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Valentine’s day is a great time to teach young kids about friendship and building relationships. Social skills are the number one predictor of later school success for kids. For me, this makes social skills my number one goal with my kids. It’s great to celebrate holidays and special days in daycare with kids.
Studies have shown that social skills help kids with math, reading, and science as well. Click here to read more about it. It’s fascinating.And we have to celebrate friendships.
We can all understand that building social skills for kids also cuts down on bullying and being bullied as well. I love taking any opportunity to teach my kids to care for each other. I feel like my kids are super kind and caring people.
Check out this fun Valentine Picture Bingo game for your Valentine’s Day theme or party this year!
Valentine theme for preschool
Our Valentine’s day theme is full of opportunities to build all kinds of academic skills including social skills.
Valentine’s day social skills building for preschool
A great way to build social skills is having kids exchange Valentine’s. All you need is a few collage materials like these I got from Oriental Trading to make some killer cards kids can exchange.
I love to have the kids make a mailbox for the Valentine’s they receive. And the Valentine gifts I give them as well. We love to make ours out of a paper sack, but you can also use a tissue box, shoe box, or any other creative ideas you can come up with. Even gift your preschooler these fun pop-upValentine’s Day cardsfeaturing their favorite Disney character. Their little face will light up with excitement when they open it!
Try to remember people bring robust goodie bags, so make sure not to use a container that’s too tiny.
A package of doilies or some cut out hearts like the ones I got from Oriental Trading, some stickers and markers are all you need to go to town making a super cool Valentine mailbox. I love letting my kids create their own ideas and build their self-esteem.
Valentine math activities for preschoolers
The same packet of hearts galore cut outs I let the kids use to make their cards and mailboxes can also be used in a number of other ways. For math, kids can count them, make patterns with them, or sort them into colors or sizes.
Preschool Valentine ideas-reading
Doilies or hearts galore hearts can be used for pre-reading activities for your Valentine’s day theme. You can write a letter on two matching hearts and have kids play a matching game. You can take the skill level a little higher by writing a capital letter on one heart and a lower case on the other. You can also make these super fun Valentine butterflies from the doilies and craft sticks.
Preschool Valentines
Mixing colors makes a cool science lesson for your little learners. You can use paint, playdough, clay or any other materials you have available. We used air dry dough from Oriental Trading to mix red and white dough together to make pink. Then the kids were able to create a valentine creation and we let them dry.
Another great use for the hearts galore pack is sorting hearts by color and letting kids tell you what color each heart is. I love to work on a few colors at a time with my kids, so Valentine’s day activities are a good time to focus on just a few main colors.
Collages are another great way to nurture creativity in kids. I love the way it builds kids up as they create, but they are also building a lot of fine motor skills as they grasp small objects to create with. Stickers are great for this too because it takes a lot of control to peel them off the sheet.
You can also make collages on sticky boards. Oriental has heart shaped ones that would make a great project for your Valentine’s Day theme.
Valentine songs for preschool
We love to sing friendship songs like Barney’s I love you, you love me
We also sing a song about friendship we call We Like You
We like Christina, there’s no doubt about it,
We like Christina, there’s no doubt about it,
We like Christina, there’s no doubt about it,
She is our good friend!
Then go around the room and sing it about every child one at a time. The kids love it. Their faces light up when they hear their name. It’s the sweetest.
Valentines snacks for preschool
There are a ton of fun snack ideas you could do. Think of red and pink foods like yogurt or strawberries. You could make pink:
- smoothies
- fruit parfaits
- Valentine themed snack ideas!
We like to make snack mix. This can be made as a friendship mix. You can have each child bring one ingredient and then dump theirs in the bowl. Everyone stirs and there you have it. Made with love. We also have done friendship soup the same way.
Valentine’s day theme can be so many things. I love to keep things simple and low pressure. These activities are minimal prep and low stress. Just my style. February is also a great time to learn about:
- dental health
- dinosaurs
- circus
- all about me
- zoo
Check out these free printable patterns for Valentine shrinky dinks too!
