Castle activities for preschoolers are sure to inspire and engage your little engineers, both in and out of the preschool block center.
There’s just something about castles that draw children in, right? Maybe it’s how they’re often referenced in fairy tales, or maybe it’s because castles are built quite different than the homes they know. Either way, I’ve found many kids through the years who love all things castles. Even better if there’s a dragon in there somewhere.
In that vein, I gathered a variety of castle ideas to share with you today. There’s even a free printable at the very bottom of the post. Be sure to grab it once you’ve checked out all the castle fun.
Castle Activities for Preschoolers
I got a little excited and ended up finding over 20 castle-themed projects to share with you. Many of them I’ve tried with my preschoolers and my son. But there are a few that I’ve yet to try (but they’re on my list to do so).
You’ll find a variety of activities here – art and crafts, engineering and building, math, and more! There’s even a castle-shaped snack idea.
My Favorite Preschool Castle Activities
I like to say that these are kid-tested, teacher-approved. They’re activities I’ve done with multiple groups of preschoolers, including my son when he was younger. They’re either castle-themed or castle-adjacent (meaning, they’d be great during a preschool castle theme).
Use block center building cards (with real photos of castles) to inspire castle building! Our book of world structures was a hit as soon as I introduced it so many years ago. You can grab a free printable preview of the large pack near the bottom of this post. Part of the printable is a castle mini book, with 4 real castles pictured. There’s even a building planning sheet for the kids!
Make ice castles with your students. They can explore early science concepts as they build, and then melt, their castles. You can even turn it into an excavation activity by “trapping” toys in the ice.
Set up an ice castle themed building center with DIY painted wooden blocks. Even if your students aren’t into Frozen, this really adds a different dimension to the blocks.
Grab the recycling and challenge your students to make their own cardboard castles. We enjoyed making a large version with a giant box, too!
Take the fun outside and try catapult painting. Yes, I said catapult painting – don’t knock it until you tried it. This continues to be an amazing amount of fun, for kids and adults alike. These catapults for kids are something to look into if your students are enamored with catapults.
Add some dragon imaginative play to your preschool castle activities. Because every castle is better with a dragon.
Castle Crafts and Castle Art
Now that I’ve shared our tried-and-true castle activities for preschoolers, let’s take a peek at some more castle-themed creative ideas!
Integrate math with No Time for Flash Cards’ shape castle. I love how something so simple, like shapes from construction paper, can yield so many different results.
Make Still Playing School’s sand castle puffy paint art with the kids. You can add a touch of gray paint if you want to take the focus off of the sandcastle part.
Get creative with a craft you can eat with Capri +3’s graham cracker castles. Then let the kids decorate the castles!
Use your building center materials to create Emma Owl’s block printing creations. I think this is a must-include when it comes to preschool castle activities!
If your students really want to learn how to draw castles, Deep Space Sparkle’s watercolor castle project would be perfect.
Grab those cardboard tubes, and some colorful tape, to make Mini Mad Things’ toilet roll castle.
The Educators’ Spin On It’s cereal box castle theater would be a fun addition to the dramatic play center once it’s done.
This sandcastle texture project from Fantastic Fun and Learning lets the children design their very own castles.
The Craft Train’s cardboard castle craft is a project the children can make along with you. It does need quite a bit of adult help, but I think it would make a great collaborative project.
A Few More Castle Activities for Preschoolers
I warned you that I found some great castle ideas, right?! I’ve shared castle-themed activities I’ve tried with my students, as well as some castle crafts. Now it’s time for a few more castle activities that I can’t wait to try!
The Preschool Toolkit shows us how to create a winter castle small world invitation with simple, everyday materials.
Rainy Day Mum explores counting variations with her castle-themed skip counting activity.
Make Life Over C’s color sorting castle to make color identification and sorting super engaging. You can switch things up to focus on letters, numbers, or words, too.
The catapult castle math game from Fun Learning for Kids will get the kids moving as they practice early math concepts. And, as I mentioned earlier, who doesn’t love a good catapult?!
I know the kids will adore Growing Book by Book’s cardboard castle reading nook! The one we made for our dramatic play center certainly was.
Happy Tot Shelf has a castle themed graphing game printable for preschoolers. I love the inclusion of Chinese words alongside the pictures.
I love how Things to Share and Remember made a floor castle out of tape and used it for so many early learning adventures!
Math Geek Mama’s pattern block castles are just right for the math center! And you can tweak her idea based on the needs of your students.
Combine sensory and building with Fun Learning for Kids’ castle in the clouds activity. How fun would this be after reading Jack and the Beanstalk?!
And, finally, once all the work has been done, feed your castle engineers some of Creative Kid Snacks’ castle sandwiches.
Now the question is, which of these castle activities for preschoolers are you going to try first?!
World Structures STEM Challenges for Your Building Center
Here’s a look at the most up-to-date version of the structure book. As I mentioned earlier, it’s grown to over 70 pages. I added more structures from around the world, as well as some of the planning pages I’ve used with students in the past. Take a peek:
- 32 full-size pages of structures from around the world
- 10 full-size pages of castles from around the world
- A flip-book version of the 42 world structures
- 4 different building plan options
- 6 recording pages to document all of the STEM fun
- 6 cover choices for a class-made structure book
Click on the image below to get your own! It’s an amazing extension of the castle activities for preschoolers! You can also find us on Teachers Pay Teachers.
Get Your Free Printable Here
If your students enjoyed some of the above castle activities for preschoolers, they’ll get a kick out of this freebie. It gives you a sample of what to expect in the full 70+ pages World Structures printable. There are four full-page structures included, along with a one-page castle add-on (to make a small flip-book of four castles), and one of the building planning sheets for the kids.
The free printable is available to members of Fun-A-Day’s (also free!) email community. If that’s you, enter your information in the form below to have the download links sent to your inbox. If you’re not a member yet, you can join us through the form below! You’ll get the printable as a welcome gift.
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