Preschool Play with Magnets

Magnets are so cool. They are really a blast to play with! For today’s play activity, I got out some big magnets and magnetic items and let my kids explore!

To set up, I put magnetic items into a bin. I put things in like nuts, bolts, pipe cleaners, magna-tiles, magnetic letters, bells, tin can lids, butterfly clip, and more. I also put in non-magnetic items.

Then I poured colored rice into the bin and mixed it all up.

Next, I invited the kids to explore and play with the magnets.

I gave them a horseshoe magnet and a magnetic pick-up tool. They both had a blast exploring items that were magnetic. (Beware…there are lots of pictures! I just had fun taking so many photos of the boys playing!)

Check out this next picture…the pipe cleaner is flying towards the horse-shoe magnet!! Love that action shot!

We also did an activity where I put cut-up pipe cleaners in an empty water bottle and we placed a magnet on the outside to make the pipe cleaners move up and down.

Then we did a letter matching activity. I traced the outline of the magnetic alphabet letters onto the back of a cookie sheet. Then I put the letters in the rice bin and had the kids find the letters and place them on the sheet.

I couldn’t find the letter Q, so we were one short! Oops!

We had SO much fun with magnets. In fact, I am keeping this bin out for a while for the kids to explore and play with.

Please only do magnet activities with kids who are old enough to NOT put items in their mouths.

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