These ideas are for Ziploc bags, but you can use resealable bags too for some of these preschool activities.

1. Put some shaving foam into a Ziploc bag, and add a few drops of food coloring. Add some more shaving foam on top of the food color. Let her squish the bag, and watch the changes in color.
2. Add two different drops of food coloring to the shaving foam, so she can see how they mix to create new colors. For instance, red and yellow.
3. Give your child some playing sand, lots of shells and rocks, and let her choose the number of objects and sand she wants to place inside the Ziploc bag. These make great sensory bags for kids.
4. Fill up a Ziploc bag with blue shaving gel, and add a few plastic sea creatures and fish into it, to make her own ocean bag.
5. Put some shaving gel into two separate Ziploc bags, and place one of them on the window sill (works only if it’s sunny), and the other in the freezer. Take them out after a while, and let her see the difference – great time to teach her about “hot” and “cold.”
6. Put some water in a Ziploc bag, and freeze it. Discuss how the water changes from liquids to solid.
7. Use Ziploc bags to store pieces of your preschooler’s puzzles.
8. Use them to store the parts of her Barbie play set, different colored buttons for sorting games, beads etc.
9. Take a bunch of Ziploc bags, and put one item in each of them – the thing should either float or sink. For instance, a cotton ball, a pebble, a toy, a leaf etc. Let her separate into objects that float and objects that sink.
10. Make ice cubes in different colors (add food color), and drop a few of these into a Ziploc bag. As the cubes melt, the colors mix and create new ones. This is also a good color recognition activity for a preschooler.
11. Put rice in a bag, and add color to it. Let her color the rice by squishing the bag.
12. Put a wet paper towel inside a bag, and sprinkle some fast growing seeds. Zip and, place near a window. Or tape the bag to the pane. Or use a clothes peg and some yarn to hang the bag near the sill. Observe the sprouting, and discuss. You have a preschool science activity that takes no time to set up. Use a Lima bean for quick results.
13. Put some glitter in a bag. Apply glue to a few objects – a small doll, pebble, a cone – and drop them into the bag. Let her experiment.
14. If you have plastic polar bears, put them into a Ziploc bag, add some water and freeze. Discuss the Antarctica, polar bears, their habits and food.

Do you have ideas for playing with your preschoolers using Ziploc bags? I’d love to hear them.