We know subjects like Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math might sound oh-so-boring to your little ones. That’s why we’ve put together these hands-on STEM activities for kids that make learning super fun!
STEM Activities for Preschoolers
Here are a few STEM activities for kids that cater to various learning stages. Let’s begin with easy STEM activities for preschoolers:
- Melt Ice – Best STEM Game for Beginners
- Sprout Seeds – Make STEM Easy for Kids
- Marshmallow Engineering – A Tasty Learning Experience
This simple Science activity could be perfect for kids who are just beginning to understand the world around them. All you need is some ice, salt, water, and liquid watercolor.
First, let a bowl of water freeze overnight. Next, color your ice with a few drops of liquid watercolor (This is just for some additional fun! You can skip this step). Then shake some salt over the ice and voilà! You’ll notice that the ice melts. This is a fun way to teach your kids about the changing state of matter.
STEM for kids can be easy with this easy experiment. Gather some Chia seeds in a jar and fill the jar with water. Make sure you cover it with a cloth and secure it with an elastic band. Let the seeds sit for the night. The next morning, drain the water. Wait for a day or two for the seeds to sprout!
Spark your child’s engineering skills by letting them build anything they want with yummy marshmallows! They could use toothpicks to ensure these marshmallows don’t topple over.
Whether they want to build a castle, a simple building, or a car – the possibilities are endless. And once they’re finished, they can treat themselves to those marshmallows. Slurp!
STEM Activities for 1st Grade
Try these easy STEM activities for 1st grade:
- Cup Tower – Stack & Measure
- Candy Math – Best STEM Game to Practice Counting & More
- Directional Cards – Screen-Free Coding Games for Kids
It’s super easy! Give your kids 1 minute to stack cups on top of each other. Once they’ve created their “tower”, instruct them to measure it. The more towers they create, the better! They could count the number of cups in each “tower”, compare heights, and more!
Check out Osmo’s fun measurement game: Math Wizard and the Secrets of the Dragons now!
There’s so much you can do with a bucket full of candy! You could count all the candy, weigh them, sort them by brand/type/flavor, and even use them to practice addition & subtraction.
For another addition & subtraction game, check out Osmo’s Math Wizard and the Magical Workshop!
Pretend you’re a computer and your child is the programmer. Your child needs to ensure you reach a specific place in the room just by displaying directional cards!
On the directional cards, kids need to create arrows pointing to the front, to the back, to the right, and to the left. You can time this game to make it more challenging.
For digital-physical coding games, shop Osmo’s Coding Starter Kit.
STEM Activities for 2nd Grade
These awesome STEM activities for 2nd grade can make dreaded subjects so much easier to learn!
- Straw Roller Coaster – Best STEM Games to Practice Engineering
- Water Cycle – A Science Experiment in a Bag
- Clothespin Math – Combine Art with Math
It’s totally possible for your kids to make their own roller coaster using straws! All they have to do is tape the straws carefully to ensure they don’t fall. Once they’ve created it, check how it works by using a ping pong ball as a “car”!
Teach your child about the water cycle process with this fun experiment. First, take a cup of water and squeeze some food coloring into it. Then pour this mixture into a bag that can be sealed shut. Within a few days, you can observe how water evaporates, condenses, and falls down in the form of precipitation!
For this fun game, first, draw a bird each on different sheets of paper. Then, number each bird. Your child will need to pin clothespins to the bird according to that number. For example, on bird #3, they’ll need to pin 3 clothespins!
STEM Activities for 3rd Grade
These simple STEM activities for 3rd grade are everything your kids need to learn through hands-on play:
- Marble Maze – Learn Engineering Through Play
- Hot Chocolate – Fun STEM Games for Kids
- Simon Says – Offline Coding Games for Kids
Provide a couple of straws to your little one. Have them cut the straws with scissors, and then make a maze using these straws. They could get creative and add tunnels along the way! Don’t forget to use tape or glue to fasten the straws to the surface. Then, veer a marble through the maze!
Who doesn’t love hot chocolate? And imagine if you could learn some science while making it too!
For this experiment, your kids need to try to dissolve the chocolate mix in cups of varying water temperatures. They’ll notice how the cold water never dissolves it, and the hot water dissolves it the fastest. Explain to your kids that the higher the energy of the water, the quicker it breaks down the molecules present in the chocolate mix.
We all know the popular game of Simon Says, don’t we? If you look at it, it actually serves as a fun coding game, where Simon is the programmer and the people he commands are the computers! Kids won’t even realize they’re developing core computational thinking skills through this game.
We aim to make learning STEM fun with these STEM activities for kids! Don’t forget to shop our wide range of many more STEM games that blur the line between learning and fun.
Frequently Asked Questions on STEM Activities for Kids
What are the STEM Activities for Kids?
The STEM Activities for Kids are melting the ice, plant a seed and sprout the seeds, water cycle, marble mazes, Simon says, etc.
What are the STEM Activities for 1st graders?
The STEM Activities for 1st graders are Osmo’s math wizard, stacking and measuring the cups, candy math, screen free games for the kids, art and math activities, etc.