Children’s bodies are constantly growing and changing- making them an endless topic of fascination and discussion in preschool, elementary grades, and beyond. From growing pains to loose teeth, testing their bodies’ abilities to jump, climb, and run, children have a logical, practical need to discover more about the concept of body parts and their five senses. Human body games and activities are a great addition to any classroom theme about growing, health, nutrition, or the senses to help them achieve just that! The activities listed below are sure to harness and promote your kiddos’ natural interest in this ever-important topic, so jump right in to pick out a few to try with them!
1. Body Parts Chant
Introduce your lesson and build body part-related vocabulary with this fun chant! As they engage with the catchy tune, your students will learn about different parts of the body through movement and begin to understand what those body parts help them do. Best of all, they’ll also explore the concept of body parts in a way that promotes body positivity!
Learn More: Pinterest
2. “The Body Song”
“The Body Song” is the perfect way for your younger children to review body part-related vocabulary terms while they get up and moving! They can tap, shake, and name different body parts while singing along to the lyrics. Talk about a perfectly themed brain break!
Learn More: YouTube
3. Parts Puzzles
Assembling these challenging body parts puzzles will help your children learn where exactly all our parts belong on our bodies! Building with puzzles is sure to also help them to develop their spatial awareness.
Learn More: Tot Schooling
4. Rock Faces
Making faces from loose parts is a Reggio-inspired way to help your pupils develop their body parts vocabulary. Help your little ones harness their powers of close observation and challenge them to make a self-portrait using eyes that are the same color as theirs, a similarly shaped nose, mouth, etc.
Learn More: Roots & Wings
5. The Brush Game
Integrate literacy and multi-sensory science learning to bring the concept of body parts to life like never before! As you read the story I Ain’t Gonna Paint No More aloud to students, you can have them use a clean brush to “paint” the same body parts as the child in the book.
Learn More: Still Playing School
6. Human Body Playdough Mats
Using playdough mats to explore the human body is a creative way to help your children visualize the body parts that we cannot see like bones, muscles, and organs. Let them draw body part cards and add them to the correct space on their mat for an extra challenge!
Learn More: 123 Homeschool 4 Me
7. Movement Dice
Start your morning meeting with 6-7 minutes of this fun body movement game! Simply invite your learners to roll two dice (get printable at the link below) that tell them which body part to move and how to move them! Incorporate literacy by calling the dice the “noun” and “verb”!
Learn More: Life Over C’s
8. Roll & Draw
Use this roll-and-draw activity to review body parts and their location on our bodies! This activity integrates math as it prompts your students to recognize dot patterns and tally their rolls. This is the perfect activity if you’re looking for a little more than a traditional body vocabulary worksheet!
Learn More: I Heart Crafty Things
9. Mr. Potato Head Senses
The Mr. Potato Head body parts game is perfect for getting your students to review body parts and their associated senses and/or abilities. Have your kiddos flick the spinner and add the correct body parts until their entire body is assembled.
Learn More: A Little Pinch of Perfect
10. Build-A-Face Snack
Incorporate your body parts unit into your daily snack time routine by making these edible faces on tortillas or rice cakes! Let your learners create silly faces and self-portraits or make facial expressions that represent certain emotions before enjoying their special snack.
Learn More: Learn Play Imagine
11. Identifying Body Parts with Dolls
Most little kids love to play with dolls and stuffed animals. So, why not make playing a teachable moment by asking them questions as they play with their dolls? For example, you can ask them, “Where is the baby’s nose?” and have them point to the body parts to answer your questions.
Learn More: Teach from the Mama Heart
12. Body Parts Lid Flip Game
For this activity, have your students lift up the lids to reveal the body part underneath. For example, when they flip up the “hand” they can talk about what they can do with their hand, what it looks like, and more. This is a really fun activity that will help them better understand the parts of their bodies!
Learn More: TPT
13. Paint with Body Parts
We bet your kids will have a blast painting with their body parts. Prepare for this activity by rolling out a long piece of paper and providing non-toxic finger paints for your children to paint with. They can place blobs of paint on the paper and then use their hands and feet to create fun prints and designs.
Learn More: Muse of the Morning
14. Simon Says
Simon Says is a game that you can play with your little kiddies to practice identifying body parts. Use specific prompts such as, “Simon says pat your belly”, or “Simon Says point to your knee”. This is a great end-of-unit review exercise to help you ascertain how much your children know about their body parts.
Learn More: Mommy Made That
15. Twister
Twister is a fun game that will test your students’ knowledge of their body parts. During gameplay, your students will have to place their hands and feet on different colored dots, according to the directions given once they’ve had a chance to flick the spinner.
Learn More: Rules of Playing
16. Skeletal System Game
This interactive, online game is a great choice if you’re keen on having your students practice naming the parts of the body, specifically focusing on the skeletal system. We guarantee they’ll have a blast engaging in play whilst using technology to learn about their bones. Up the ante by setting a timer to have them race against the clock to complete the rounds.
Learn More: Soft Schools
17. Muscle System Board Game
Here’s a hands-on opportunity for your kiddos to learn more about the muscle system. To successfully make their way to the end, they’ll need to overcome various obstacles and avoid the blocks throughout the board.
Learn More: Physiology
18. Magnetic Human Body Play Set
Your little ones will have a ball putting people together with this play set. They’ll have the opportunity to view the important bones, muscles, and organs that make up the human body and hopefully come to master the basic names of various body parts.
Learn More: Amazon
19. Internal Organ Puzzle
We love this internal organ puzzle! While we typically focus on the basic external body parts, this puzzle is fantastic for introducing your students to what’s going on inside their bodies. Simply have them match the organ with the size and shape that fits into each piece of the puzzle.
Learn More: Etsy
20. Life Size Human Body Interactive Model
This life-sized human body model gives your learners the chance to piece together the special parts that make up our amazing bodies. As they engage in piecing everything together, they’ll get a closer view of the lungs, heart, intestines, brain, and other vital organs, whilst learning how everything is interrelated.
Learn More: Etsy
21. Body Parts Bingo
Body Parts Bingo truly makes learning fun! Call out different body parts and prompt your students to have a go at marking them off on their Bingo cards. When someone gets 3 body parts in a row, they can call out “Bingo!” for a prize.
Learn More: Gift of Curiosity
22. DIY Robot Hand
This DIY robot hand project is perfect for giving your pupils an in-depth look at the complex anatomy of hands. Engage them in creating their own robot hand that moves just like a real one! All you’ll need are straws, yarn, cardstock, and sticky tape. Once complete, your kids will be amazed to learn about how the different parts of the hand work together to function properly.
Learn More: Mombrite
23. Playdough Skeleton Sculpture
Get your youngsters to use toothpicks and Playdough to create skeleton sculptures. The toothpicks will act as the bones that help to support the other body parts. To bring about a comparative activity, have your littles create two different sculptures- one with “bones” and one without. As a result, they’ll gain new insight into how important bones actually are in terms of the stability they provide!
Learn More: Mombrite
24. Skeleton Handprints
Your little humans will love to see their handprints in skeleton form using only white paint and black construction paper. The end result of this craft will resemble an x-ray of hands when it’s complete. Have your students work with a partner to help one another bring these cool prints to life.
Learn More: Simple Everyday Mom
25. Lung Craft
Introduce your class to the respiratory system with this fascinating project in which they’ll learn and craft at the same time! All they’ll need to do is glue pink and red squares on the lungs in the picture to illustrate the color of healthy lungs inside our bodies.
Learn More: Simple Everyday Mom
26. Parts of the Brain
Here’s another awesome way to incorporate playdough into your body part unit! Have your kiddos make a sculpture of their brains using the malleable substance! They can use different colors and labels to identify various parts of the brain. Once complete, encourage everyone to quiz one another about the parts of the brain and their functions.
Learn More: 123 Homeschool 4 Me
27. Body X-Ray Craft
Your students will gain a new appreciation for their bodies whilst completing this body x-ray activity. Have each person lie down on a piece of butcher paper before getting a friend to trace their body. Then, they’ll need to cut the paper body out, correctly position bone cut-outs, and top things off with an image of their face! Once complete, your kiddos will be left with a life-sized replica of themselves!
Learn More: 123 Homeschool 4 Me
28. Create a Lung Model
Get your older learners to create a working model of their lungs to learn what happens inside our bodies as we breathe. Once assembled, they can blow into the straws to inflate the balloons that represent their lungs; getting a closer look at how our lungs rise and fall with every breath.
Learn More: Hello Wonderful
29. Make an Inflatable Heart
Put a spin on the above activity by having your little ones put together their own inflatable heart model that mimics the actual functions of the heart. They’ll use pipe cleaners to represent cardiac veins and coronary arteries. The red pipe cleaners should represent the blood that is pumped throughout the body.
Learn More: Kids Activities Blog
30. My Amazing Body Project
Invite your upper elementary students to create a flipchart all about their amazing bodies. This resource includes labels that they can edit in Microsoft Word and add more details after completing some research. We bet everyone will gain a new appreciation of their bodies as they complete this interesting project.
Learn More: Primary Theme Park
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