18 Key Activities For Kids to Keep Them Engaged

A key that is a common and essential item at home that you use often and every day can be used for various activities for your kids to try at home.

If you’re wondering what can be done with a key, you’re at the right place, as I have a few fun and engaging ideas that you can make your kids do.

Interesting Key Activities for Your Kids

These key activities can help your kids stay engaged while also improving their fine motor skills and cognitive skills to match the shapes and sizes of the keys.

Your kids will have a great time doing these activities that are all based on the simple household, the key that is a key art of our lives.

In this blog post, I have made a list of activities that can be done with a key for your kids to try at home and have a good time with.

Playdough Imprints With Key

Playdough is one of my son’s favorite things to play with, and he spends endless hours shaping and molding it as a pastime.

You can give your kids a box of play-dough and make them roll it into flat sheets, cut into circles with considerable thickness. 

Then, kids can gently press keys of different sizes and shapes into the flattened playdough and slowly remove them after a few seconds to create key-shaped imprints.

Key and Lock Color Matching

This is a fun activity to teach your kids about colors and present them with an opportunity to match them.

You can buy a few sets of colored padlocks with their keys and let your kids open the locks by matching the colors. Kids can say the names of the colors and even spell them as they unlock the padlocks.

I would recommend this activity of matching colors for little ones who are starting to learn and identify colors.

Key Chain Craft

As my son would say, we need some key chains for the keys. And I agree with him, as I somehow love the idea of adding a key chain for each of my keys.

I recommend that you make keychains at home with beads, cardboard, craft paper, etc, as a craft activity with your kids and add a personal touch by displaying their art through your keys. 

You can thread beads in various patterns onto a piece of thick string, tie the loose end into a knot, and loop the other end through a keyring to make a beaded. keychains.

Lock & Key Shape Match

This Lock & Key Shape Match activity is an excellent way to introduce your child to early geometry and problem-solving in an interactive way.

You’ll love watching them practice shape recognition and critical thinking as they work to match each key to its corresponding lock.

It’s a hands-on, engaging activity that builds essential cognitive skills and provides a satisfying sense of accomplishment with every correct match.

Key & Lock Sensory Math

I specially designed this fantastic Key & Lock Sensory Math activity to make math concepts truly come alive for kids.

You’ll love how it combines sensory exploration with hands-on learning, allowing them to discover numbers, addition, and problem-solving through play.

It’s an engaging and multi-sensory approach that helps solidify early math skills memorably and excitingly, perfect for kinesthetic learners.

Lock & Key Beginning Sound

This Lock & Key Beginning Sound activity is a fun, interactive way to bolster your child’s phonological awareness and letter recognition.

You’ll be delighted to see them actively learn initial letter sounds by matching keys (words) to their correct locks (letters).

It’s a hands-on approach that makes foundational literacy skills enjoyable and memorable, setting them up for reading success.

Count & Unlock

This Count & Unlock activity is a brilliant hands-on approach to strengthening your child’s counting and number recognition skills.

You’ll love seeing them actively engage as they count the dots on each lock and then find the corresponding numbered key to ‘unlock’ it.

This interactive game makes learning numbers incredibly concrete and fun, building essential foundational math literacy and providing a satisfying sense of accomplishment with every match.

Key Theme Birthday Card

This Key Theme Birthday Card activity is a charming and personal way for your child to celebrate special occasions.

You’ll love seeing them express their creativity by decorating a unique key-shaped card, making it a truly memorable gift for family and friends.

It’s a simple yet meaningful craft that helps develop fine motor skills and fosters a sense of thoughtfulness and connection, providing a delightful way to show they care.

Popsicle Stick Key Craft

Let’s make your kids very own magic key with this Popsicle Stick Key Craft.

Give your kids paint, glue, and decorate colorful sticks and hearts to create fun keys. It’s a super fun activity that helps your kids use their hands, learn colors, and be super creative.

Are you ready to make the coolest key with your kids ever?

Key Theme Tracing Line

Your child will love guiding colorful keys to their matching locks in this Key Theme Tracing Line activity.

It’s a playful way to strengthen their fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, and early writing readiness, all while having fun.

With every line they trace, you’re supporting their pencil control and focus. Just hand them a pencil, and let the learning begin.

Key Wind Chime

Let your child turn old keys into a colorful sound maker with this Key Wind Chime activity.

It’s a fun way to explore sound, rhythm, and color while building fine motor skills and creativity.

You’ll love how this craft encourages focus and patience. Plus, it makes a beautiful decoration for any space. Just hang it up and enjoy the gentle music made by your little one.

Playdough Key

Let your child shape their imagination with this Play-Dough Key activity.

It’s a hands-on way to build fine motor skills, creativity, and shape recognition as they roll, twist, and mold their own colorful keys.

You’ll love how this activity encourages focus and playful learning, all while keeping little hands busy and engaged. Let the fun begin, one squish at a time.

Key Counting

Make counting fun and hands-on with this Key Counting activity.

Your child will love matching key sets to the correct numbers while practicing number recognition, counting skills, and visual comparison.

It’s a simple yet exciting way to reinforce early math through real objects. You’ll be amazed how quickly they learn, one key at a time

Key Finger Print Craft

Let your little one turn their fingertips into art with this Key Finger Print Craft.

It’s a joyful way to explore colors, shapes, and textures while boosting fine motor skills and creativity.

You’ll love how this mess-friendly activity encourages self-expression and hands-on learning. Just dip, dot, and decorate; each print unlocks a new world of fun!

Key Stamping Art

Let your child explore letter art in a whole new way with this Key Stamping Art activity.

By stamping real keys with paint, they’ll create a fun and textured letter K while building letter recognition, fine motor skills, and creative expression.

You’ll love how it combines sensory play with early literacy, plus, it’s just plain fun.

Match The Right Key

Your child will love this fun and colorful Match The Right Key activity.

It’s a great way to practice visual matching, color recognition, and fine motor skills as they find and place each key in the right spot.

You’ll enjoy watching their confidence grow as they match shapes and colors with a smile. It’s hands-on learning made simple and joyful.

Uppercase Lowercase Lock & Key

Help your child unlock letter learning with this Uppercase-Lowercase Lock & Key activity.

It’s a fun and hands-on way to match capital and small letters, building letter recognition, early literacy, and problem-solving skills.

You’ll love how your little learner stays engaged while mastering the alphabet, one key at a time.

Key Pairing

My son enjoyed doing this activity, and it is a simple way to teach your kids how to sort and identify items that look similar. 

You can place a few different types of keys along with their duplicate pairs in a bowl. Let your kids try to sort the keys and pair the original keys with their duplicate keys as a fun activity. 

I sometimes set a timer to help my son challenge himself and try to sort and match the pairs of keys more efficiently.

Conclusion 

These activities, which were done with a key, were so much fun for my son to do, and he enjoyed doing them, much to my delight.

You can get your kids to try these activities to keep them entertained and also provide them a chance to have fun.

I hope you enjoyed reading this list of key-related activities that your kids can try, and that you found some ideas to take away from this article.

Please let me know in the comments if you have any more activity ideas with a key to add or any questions for me to answer – I would love to hear your feedback!