Preschool Bird Theme Activities & Lesson Planning Ideas

Below you can find tons of fun and engaging Preschool Bird Activities! This page is packed with fun, hands-on activities designed to help you plan engaging bird-themed lessons for your preschoolers. You’ll find everything from learning objectives and circle time lessons to activity ideas for different learning centers. Use the buttons below to quickly jump to each section or download our free Bird Preschool Activity Plan to make planning easier!

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Bird Theme-Lesson Planning Overview

Click on a button below to view a section.
Use the yellow arrow to return to the top!

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Featured Activity Ideas for This Theme

These activity ideas are featured in our Bird sample plan.
Club Members download their full Theme Planning Guide and
all of the related resources from the Activity Library at no additional cost.
Not a member? Learn more here.

Download our Free Bird
Preschool Sample Activity Plan

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Featured Plan Activities

Below you’ll find activity ideas featured in our Bird sample plan.

Art & Creativity
Pine Cone Bird Feeder
This activity involves spreading peanut butter on a pine cone and rolling it in bird seed, creating a bird feeder.

Dramatic Play
Bird Watching Station
Set up a bird watching station on your dramatic play stand. Add binoculars, books about birds, photos of birds, and clipboards for marking notes. Hang up pictures of birds in the room if playing indoors for kids to spot with their binoculars.

Building & Small World Play
Bird Small World Play
 Add plastic birds, nests, birdhouses, and trees to the building space.

Language and Literacy
Birdhouse Letter Matching
Introduce and reinforce letter recognition with a charming birdhouse theme.
Practice Making Bird Calls
Preschoolers need all the practice they can get making a variety of sounds to support muscle development essential for speech. Making bird sounds is a great way to work those muscles!

Mathematics
Build a Nest Sequencing Mat
Develop sequencing skills as children build a nest in the correct order.
Roll, Color, and Graph Backyard Birds
Foster early math skills with a fun roll, color, and graphing activity.

Science
& Discovery
Investigate a Nest
Encourage children to observe a nest and document the materials the bird used to create the nest.

Physical Fine Motor
Bird Pre-Writing & Cutting Practice
Prepare young hands for writing success with engaging pre-writing practice sheets featuring adorable bird-themed images and tracing lines.

Physical Gross Motor
Pretend to Fly like a Bird
Fly around like birds, build a nest, and make bird calls!

Other
Learn About Birds in Your Community
Preschoolers will have so much fun spotting birds in their own backyard! This activity helps them look closely, notice different kinds of birds, and learn cool facts along the way. 

Other
Can I fly? Sorting Mat
Sort Birds that Can Fly vs. can't Fly

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Stock up on feathers this week! Add Bird related cookie cutters to your Art space to use with play dough, or stamping. Add Bird Stickers, and items that can be used to create nests.

​Create a Nest

Member Sheena W. of Building Blocks Family Child Care invited her students to create a nest using paper plates, glue and pine needs, leaves, and other items found in nature. 

Craft a Bird

Provide bird cutouts, or cookie cutters/stencils for children to use to create their own bird. Other supplies might include faux feathers, googly eyes and stickers

*Make your own bird feeder

Invite your preschoolers to Create a Bird Feeder
and then observe the visitors!

Try this!

*Painting with Feathers

Gather a variety of feathers, and tempera paint (or acrylic on canvas) to create your own feather painting art piece.

Paper Plate Bird Feeder

Create a paper plate bird feeder for your yard!  Start by painting a paper towel roll green for the stem.  Use a few plates and paint them whatever color you want for your flower.  Cut the plates to make them look like petals on the flower.  Finally, add a small plastic bowl filled with bird seed for the birds to enjoy!  

More Bird Themed Art & Creative Ideas:

​Feathered Parrots by Little Page Turners
​Construction Paper Nest from Frugal Fun for Boys
Free bird sounds, songs and rhymes from Living Montessori

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Life-Size Bird Nest

​Create a "Child Sized" Bird Nest. Use a large Cardboard box, kiddie pool or pool noodles to create the nest. Use brown packing paper or brown fabric for the nesting material.  Provide pretend bird wings, and beaks for preschoolers to dress up in. 

*Bird Watching Station

Set up a bird watching station on your dramatic play stand. Add binoculars, books about birds, photos of birds, and clipboards for marking notes. Hang up pictures of birds in the room if playing indoors for kids to spot with their binoculars. 

Pretend to be an Ornithologist

Set up an ornithologist station with tools preschoolers can explore along with photos and stuffed animals for them to examine.

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Bird Small World Play

Add: Plastic Birds, Nests, Birdhouses,
and Trees to the building space.

Bird Nest Provocation

Set up an invitation to provoke thought and creative exploration with your preschoolers.
Provide materials like moss, twigs, leaves, and shredded paper for children to build nests with. 
See our Bird Nest Provocation blog post here.  

Try this!

Build a Bird

Break out the interlocking blocks and build birds!

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*Bird Seed Writing Tray

A bird seed writing tray is a great way to support preschoolers that are beginning to recognize letters and learn to form them.

Try this!

*Bird & Birdhouse Letter Matching

​Practice matching uppercase to lowercase letters or phonics with this Birdhouse Uppercase/Lowercase matching  from the Pre-K Printable Fun Bird Activity Pack

Buy this!

Spring Word Wall Activities

When I think of Spring birds are often one of the first things that comes to mind. 
My Spring Word Wall Set is a great compliment to your bird theme activities. 

Buy this!

Bird 3-Part Cards

Use these 3-part cards from the Pre-K Printable Fun Bird Activity Pack to support your preschooler as they learn the names of a variety of birds. 
Find more ways to use these cards on my blog post Tips for Using 3-Part Cards in Literacy Activities

Buy this!

*Practice Making Bird Sounds

Preschoolers need all the practice they can get making a variety of sounds to support muscle development essential for speech. Making bird sounds is a great way to work those muscles!

*Labeling Parts of a Bird

Learn more about birds and their nomenclature with this bird labeling activity from our Birds Activity Pack.

Buy this!

Bird Builds a Nest Pre-K Book Companion

Our Preschool Bird Builds a Nest Book Companion includes a carefully crafted collection of activities designed to complement the related book; fostering early literacy skills, and vocabulary development.

Available in our shop!

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Mama Built a Little Nest
by Jennifer Ward and Steve Jenkins
Hooray for Birds!
by Lucy Cousins
Feathers for Lunch
by Lois Ehlert
An Egg is Quiet
by Dianna Hutts Aston and Sylia Long

*Building a Nest Sequencing

​Build a nest sequencing activity from the Pre-K Printable Fun Bird Activity Pack

Buy this!

Worm & Bird Color Sort

Member Sheena W. from Building Blocks Family Child Care 
printed photos of birds in colors to match the Learning Resources Measurement math worms and invited students to match the worms to the same colored bird. 

Feed The Bird Counting Game Freebie

Practice math skills with this fun hands-on
Feed the Bird math activity from Pre-K Printable Fun

Spring Measure, Compare, and Graph

Preschoolers are learning a large variety of math skills including measuring, graphing and comparing objects.
Support these math skills while exploring birds with our fun Spring Measure, Compare & Graph pack.

Part of our Spring Measure and Graph Activity Pack!

Graph Backyard Birds by Color

Observe birds in your backyard, make a tally mark for birds in different colors. When done graph the results.

Sort Feathers by Color

Gather feathers in a variety of colors or patterns (craft feathers work great for this activity) invite children to sort by color, size, or pattern.

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Backyard Bird Watching

Set up an Outdoor Space for Bird Watching: Add a variety of Bird Feeders, Nesting Materials, Binoculars, a notebook for drawing birds, Reference Books, and a comfy space to sit and observe.

This adorable bird feeding and watching area was shared by Community member Kathy M. of Just like home Childcare and Preschool

Sheena Wheeler of Building Blocks Family Childcare created this fun outdoor bird watching area.
A bird house and feeder is a great way to encourage repeat visitors. 

Bird Seed and Gelatin Feeders

• Dissolve a packet of unflavored gelatin in hot water (an adult needs to do this part). 
• Add 3/4 cup of bird seed (more if mixture has too much liquid)
• Line a baking sheet with wax paper. Fill cookie cutters with the mixture, use a straw to make a hole to thread string or ribbon through. 
• Allow to dry and then hang
• Observe visiting birds!
• **Optional: Make a few different shapes and try to predict which shapes will be consumed first. 

Bird and Egg Sorting

Sorting eggs activity from the 
Pre-K Printable Fun Bird Activity Pack

Included in our Birds Activity Pack!

Explore Birds on the Light Table

Light Table Invitation created by Community member
Laurie P. of Pitter Patter Dayhome.

Bird Themed Sensory Bin Inspiration

Add some bird seed along with tweezers, tongs, scoops and containers for preschoolers to explore.

Bird Sensory Bin created by Community Member Erica P. of Erica's Educare Learning Center

Bird sensory bin created by community member
Laurie P. of Pitter Patter Dayhome.  

*Bird Investigation Invitation

This lovely invitation to explore birds was created by reader Laurie P. of Pitter Patter Dayhome.  

Investigate a Nest

Ask parents or other local resources if they have items such as abandoned nests for students to investigate. Encourage children to observe the nests and document the materials the bird used to create the nest. 

More Bird Themed Science & Discovery Ideas:

Toddler feather sorting activity from Fantastic Fun and Learning
Fine Motor Feather Cutting by  A Little Pinch of Perfect
Feather experiment by Life over C's
Feed the birds fine motor activity from Learning 4 Kids

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Bird Fine Motor Sweeping Mat

Invite your preschoolers to engage in some fine motor fun with the Fine Motor Sweeping Mats from Pre-K Printable Fun. This pack includes more than a dozen options including this bird mat. Simply pair with a paint brush and colored sand. 

Frozen Bird Seed

Freeze bird seed in chunks of ice. Challenge preschoolers to use tweezers as a beak to remove the bird seed for some fine motor fun.

Build a Bird Play Dough Invitation

Set up a fun bird building play dough invitation for your preschoolers. They can practice building birds and exploring feathers.

Try this!

Pick up Bird Seed with Tweezers

Set out a bin of bird seed and a few empty bins. Provide children with tweezers and have them pick up individual pieces of bird seed and transfer them to the empty bins. You can extend this activity by given each child a specific number of bird seeds to transfer so that they practice counting and fine motor skills at the same time!

Bird Themed Pre-Writing/Cutting Practice

Practice hand-eye coordination, folllowing a line from left to right, and pencil grip with our pre-writing activity included in our Birds Activity Pack

Included in our Birds Activity Pack!

Gross Motor: Pretend to be birds!

*Fly around like birds, build a nest, and make bird calls!

Gross Motor: Duck Duck Goose

Play Duck Duck Goose Together!

*Bird Yoga

Try out some bird inspired yoga poses!

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Gross Motor: Bird Scavenger Hunt

Grab your binoculars and go on a backyard bird scavenger hunt! If you don't have all these birds in your area try printing photos and hanging them in trees for children to spot.

Then learn more about the areas where each bird lives. This list can be found in my Around the House Scavenger Hunt pack. 

Included in our Around the House Scavenger Hunt Pack!

*Can I Fly? Bird Sort

Sorting  birds that can fly from the Pre-K Printable Fun Bird Activity Pack. 
This is a great activity to set up for children in a small group to encourage discussion. 
Support discussion of where in the world these birds live.
Extend this activity to a discussion of which birds in your community can fly and which cannot. 

Included in our Birds Acxtivity Pack!

Find Native Birds

Research and learn more about the birds that live in your community.

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Spring Bird Rhyme

Add some bird fun to your circle time with a fun rhyme!
This rhyme, and four more spring rhymes, can be found inside my Spring Rhymes for Circle Time pack. 

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Count the Birds in your Backyard

​Count the number of birds and number of different types of birds viewed each day, graph and compare. Alternatively you can play this roll and graph game from our Spring Measure, Compare, and Graph set. 

Included in our Spring Measure, Compare and Graph pack!

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Pre-K Printables Club Members have free access to all of these resources. Not a member? Find out more here!

Birds Preschool Activity Pack

$7.00

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Feed the Bird Preschool Counting Game

$0.00

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Play Number Dough Mats

$3.00

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Animals Sorting and Classifying Mats

$4.00

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Scavenger Hunt Lists for Around the House

$3.00

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Spring Word Wall & Writing Activities

$4.00

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Spring Sensory Bin Scavenger Hunt Activities

$4.00

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Spring Rhymes for Preschool Circle Time

$4.00

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Spring Preschool Calendar Display and Games

$4.00

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Spring Measure Graph & Compare for Pre-K

$4.00

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Spring Pattern Block Mats

$3.00

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