"What are living things" activity

Are you looking for an easy and basic activity to introduce Biological science to young children?  This is a great activity that made the learning of living and non-living things into a fun activity for my boys.

First, I introduced the concepts of living and non-living things to my boys.  We came up with the following characteristics of living things: living things move by themselves, need energy from food, grow, respond to the world around them and create new living things just like themselves.  Non-living things have the opposite characteristics as living things.

Now onto the fun activity!  The activity involves little ones cutting out pictures from magazines or newspapers to classify into living and non-living.  The using of scissors is an excellent fine motor development activity for little ones however, ensure that they use child friendly scissors.  Select a pair of scissors that fit your little one’s hands and have a blunt point. Cutting with scissors requires the skill of hand separation, which is the ability to use the thumb, index, and middle fingers separately from the pinkie and ring fingers.  Although many 3 or 4 year olds have the skills to snip and cut, scissor skills are not fully developed until around age 6.

This is a great activity that combines the fun of crafting with a basic lesson in biological science.  This topic can be taken further by heading outdoors and identifying living and non-living objects.

Hope your little ones enjoy this fun learning activity!

• Variety of magazines and/or newspapers
• 2 x Poster paper
• Scissors
• Glue

INSTRUCTIONS FOR THE WHAT ARE LIVING THINGS ACTIVITY:

1. Head one poster paper as “Living” and the other as “Non-living”.
2. Cut out a variety of pictures from the magazine and/or newspapers.
3. Classify the pictures between living and non-living things based on the characteristics discussed.
4. Glue the classified pictures on their respective posters.

* This post and all associated images have been supplied by the lovely Rossa from Curious Little People.  Follow her on Instagram for more creative inspirations!