Animal Habitat Invitation to Play
Invite your preschooler to create and play with this animal habitat playdough tray! Using blue, green, and brown playdough, some animal figurines, and whatever you have around the house, you can create a variety of engaging habitats that your child will love.
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For our Animal Habitats theme, I knew I wanted to incorporate several different sensory bins for some of the various habitats, but I was also curious to see what my son would prefer to create when given the option to choose from different colors and animals.
In the end, it didn’t seem to matter which animals lived where. The polar bears visited their deer friends in the forest, and the tree frogs went to the desert for groceries! Ha!
And that’s okay! I used this activity as an opportunity to talk about where the animals lived in real life, but the line between real life and play pretend is thin at 4 years old.
WHILE YOU’RE PLANNING YOUR ANIMAL HABITATS THEME:
- Check out my Animal Habitats Unit here. (Use code HABITAT25 for 25% off) If you join my Preschool Program Membership, you’ll get a major discount on all past Unit Studies, and 2 brand new units included each month!
- Here are 25 Animal Activities for your Preschooler’s Habitat theme!
- Here’s a list of Animal Books for your Animal Habitat Unit Study.
- Here are 25 Animal Habitat Crafts for your Preschooler
- Here’s a list of 16 Fun & Delicious Animal-Themed Snacks for your Kids
Animal Habitat Activities & Crafts We’ve Done at the Moore Homestead:
- How to Make a Paper Bag Nest
- Make a Bear Cave Craft
- How to Make a Rainforest Terrarium with Kids
- Toilet Paper Roll Bird Feeders
- Paper Plate Lion Craft
- Owl Paper Bag Puppet Craft for Kids
- Desert Sensory Bin
- Arctic Sensory Bin
- Forest Sensory Bin
- Ocean Sensory Bin
Animal Habitat Facts for your Preschooler:
For tips on planning your homeschool preschool year, including curriculum recommendations, check out this article.
Join the Homeschooling Preschoolers Facebook Page! There are free resources available, and it’s the perfect way to connect with other families!
Animal Habitat Invitation to Play
For this playdough tray, I added:
- Playdough (green, brown, and blue)
- Aquarium pebbles
- Glass gems
- Fake plants
- Sensory play tweezers
- Animal figurines
- Rolling pin
For those interested, this is the wooden tray I bought. I recommend it all the time!
Many of the animal figurines were already floating around at our house, however, I did purchase this set of rainforest animals, and this polar bear/penguin set. The rainforest animals were a little pricier than I wanted to spend, but they came with a TON of little figurines. I’ll be able to incorporate these into play and school for years to come.
The polar bears and penguins were a little pricy as well, but they’re high quality, and a good size, too.
Give the tray to your child and watch their imagination soar! You can show them how to roll out the playdough using a rolling pin, to create different terrains. Let them explore freely, but use it as a chance to discuss various animals and their habitats.
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