17+ STEAM Activities for kids to explore knowledge!

STEAM ( Science 🧪 , Technology 👨‍💻 , Engineering 🪛, the Arts 🎨, and Mathematics 🔢) activities are famous for providing a helping hand in the development of overall motor and cognitive abilities, analytical skills, and intellect. 

My little scientist loves to take part in numerous STEAM activities and learn about new concepts 📚 and ideas.

These activities are excellent and effective ways ✅️ of explaining complex topics to little ones.

Engaging STEAM Activities for Kids

Here are a few intriguing 🧐 STEAM activities my adorable little scientist loves to engage in and learn from.

Pile The Rock

My little scientist and I travel back to the Stone Age and learn how to pile a few stones or rocks 🪨 of diverse shapes and sizes on top of one another in the form of a tower.

This STEAM activity helps to polish my little scientist’s analytical 🧠 skills.

It challenges her to analyze the shape and weight of rocks to figure out how to position the rocks 🪨 so that the tower doesn’t topple down.

Learn About Capillary Action

I tried to teach my little scientist about capillary action by means of this STEAM activity.

We just take a flower 🌸 (a white one) and cut the end of the stem diagonally. We place it in a jug carrying a mixture of water 💧 and highlighter ink (that glows prettily under fluorescent light) for a short period.

On observing the petals of this flower under fluorescent light, my cute little scientist can observe glowing ✨ ️ petals telling the story of water traveling upwards through capillary action.

Build A Bridge

I just require a few cups or empty milkshake containers 🥤 for this activity. My little scientist collects branches of different sizes from the lawn 🍃 in a basket.

We sit together, and I position the cups or containers at random distances from one another along a straight line.

My little scientist’s job is to figure out 🧐 which branch amongst the ones he had collected will be suitable in terms of length and be placed on top of the cups to form a 🌉 bridge. 

Guide your little scientists through the process of using a measuring tape or scale for building this bridge, too.

Baking Soda And Vinegar Magic

Baking soda and vinegar are two magical ingredients that open the door to several creative 🤩 activities for little ones.

I mix baking soda with paint 🎨, and my little scientist loves to create a painting using it. We pour 🫗 vinegar over the painting, and the release of carbon dioxide marked by an amazing fizz 🫧 takes my little scientist by surprise.

Moreover, I fill up this mixture in a bottle painted like a boat ⛵️ and position it in a tub of water. When the fizz is released from the mouth of the bottle, it pushes the bottle forward. 

It is an amazing STEAM activity ✅️ to create a self-powered boat.

Pro Tip

You can make a rocket 🚀 using a bottle filled with this magical mixture or an erupting volcano 🌋 too. 

Coffee Filter Color Magic

Chromatography is another form of scientific magic that makes my little scientist fall in love with 🎨 colors.

I take a triangular piece of coffee filter paper and color one of the vertices with a marker pen 🖊 before dipping the tip into the water.

Within a few seconds, the colors 🌈 segregate from the tip covered in ink and spread out all over the paper in various shades.

Self Inflating Balloon

My little scientist is completely fascinated by this STEAM activity showcasing how a balloon🎈 can magically inflate itself on its own. 

We just put a balloon on the mouth of a bottle carrying a mixture of warm water 💧, sugar, and yeast.

Within a few seconds, the balloon starts inflating on its own due to the chemically magical reaction 🤩 occurring inside.

Snowflake Geometry

Patterns and geometries have been little scientists’ best friends.

Is there a better example than a snowflake ❄ ️ when we are discussing naturally occurring flawless geometric patterns? 

My little one and I have a great time creating snowflakes of different shapes, patterns, and sizes using earbuds, cotton balls, ice cream sticks, and pom poms.

Moreover, sometimes we also create edible snowflakes ❄ ️ by connecting yummy marshmallows using delicious chocolate 🍫 sticks.

Geoboard Activities

Starting from patterns, characters, alphabets 🔤 , and numbers 🔢 to constellations- I can teach my little one about anything using an amazing geoboard.

Different kinds of geoboards, such as light 💡 table geoboards or colorful geoboards, are my little scientist’s favorite.

Learning how to form an alphabet or a number using elastic or a piece of yarn 🧵 improves her focus and concentration.

Oobleck Activity

A magical mixture of water and cornstarch, popularly known as a non-Newtonian fluid, is a perfect choice ✅️ for a STEAM activity.

When my little scientist applies force on it, this magical mixture acts like a solid, otherwise a liquid.

Polymer Activities

Slime is a favorite supply 🤩 for my little scientist’s daily fun activities. Moreover, mixing up tiny sensory toys in this mixture of slime is very beneficial for the little ones. 

You can add several primary colors 🎨 to slime to let your little scientist squish the slime to produce a slime in a secondary shade of color.

Chain Of Colors 

Here is another STEAM activity based on the fantastic capillary action 🤩 by which water 💧 travels against gravity in an intriguing way.

What you need- 

paper or plastic cups, paper towels, food coloring, gloves, droppers, and water.

Steps:

• I place the milkshake cups 🥤 or paper cups in a circle after adding a mixture of water and diverse shades of food coloring into it.
• I roll up paper towels 🧻 into strips or slender cylindrical shapes and fold them into a U-shaped structure.
• This structure of the strips will come in handy in acting as a bridge when one end of it is placed in one cup, and the other end is placed in the following cup.
• I add these U-shaped strips to all the milkshake cups. These strips will absorb water by capillary action, making the food coloring 🎨 split into a broad spectrum of secondary colors on it.

My little scientist is awestruck by observing the magic of capillary action, making the colorful 🌈 mixture rise through the strips.

Magnet Counting Activity

I used to love 🤩 playing with magnets during my childhood days.

I place magnets at random distances on the table and ask my little scientist to use the magnetic force of one magnet 🧲 to attract other magnets one by one, forming a chain.

While forming the chain, my little scientist also proceeds to count the magnets 🧲, brushing up her counting 🔢 abilities.

Phases of The Moon

Now, let me tell you that this topic is very interesting 🧐 one of your little scientists is a fan of astronomy 🔭 like my son.

I teach him about the phases of the moon 🌝 using art paper cutouts, geoboards, and picture books. I even put in black cutouts of the different phases of the moon 🌛 🌗 🌔 in a transparent glass bottle and added LED lights to it.

In turning on these lights in a dark room, my little scientist is able to observe all the phases of the moon in a particular order.

Sprouting Of A Seed

I love ornamental plants 🪴, and my kids are also my greatest cheerleaders when they watch me taking care of my plants. My little scientist loves to plant seeds, waiting for them to sprout with utter devotion and 😇 hope.

My little one learns how a seed sprouts into a sapling 🌱eventually becoming a plant bearing pretty flowers 🌷 just by observation.

You can also place a sapling in a dark room with a single window 🪟 acting as the only source of sunlight for the plant.

After a few days, on observing that the plant has started growing toward the source of sunlight 🌞 your little one will learn how sunlight influences the growth of plants. 

Float, Sink, And Density Activity

I just take a few objects of different weights or densities and ask my little scientist to put them in a tub of water.

My little scientist’s job is to observe, reason, and think 🧐 about which objects were floating and which ones sank. 

Sometimes, I take a container and fill it up with a mixture of oil 🛢 and water. My little scientists are fascinated to see how oil floats on top of the water without mixing in it at all due to different densities.

Tinker Box Challenge

Tinker boxes 📦 are challenging boxes carrying different kinds of stuff like ice cream sticks, cups 🥤of various shapes and sizes, and other similar things.

On a very boring or monotonous day, it comes in handy to engage in several interesting engineering activities 🤩 with my little scientist.

Moreover, I just observe how my little scientist uses the materials according to her own intellect 🧠 to build or engineer a certain structure.

Learn How To Use A Calculator 

This STEAM activity is a classic one, and all of us loved to explore all the functions of a calculator or an abacus 🧮 during our childhood days.

My little scientist loves to play with the calculator or abacus 🧮 and explore different ways of solving numerical 🔢 problems.

You can also hand over a more advanced form of digital calculator to your little one under your supervision.

Engineering Blocks

I just take a few big blocks of styrofoam and prepare brick-sized blocks from them using a cutter. 

My little scientist’s job is to use her mind and analyze how to place these blocks in a particular fashion to engineer 🧐 a proper structure.

You can also mark these blocks with numbers 🔢 to guide your little one toward making the structure. 

Salt Water Painting 

This STEAM activity is extremely popular throughout the globe 🌎, and my little scientist loves it, too. 

My little scientist just draws various patterns using a tube of glue on a thick sheet of paper before sprinkling salt on it.

I remove the extra salt 🧂 from the paper, and my little scientist proceeds to put drops of concentrated, vibrant colors 🎨 on it using a dropper. 

The phenomenon of absorption is observed by my little scientist when the paint automatically spreads out, and a wonderful piece of art takes form.

Conclusion

Science, technology, art, mathematics, and engineering are extremely important aspects that should be paid attention ✅️ to during the growth years of a child.

I hope you have a wonderful time with your little scientist 🤩 while engaging in these activities.

Please don’t forget to tell me 😇 which STEAM activity turned out to be your adorable one’s favorite one.