Preschool Summer Activities for Kids:
On a wonderful summer day, we just want to stay outside for as long as we can, enjoy the weather, and be active with our children.
But how can you keep preschool children and young kids busy, educated and avoid becoming bored?
What kinds of preschool outdoor activities are there for the summer time?
Outdoor Activities for Kids During the Summer
Here’s an idea for a fun filled preschool summer activity day in the sun with lots of fun outdoor activities to keep kids active.
Send notices home with the children saying that they will need to bring a swim suit, towel, and sun screen to stay in their cubbies for the beautiful summer days ahead.
When you have one of those day where you just don’t want to go inside, why not set up the playground/yard like this:
- Set out one kiddy sized pool with floating water toys in it.
- Set out a sensory bin or large basins with water. Try decorating the water with sparkles or foam shapes and put different sized plastic cups and scoops for the children to explore and practice pouring.
- Have a “bubble station”. Buy a few packs of bubble solution, *(or make your own). Dump the bubble solution in a large bowl and put a bunch of bubble sticks in it so the children can easily blow bubbles when they go to that station.
- Fill up some balloons with water and encourage the children to try and toss the balloons back and forth without breaking them, or just have fun and throw them around.
- Put a sprinkler on for the children to run through.
Enjoy hours of fun in the Summer sun BUT don’t forget the Sunscreen!
Feel free to do all, or some of these outdoor summer activities at one time. Just make sure you have adequate supervision around the kiddy pool to prevent accidents or potential drownings.
**NEVER leave children Unsupervised! NEVER!**
Your playground/backyard will be the talk of the town during the Summer.
To make things easier, we recommend buying the bubble solution as you can get it cheap at dollar stores.
Summer Bubble Science Activity:
*Making the bubble solution could be an outside summer science activity with the children on a different day.
Bubble are always a fun idea for children (and adults).
Children love to blow bubbles, chase bubbles and catch the bubbles while trying to pop them.
Homemade Bubble Solution Recipe:
Here are the items you need for this bubble recipe for your kids.
- ½ cup Dawn or Joy dish washing
- 4 tablespoons glycerin (found at health stores & pharmacies)
- 4 ½ cups of luke warm water
- Mixing Spoon
- Some sort of storage container to keep your bubble solution in.
Bubble Recipe Directions:
Very slowly mix the detergent and the luke warm water together in your container so that it does not suds up. Carefully begin to add in the glycerin and stir the mixture slowly.
This has been tested and discovered you will get best results to leave the mixture to sit overnight. If that is not possible then wait for a few hours before using the bubble mix. These bubbles will be bigger and they should last much longer.
One great idea is to make the mixture as a science experiment or activity with the children one day, and then get the bubble mix out for use the next day with the children.
How to store bubbles and variations for using bubbles:
Old bubble containers work the best for storing the bubble solution. Any wide mouthed plastic jar is perfect as long as the bubble wand can reach in to the container and reach the bottom.
A shallow basin or baking container (not glass) is another way to store the solution outside where all the children can use the mixture to blow their bubbles. *Do not use glass containers as these can break and cause injury.
Should you decide to double or triple the bubble mixture then be sure to use a large container to store it in.
Try Different Bubble Blowing Objects:
Some different objects or materials you can use are things like small plastic berry baskets with all the little square holes around it. You can try old CD’s ( try blowing through the center hole in the cd). Plastic zip ties can be looped to make circles of different sizes.
You can bend twist ties into small circles,or try bending pipe cleaners into loops or oblong loops. You can also buy different bubble wands at dollar stores and retailers to make different bubbles.
Making Colored Bubbles:
Making colored bubbles is as easy as adding food coloring to the solution.
Ever tried blowing colored bubbles in the winter time against the backdrop of white snowy ground?
Be sure that the day is a milder day in the winter when there is snow on the ground. Make up some of the colored bubble mixture, get your wand and have fun on those mild winter days.
After all, who said bubbles are only for summer
Painting with Water:
Why not cool off this summer with a fun painting activity that won’t leave a big mess to clean up.
All you need are a couple of buckets filled with water and a variety of paint brushes.
Now sit back and watch as the preschool children become little painters and artists outside, painting everything from the fence, bricks, doors, and more. Or for more fun, why not join in the water painting fun.
Sunshine Art:
Did you know that you can actually make art from sunshine alone? The preschool children are going to be amazed at the results.
Here’s what to do:
Supply the pre k kids with one piece of dark construction paper (with their names on the back) and one or two weighted rocks.
On a not to windy clear sunny day go outside and have the children find a sunny place to lay their paper down and put the rocks on it to hold it down.
Ask the children to go around and find other objects to place on their paper (twigs, leaves, grass, etc.)
Leave the paper in place until you go outside in the afternoon. Take the objects off of the paper and voila, sun art!