The five senses are an amazing gift from God. Preschoolers will love indulging their senses with these fun project ideas.
Smell: Collect baby food jars and poke holes in the lids. Cover each
baby food jar with a piece of construction paper, so children cannot
see what is inside the jar. Place a substance in each jar (cinnamon,
vanilla extract, onion, etc.). Make a checklist by drawing each object
on a piece of paper and writing out its name below the drawing. When a
child smells one of the baby jars they will mark off what scent it is,
and continue until the entire sheet is marked.
Touch: Make mystery bags using paper lunch bags. Place a different
object in each bag. Blindfold a child and let her touch the item in one
of the bags. See if she can guess what the item is without looking. If
she can't guess, let another child try. Give each child a chance to do
a different bag, and when you switch center groups, a new set of kids
will be able to do the same activity.
Hear: Play animal sounds on a CD player. When the children hear the sound, they must act like the animal they hear.
Taste: Make rainbows out of Fruit Loops or a similar colored cereal.
Prepare by making rainbow shapes on posterboard and lightly writing the
colors for each stripe as a guide. Let the children glue the correct
colors to form a rainbow. At the end of the activity, give each child a
cupful of cereal to enjoy the taste.
See: Play charades! Prepare cards with people or animals in the Bible
that children can act as. Divide children into teams. Let a child pick
a card, act it out, and see if his team can guess who or what he is.
Make the situations easy for preschoolers to act out. They get more joy
out of actually being able to guess correctly.
Bible Stories Related to this Center: God Made Me
This center offers a great opportunity to rotate on an ongoing basis.
Whatever Bible story you are working on, provide the clothing and props
to match, and let children act out the stories. Here are some ideas:
Good Samaritan - Generic Bible costumes, as well as Band-Aids, and a Bible.
Christmas Story - Stuffed animals, Mary & Joseph costume, baby doll (Baby Jesus).
- Noah's Ark - Large cutout of the ark from a cardboard box, Generic Bible costumes, pairs of stuffed animals.
Use your imagination, and any Bible story can come to life for your class.
Ideas to Consider:
- Make props simple for preschoolers. They don't need elaborate productions to have fun and learn in class.
- Have helpers to make dramas run smoothly.
Have bookshelves in place and
stock them with Bible stories. Get donations of books from parents in
the church, and find clearance sales in Christian bookstores and
online. Provide a circle time rug for children to sit on. Have an adult
helper ready to read to the children, or just let them browse through
pictures on an individual basis.
Flannel Board Center
Let children create their own version of Bible stories with a flannel board center.
Ideas to Consider:
- Make your own flannel board with cardboard and felt. Cover the cardboard with felt and staple or staple gun in place.
- Cut figures and shapes out of flannel pieces. Be as creative as you want!
Set up coloring pages based on the particular Bible story you are doing each week. Find many coloring pages here on PSS Central, or try the following resources:
Karen's Whimsy Bible Coloring Pages
Bible Coloring Pages - BibleColoringPages.org