Check out these fun and easy activities and play ideas for 4 year olds. Here you will find tons easy ideas that you can set up for your preschooler while you take a meeting or get some work done at home. There are also fun sensory bin ideas, cool crafts for them to make and amazing hand-on learning ideas that are playful and fun. Tons of easy ways to keep your 4 year old busy, engaged and entertained at home!
Ways to Keep 4 Year Olds Busy
This amazing list of ideas is organized into a few sections. Let me highlight them here for you so you can quickly find what you are looking for fast. Scroll down to find each section.
- Easy Activities That 4 Year Olds Can Do Alone While You Work. These are ideas that you can set up and let your 4 year old do while you work, tend to baby, fold laundry or simply sit down scroll through your phone (yup you’re allow to do that every once in a while)!
- Low Prep Activities for 4 Year Olds. Activities that require little to no prep to create for your preschooler.
- Fun Sensory Bins. Easy sensory bins to create for your 4 year old!
- Easy Crafts for 4 Year Olds. Fun arts and craft ideas that you can do with your 4 year old.
- Hands-on Learning Activities. Fun ways to learn everything from letters, to their name, to numbers, shapes, counting and more.
- Simple STEAM for 4 Year Olds. Engaging Science Experiments four year olds will love!
- Easy Process Art Activities. Process art ideas to help develop creativity and have fun!
5 Easy Activities That 4 Year Olds Can Do Alone While You Work
1. Wash the Toys.
Grab two large sensory bins or Tupperwares ware containers. Fill one container with water and dish soap. Mix it up to make it bubbly. You don’t need a lot of water to make this fun and engaging just an inch or two will do. Lay a towel underneath everything in order to reduce the mess and clean up afterwards. Fill the other tub with tons of farm animals or dinosaurs or cars. You can set up one thing to wash every week! Let them wash the animals in the soap water. Add towels for drying. You can also add fine motor tools like eye droppers or turkey basters for washing, sponges or scrub brushes. If you’re feeling ambitious you can also place the animals outside the tub and put clean water in the second tub allowing your child to wash and then rinse the animals off before drying them.
Fun Activity using Magnets
2. Playing with Magnets.
Fill a sensory bin with all the metal object you can find. Think toy trains, cars, coins, paper clips, fridge magnets, bells, magnetic letters, keys. Throw in some other nonmetal items too. Hand your child a magnetic wand and let them explore trying to pick up item. Add cardboard tubes to the sides of the sensory bin using painter’s tape and have them toss metal items down the tubes that will fit and then have them recover the items using the magnetic wand. Check out here how we did it.
Make Foil Presents
3. Foil Puzzle Match.
Tear off sheets of foil to fit the puzzle pieces and have them do the wrapping for you! Model how to wrap with foil, folding over the puzzle pieces rather than scrunching. Place all the pieces in the basket and let the unwrapping begin! Trust me they will want to do this more than once so tear off a bunch and hand them over as they need them.
Fun Activities using LEGO
4. LEGO Animal Trace
One a large sheet of butcher paper draw the outline of a few animals like a turtle, lion or peacock and invite your child to fill in the rest of the animal with LEGO DUPLO.
5. LEGO Body Trace
Similar to LEGO animal trace but instead you trace their bodies and have them fill them in with LEGO DUPLO or magnetic tiles!
10 Low Prep Activities For 4 Year Olds
6. Super STEAM Activity Book
7. Make a Bubble Snake
8. Super Easy Ice Sensory Bin
9. Ready Made Playdough Kits
10. Dot Sticker Match
11. Sponge Letter Wash Sensory Bin
12. Pom Pom Water Sensory Bin
13. Mega Blok Names
14. Paint the Toys
Paint plastic outdoor toys with washable paints. Then have your kids rinse off the toys with soap and water and sponges before it actually dries!
Fun Sensory Bins and Sensory Play Ideas for 4 Year Olds
21. The BEST (Super Easy & Soft) Playdough Recipe
22. Mud Kitchen Set Up For Kids
Crafts for 4 Year Olds
Easy Learning Activities for 4 Year Olds
50. Easy Paint the Shapes Activity for Preschoolers
51. Alphabet Matching
Easy STEAM Activities for 4 Year Olds
52. Easy Baking Soda and Vinegar Experiment for Kids
53. Fizzy Lemon Volcanoes
54. Dot Sticker Coding: Easy STEAM Activity
55. How to Make Oobleck for Kids
56. Dancing Water Beads
Process Art Activities for 4 year Olds
57. Salt Painting for Toddlers & Preschoolers
58. How to Easily Do Blow Painting with Straws
59. Sock Hands Painting
60. Painting Ice: Super Easy Art Activity for Kids
61. Shower Curtain Painting
Age Suitability
Mess Level
Difficulty to Create
Skills Developed
Check out My Books, TV Show & Play Kits!
Book: Exciting Sensory Bins for Curious Kids
Book: Big Book of Riddles for Kids
Riddle me this: What’s an exciting way to practice critical thinking while having a blast? The Big Riddle Book for Kids, of course! From hilarious puns to tough brain teasers, kids can build problem-solving skills with hundreds of riddles that show them how to think outside the box.
- 350 riddles for kids—Have hours of fun with riddles, puns and jokes, and math and logic puzzles that’ll get their wheels turning!
- Level up their skills—Riddles get trickier as kids progress through the book, challenging them as they get better at solving puzzles!
- Double-check their work—Kids can check their answers in the back of the book with a handy answer key.
Help children expand their minds while having fun with this puzzle book for kids!
Designed for kids ages 6 years old and up.
TV Show: Curious Crafting
The Best Sensory Play Kits for Kids
Shop our ready made play kits here.
WILL YOU TRY ANY OF THESE ACTIVITIES WITH YOUR 4 YEAR OLD? PIN IT FOR LATER!
