These activities for 4 year olds to do at home will keep your children busy and engaged, and will give you bonding experiences. You don’t need supplies, do them every day!
Four year olds are busy practicing what they have learned and experienced while honing gross and fine motor skills. They like to stay busy and are better at independent play.
We have written a list on ideas for Activities for 4 Year Olds that are great play-based, educational activities. These are great, but often require setup and materials. This particular list is less for education, and more for ways to stay busy and bonded with your child.
This printable list below will serve as a reminder to you of 4 year old activities that you can do every single day, some are great for long days indoors, and some perfect for getting outside.
4 Year Old Development
Important milestones for 4 year olds include:
Social and emotional development such as make-believe or pretend play, acting our scenes from life, cooperation and teamwork and developing interests.
Language skills like a growing vocabulary, singing songs and poems and telling stories.
Cognitive development in learning numbers, shapes, colors, and counting. Combined with fine motor skills like cutting with scissors and holding a pencil.
All of this is more than enough work for a 4 year old! Luckily, you can keep them busy and bond with them by carrying out some of the activities on this list, all while encouraging those milestones they are working so hard on.
Activities for 4 Year Olds to do at Home
As a stay-at-home mom, there were many days where I was left wondering, “what am I going to do with him/her all day?”. When my kids were younger toddlers this was more difficult as I was trying to keep them distracted and busy. With older preschoolers, it’s more about fighting the “I’m bored’s” and finding ways to complete activities together.
I’m sharing some of my go-to activities and boredom busters that can be done every single day (even older kids love repetition), and, that don’t require anything that you most likely wouldn’t have at home. We had a similar list of activities to do with a 1 year old every day and 2 year old activities and it was a helpful resource!
Grab the free printable of these activities at the bottom of this post and hang them in every room in your house for quick reference 😉
Activities for 4 Year Olds
Color in a coloring book. This age likes the challenge of staying in the lines and purposefully choosing colors for their picture. (Although staying inside the lines is certainly not a necessity! Creativity in coloring is ok too)
Play a card game. A simple game of Go Fish or War is great for this age group, and practices turn-taking and waiting.
‘Wash’ the dishes. Put some of the plastic kid dishes in a sink of soapy water and let your preschooler scrub them.
Draw a picture. I love collaborative or side by side drawing with this age. It’s a great calm activity to do together.
Play with Playdoh. This age might be able to build small play dough sculptures and will still enjoy practicing fine motor skill with playdough through rolling and cutting. Make your own for a cost-effective alternative to store bought dough.
Stack pantry items. Your child might have been doing this since they were an infant able to sit up, but 4 year olds still enjoy building towers with cereal boxes, oatmeal containers and cans!
Dig in the dirt. Strip them down or put on some play clothes and let them go outside and play in the dirt. If they are hesitant, they can touch the dirt with kitchen tools such as spoon, whisks and tongs.
Make a pillow fort. Grab the couch cushions and pillows and get building!
Look through a book, or listen to an audiobook. An Audible subscription might be worthwhile for this age. Listening to an audiobook is calming and encourages imagination.
Mix baking soda and vinegar. This is such a fun experiment that is magical every time. Spread some baking soda on a baking sheet, and let your preschoolers use medicine droppers to add vinegar to the sheet of baking soda.
Take pictures. Use your phone or an iPad to let your child take pictures around the house of things that are important to them or that they like. We like to play picture I-Spy. The child take close up pictures of household items and we try to guess what they have taken a picture of! A fun boredom buster indoors.
Switch the laundry. Chores are daunting to us as adults, but guess who loves to help? Kids! They likely love spending time with you, even if it’s when putting the dirty clothes into the washing machine.
Draw with sidewalk chalk. Do some free drawing outside, or play this fun sidewalk chalk board game, or make a flower mandala with chalk!
Play with stickers. Stickers can be fun drawing prompts! We like to decorate a blank sheet of paper with a few stickers, setting a scene. Then, we take our pencils or crayons and draw around them. Maybe a tree for the monkey sticker or an ocean for a boat sticker.
Play dress-up. If you don’t have dress up clothes at home, look around for what you can turn into dress-up clothes. Do you have an apron your child can borrow to be a chef? A red cardigan they can wear as a firefighter coat?
Wash dirty toys. Toys can always be washed. Throw any plastic toys in a sink of soapy water and let your preschooler scrub away.
Do an outdoor obstacle course. Sticks can be jumped over, frisbees can be run around, and hola hoops can be jumped in. Get creative!
Play catch. This age group is really developing this skill, and might be able to switch to smaller balls and gloves for a game of catch.
Take a bubble bath. Add some food coloring to the water for an extra treat!
Act out a book. This is one of our favorites. Classic children’s stories such as Goldilocks and the Three Bears or the Three Little Pigs are great for acting out.
Print this List Activities for 4 Year Olds to do at Home
Simply click on the image below to access this printable!
So, do you think you can do these 4 year old activities every day?
If you’re up for the challenge, don’t forget to print them out above.
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Looking for Printable Activities for 4 Year Olds?
This printable gives you ideas that you can hang up on your wall for inspiration of ways to play with your kids. If you’re looking for games and more fun that you can print out to do with preschoolers, we’ve got you covered!
Some of our favorite printable preschool games include Bingo, Matching and I-Spy and board games. Small kids can match pictures and love to do this together. Laminating game pieces is a good idea if you’re playing these games with small children who might still put items in their mouth.
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