encourage the kids to color in the shapes and features with bold, solid colors.
- They can mix and match eyes, noses, and mouths to create their abstract portraits.
Biscuit Body Activity (3-5 Years)
Combining snack time with craft time, this activity is great for small children. It allows them to assemble a little “person” or creature using biscuits and other edible items. This fun craft can teach them about body parts and also improve their fine motor skills.
Materials: Crackers or biscuits for the body and head, pretzel sticks or similar for arms and legs, small candies or raisins for the eyes, nose, or buttons.
How to Do:
- Use two crackers – one for the head and one for the body.
- Attach pretzel sticks to the body cracker to make arms and legs.
- Place candies on the head cracker to make eyes, a nose, or a mouth.
- Assemble the pieces together on a flat surface to make a biscuit person.
Stones Faces Activity (5-8 Years)
The “Stones Faces Activity” is a lovely and creative craft that transforms ordinary stones into vibrant, expressive faces. This activity is perfect for nurturing creativity and fine motor skills in children.
Materials: Smooth stones or pebbles of various sizes, acrylic paint in multiple colors, and paintbrushes of different sizes.
How to Do:
- Wash the stones and dry them thoroughly to ensure the paint adheres well.
- Decide on the facial features you want to paint, like eyes, lips, or noses.
- Paint the background of the stone white or any light color as a base, and let it dry.
- Sketch the outline of the facial features with a pencil, then fill in the details with your paint.
- Allow the paint to dry, and add another layer if necessary for brighter colors.
- Once the final layer of paint is dry, you can add a clear varnish to protect your stone faces.
Digestion Experiment Activity (6-10 Years)
The “Digestion Experiment Activity” is an educational activity that helps children understand the human digestive system. By creating a model using playdough or clay, kids can learn how food travels through the body.
Materials: Playdough or modeling clay in various colors, a large, flat surface to work on such as a tabletop or tray, and a diagram or picture of the digestive system for reference.
How to Do:
- Flatten a large piece of brown playdough to form the base of your digestive system model.
- Use red playdough to create the esophagus and stomach. Remember to shape the stomach like a ‘J’ and place it on the left side.
- Create the small intestine from green playdough, making a squiggly line that fills the space below the stomach.
- Use yellow playdough to form the liver, which is positioned just above the stomach on the right side.
- Shape the large intestine with pink playdough, arranging it around the small intestine like a frame.
- Finally, use dark brown playdough to represent the waste part of the digestive process in the lower part of the large intestine.
Movement Dice Activity (2-4 Years)
The “Movement Dice Activity” is a lively and interactive game that combines fun and exercise. It’s a great way to get kids moving while also teaching them about different actions and body parts.
Materials: Two large cubes that can be used as dice, colored paper or paint, and a marker for writing.
How to Do:
- Cover each cube with colored paper, or paint them in bright colors, and wait for them to dry.
- On one cube, write different movements like ‘Jump’, ‘Twist’, ‘Spin’, etc., on each side.
- On the second cube, write body parts like ‘Hand’, ‘Foot’, ‘Head’, etc., on each side.
- Players take turns rolling the dice together and must perform the action with the body part shown on the dice. For example, if one die shows ‘Rotate’ and the other shows ‘Hand’, the player must rotate their hand.
Noodle Anatomy Activity (4-8 Years)
The “Noodle Anatomy Activity” is a unique craft that uses different types of pasta to create a representation of the human skeleton. It’s a fantastic way for kids to learn about anatomy in a hands-on way!
Materials: Various types of dry pasta such as spaghetti for bones, penne for limbs, rotini for joints, etc., glue or playdough for attaching the pasta, and a sheet of construction paper or cardboard as a base.
How to Do:
- Lay the sheet of construction paper or cardboard flat on your workspace.
- Sort the pasta by type to plan out which pieces will represent different bones.
- Use glue or playdough to attach the pasta to the paper to form the skeleton. Long, straight pasta like spaghetti works well for the arms and legs, while spiral pasta can represent the spine and joints.
- Start from the head (a piece of round pasta) and work your way down to the feet, attaching each “bone” with glue or playdough.
- Allow your pasta skeleton to dry completely if you’re using glue.
Playdough Faces Activity (3-5 Years)
The “Playdough Faces Activity” is an interactive way to help kids express their creativity. They can mold different facial features using playdough and place them on a face template to create unique looks.
Materials: Playdough in various colors, laminated face templates or heavy-duty paper for a base for that use our printable, and rolling pins or flat surfaces for flattening the playdough.
How to Do:
- Choose a face template to add features to.
- Take different colors of playdough and roll them into flat pieces for each part of the face eyes, nose, mouth, and ears.
- Use your hands or tools to shape the playdough into the desired facial features.
- Carefully place each playdough feature onto the corresponding area on the face template.
- Press the playdough down lightly to stick it to the paper or laminate.
Hand and Foot painting (2-5 Years)
Hand and foot painting is a fun and creative activity for kids 🎨. To do this activity, you will need washable paint, paper or canvas, and a place for the kids to stand or sit.
Instructions:
- Pour some paint into a shallow dish or tray.
- Dip the child’s hand or foot 🦶 into the paint and make prints on paper or canvas.
- Repeat this process with different colors 🖌️or mix the colors to create new shades.
- Let the paintings dry completely.
This activity 💫 can help the child’s fine motor skills and provide a fun way to express creativity.
Point out Animal body parts (2-4 Years)
Some young children may lose interest in learning about their body parts due to repetition. To keep them engaged, try teaching them about animal🐱 body parts, using their stuffed animals or pets as examples.
Pointing out that some animals🐘 have tails while others do not can help children understand differences and similarities.
Similarly, you can add to their vocabulary by speaking to them about other exciting pet or stuffed animal body parts.
Summing it up:
Building a solid foundation of motor skills and knowledge of body parts will help your child develop confidence💪 and a sense of self-worth. They’ll also be better equipped to tackle the challenges and opportunities of growing up.
Start growing your child’s motor skills today with these fun body part activities, and reap the benefits in the long run. Body part🏋️♀️ activities are an excellent way for preschoolers to build core body strength and improve their coordination.
By strengthening these skills, your child can explore the world and use their bodies to their fullest potential.
I’m a former teacher (and mother of Two Childs) with a background in child development. Here to help you with play-based learning activities for kids. ( Check my Next startup Cledemy.Com)