Favorite Preschool Science Experiments (Updated for 2026!)
- Amy Wung Tsao
- 3 days ago
- 9 min read
There’s nothing like sparking wonder and curiosity in a preschooler with a fun interactive science experiment or STEM/STEAM activity. Bonus points if it’s easy to set up and clean up too, right?
If you're a parent or teacher of preschoolers, then keep reading for easy, hands-on preschool science experiments and activities to use in your home or classroom!
Rainbow Science Activities for Preschool
Sunlight has all the colors of the rainbow hiding inside it! It's super easy to help your preschoolers separate all those colors out into a beautiful rainbow.
Make a Rainbow Indoors from SciShow Kids You just need a sunny window, a white piece of paper, and a clear glass of water. Your kids can follow along, but also experiment with moving the glass and the paper around. Stick around to the end of the video for tips to find a natural rainbow in the sky.
from Hands On As We Grow
This time go outside with a sprinkler! You can also use a hose spraying a fine mist. Make sure the sun is behind you, and then experiment with different angles to try to make the biggest rainbow you can!
Migration Science Activity for Preschool
from Science World
Migrate like salmon through an obstacle course filled with waterfalls, dams, predators, and fishers.
I love this activity because it gets kids active and moving, and can easily turn into independent pretend play! Plus it’s easy to modify for your circumstances. You could play this indoor with string or jump ropes to outline the migration corridor, and stuffies and furniture as the obstacles. Or you can play this outside with chalk to draw the migration corridor and obstacles. I can see this working for just one kid or groups of kids as well.
I love the idea of migrating multiple times, each time adding a new obstacle for your kids to navigate. Keep the play and learning going!
Seed Science Experiment for Preschool
Grow Popcorn Seeds in a Bag from Special Treat Friday This must be the absolute easiest version of experimenting with growing seeds! You can probably do this literally right now with supplies you have in your kitchen - popcorn kernels, paper towels, and plastic baggies. I would have never thought to grow in plastic baggies, but it really makes the whole process so much more visible to kids. And you might even be able to transfer your corn plants into the garden later to become full grown.
With enough popcorn baggies and kernels, you can easily experiment with giving seeds lots of sunlight, no sunlight at all, or something in between, and observe the differences!
There are so many fun seed science books to read aloud while you're waiting on your seeds to grow!
Forces and Motion Science Experiments for Preschool
From Busy Toddler
Find a cardboard box or a big book and build some ramps for your kids to experiment with. They get to have fun and experiment with the physics of gravity and speed at the same time!
Make a Catapult from Go Science Kids
Add a toilet paper roll and a rubber band to your spoon to build a simple catapult! Try moving the toilet paper roll (the fulcrum) higher or lower on the spoon handle. If you move the fulcrum closer to the side you’re pushing on, it will feel a little harder to push but should launch your projectile farther. And adding a target to hit makes this science experiment into a game!
from SciShow Kids
Preschoolers can follow along with the video to fold a basic paper airplane. The video also explains how the forces of thrust & lift work together to make their airplane fly. Their arm makes the thrust, and the plane’s wings make the lift!
Building/Engineering STEM/STEAM Activities for Preschool
from SciShow Kids
Kids can easily build cup towers along with this 4 minute video. They’ll learn by doing how wider bases help with stability. They’ll need at least 6 paper or plastic cups, depending on how high they can stack!
Little Bins for Little Hands
Next time my kids ask for hot chocolate, I’m going to give them extra marshmallows and toothpicks for building. Younger kids can just make 2D and 3D shapes, while older kids can try to build the tallest tower they can!
Space STEM/STEAM Activities for Preschool
from Inspiration Laboratories
The idea of the solar system can be so abstract for preschoolers, until they build their own! Use balls and balloons to make your own solar system on your living room floor. And then really have some fun (and burn some energy!) throwing “asteroids” (small balls or pom poms) at the bigger planets!
from Gift of Curiosity
A memorable snack time, paired with science learning! Pretend you’re an astronaut using velcro to keep your snacks from floating away! This pretend play idea asks kids to think critically about the difficulties of eating in space, and how to solve them.
For kids who can’t get enough of space travel, check out the astronaut books & videos in this post.
from SciShow kids
This quick STEAM activity teaches preschoolers about the phases of the moon. It also works on their fine motor skills like tracing and cutting too! And if you’ve got a kid that likes puzzles, they might feel pretty cool making their own puzzle of the moon!
And there’s more Moon science for kids, including fun books and videos, in this post here!
Sun-Powered STEM/STEAM Activities for Preschool
Paint with sunscreen!
from Kids Activities Blog
This art project shows kids the power of both sunlight and sunscreen! Let them paint on bright construction paper with a brush or fingers or even stamps, then put your paper outside. After a few hours, the paper color will have faded except where the sunscreen is. (You might keep one sheet of paper out of the sun to compare against the faded color that’s been in the Sun.) For older kids, you could experiment with different sunscreen brands or types.
Melting Crayons with the Sun
from No Time for Flashcards
Just imagine telling your kids that the Sun is so hot today, it could melt a crayon. If you happen to be in the middle of a heatwave, you could at least use the weather for a cool artsy science project, right? If you have enough supplies, try putting some crayons in the sun and some in the shade as an experiment to see which ones melt first!
If you want science books and videos that go along with the theme of solar energy and sun power, click on over to this post!
Electricity STEM/STEAM Activities for Preschool
Static electricity experiments are great because once you’ve helped a kid get started, they’ll often find new ways to experiment with it on their own! Start by rubbing a balloon in your hair, running a plastic comb through your hair, or rubbing a plastic spoon on a towel to charge it up. Once you have a charged up balloon, comb, or spoon, you can experiment with attracting sugar, pepper, confetti, and other small light things. You can even make running water bend like this guy!
Magnet STEM/STEAM Activities for Preschool
from Brookhaven National Lab
Arm your kid with a magnet and send them out to see what it sticks to! Independent discovery at its finest. If that’s too open-ended, Brookhaven National Lab has this scavenger hunt list of things to try your magnet on. Some things may surprise you! I was just as surprised as my kids to learn that only some of my stainless steel pots are magnetic, and some aren't.
from Left Brain Craft Brain
This is such a great combination of art and science! Paint with a magnet and bits of metal that you found in the scavenger hunt. It’s easier with a strong magnet, stronger than your standard fridge magnet. Learning Resources has some options in its $19 Magnet Movers set, or you can find a single magnet wand for around $6 online.
Make a Paper Clip Float in Mid-Air
from Mombrite
This one will need a really strong magnet! Our magnet wand from Learning Resources was just strong enough to float a single paper clip, but two clips were too heavy. Still, floating one paper clip was pretty darn impressive to all my kids, and it was super easy to set up! Building a LEGO structure to hold the magnet is completely optional, as you can easily hold the magnet by hand instead.
Bird Science STEM/STEAM Activity for Preschool
Make Recycled Bird Feeders from SciShow Kids
Upcycle your toilet paper rolls, plastic water bottles, or milk jugs with these three easy bird feeder designs. Plus, learn about what birds really need to eat. (Bread crumbs are not great, and definitely don’t use trail mix that has chocolate in it!)
Looking for bird books and videos that pair well with these activity? Click on over to this post!
Worm Science Experiment for Preschool
Easy Earthworm Science Experiment
by Inspiration Laboratories
Here’s a great excuse to get hands on with a wiggly worm. This simple experiment gets kids making a hypothesis about whether worms prefer a wet or dry environment. Then let them come up with their own ideas for how to test their hypothesis! If they need some ideas, here’s a simple experiment setup using just wet and dry paper towels.
If your preschooler can’t get enough of worms, they’ll love the videos and books in this post.
Pollination Science Experiment for Preschool
Make “Pollen” Chalk Art from the Oregon Museum of Natural and Cultural History
This STEAM activity is part chalk art and part scientific model! All you need is two different colors of chalk and a cotton ball. Draw different color chalk flowers, and then use the cotton balls as your pollinator, feeding from both color flowers. Notice how your pollinator picks up the “pollen” as it feeds!
If you’re a teacher and going outside won’t work for your class, you can try this activity with paint on paper and cotton balls. Or here’s another indoor classroom activity that uses Cheetos as the “pollen”.
And there’s more great science all about bees, butterflies, flowers and pollen just a click away over here.
Water Cycle Science Experiments for Preschool
from Plum Landing on PBS Kids
What a super easy art activity that also demonstrates water evaporation! All you need is water, a paint brush, and a spot of sidewalk in the sun. Plus more evaporation activities with construction paper and plastic baggies.
Sink or Float Science Experiments for Preschool
from PBS Kids
This activity is so easy to set up. To go the extra mile, you can practice the scientific method of defining the question, making a hypothesis, gather data, analyze the data, and make conclusions. (PBS Kids has a colorful Cat-in-the-Hat themed chart that you can use to record your data.) Give your kids metal spoons and plastic spoons and see if they can make a conclusion that explains why one sinks and one floats!
from Siemens Knowledge Hub
Oranges float! But did you know a peeled orange sinks, even though it weighs less without the peel? It’s because there’s lots of air bubbles in the peel that make the unpeeled orange float. This makes an orange an unexpectedly great example to show the difference between weight and density!
Make Your Own Boat! from SciShow Kids
Make an aluminum foil boat! Whose boat can carry the most marbles? (Or pennies, or beans…) You could try a canoe design like these kids Sophie and Zane, or try your own design. Definitely try a flat sheet of foil or a crumpled up ball of foil too to compare with your boats!
Food Science Experiments for Preschool
Experiment with Yeast! from Playdough to Plato
Did you know the yeast that makes your bread is a living fungi? And its ability to create carbon dioxide gas is how we get bread to rise in the oven. If you have some yeast and balloons on hand, this is a pretty quick and satisfying science experiment!
from Chicago Botanic Garden
Mushrooms don’t have seeds because they’re not a plant! Mushrooms are a fungi that reproduce from spores.
This art print was actually made from the spores falling out of a mushroom’s gills! Just snip the stem off of a mushroom, and leave it on a piece of paper overnight.
If your preschooler wants more fungi & mushroom science, check out the books and videos in this post!
from KiwiCo
In this colorful experiment, kids will get to see how plants get water from their roots all the way to their leaves! Great way to reinforce how water is in so much of what we eat. This could also jumpstart a conversation on how pollution could affect our food supply.
Germ Science Experiment for Preschool
Experiment with Soap and “Germs” from Nanogirl
This activity is so easy to set up. Instead of germs, you’ll use black pepper. Water alone will make the pepper stick to your fingers, but with soap the black pepper will swim away from your finger!
I hope you found a new fun preschool science experiment to try at home or in your classroom! Keep lighting sparks of curiosity!
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