You have come to the right place if you are looking for fun, engaging and exciting Fish themed activities to do with toddlers, preschoolers and kindergartners. Our activities are used by teachers, moms, dads, child care providers and more!

All our activities are available at no cost and are free to print and share. Select below to get started.

Fish Arts and Crafts

Plate fish
Make a fish out of paper plate. Or cut out fish shape out of cardboard and let children color, paint and decorate their fish.

Tissue Paper Collages
Tissue paper can be cut or torn by the children to make various shapes and sizes.
OR if you prefer not using the fish shapes, how about tissue paper collages on paper using the various ocean colors: blues, greens and purples.

In either project, paint on the tissue paper with liquid starch or diluted school glue to give it a “wet look” as the children create it and then a stiff texture when it has dried.

The children may want to add fish to this “ocean”. If so, provide small rubber stamps of fish for the children to stamp on fish pictures or furnish more tissue paper in other colors for them to tear and cut their fish shapes.

Do either of these when the ocean picture has dried. If you want to use this as a sort of a printing experience, you can have the children peel off the tissue paper when they have finished painting it on and while their projects are still wet, and the colors will remain, kind of a watercolor look.

Aquarium
Take 2 paper plates & cut out the inner circle. Tape blue cellophane or clear plastic on to the inside of each plate. Glue fish, shells, sand & “seaweed” to the inside &; then glue paper plate together to make an aquarium.

Stuffed Fish
Cut large fish pattern from two pieces of colored cellophane & punch holes around edge. Stuff with small pieces of shiny paper & “sew” around the edge with ribbon. OR cut out two fish shapes from grocery sacks & stuff with newspaper. Decorate or paint.

Sea horse
Cut out a figure of a sea horse and the children spread glue on and glue on a googly eye. I let the children sprinkle the Sea horse with sand to give it, its texture.

Finger paint With Ocean Colors
Print with sponges shaped like under water creatures. Children could create any ocean creatures they like with any materials they like (have scissors, variety of paper, paint, markers, yarn, etc.) available and put together on a group mural if desired.

Flashy Fish
Have children glue oval shaped tissue paper and foil pieces onto a white construction. paper fish shape. Attach a black dot sticker to resemble the eye. Punch a hole near the mouth of the fish. Put a paper clip through the hole in the mouth then attach to the rope.To display, suspend a length of rope from your ceiling, then attach your fish like you would on a stringer.

Triangle Fish
Cut a 9″ X 12″ piece of construction paper diagonally from corner to corner. Now you have triangle to make two fish. Cut a muffin paper in quarters. Glue one quarter to the tail, one quarter to the top near the right angle and one quarter to the middle of the bottom ( the longest side) for fins. Add eyes and decorate anyway you desire. We usually use crayons and markers.

Circle Fish
Cut out a 6″ circle from construction paper and glue to a piece of light blue construction paper. Cut a triangle from the same color or a contrasting color and attach to the back of the circle for a tail. Draw eye, mouth, gills, fins, a fish line with a hook and worm and whatever else you want.

Paper Bag Fish
Lay a plain paper bag down flat. Leave the bottom folded up and fold in the corners of the bottom of the bag and staple in place to form the fishes snout.

Loosely stuff the sack with scrap paper or whatever you have. Close the end of the bag with a rubber band. Slide it up a couple of inches and spread out the end to make the tail.

Let the children paint the bag with watercolors or tempera paint any way they want. Add paper or googly eyes if the children haven’t already painted on eyes.

Some times we have attached these to a piece of yarn like a fish on a string. We have also added a straw to the yarn for a fishing pole.

Toothpaste Aquariums
Get a small snack-size Ziploc bag and put blue sparkle toothpaste in it, add a couple gummy fish. Close the bag and let them squish!

Stained Glass Fish
Materials:
Wax paper 9″x12″, liquid starch, paintbrush,black crayon,tissue paper squares,construction paper, scissors and glue
Use a black crayon to draw a large fish shape onto the wax paper. Cut out the fish shape and paint it with the liquid starch. Cover the fish with tissue paper “scales” overlapping as desired, adding starch as needed for the pieces to stick. Let dry.

Glue on construction paper details, such as eyes, mouth or fins.

Hang the fish in a sunny window.

Whales in Water
Take a clear empty 2 liter drink bottle and filled it about 1/3 full of water. Take a small blue balloon, and as it is held in the bottle, blow up the balloon and tie a knot in the end. Add a couple of drops of blue food coloring to the water. Turn the bottle on its side & there is a whale floating in the waves.

Paper Bag Whale
Need:
Small paper bags, paint, construction paper(black and white), yarn, newspaper
Have children stuff bags with newspaper. Tie the end with yarn and create the tail. Paint the bag gray or any other whale colors (black and white, etc.). Cut eyes out of construction paper & glue onto bag when paint is dry. Cut out spout shapes from white construction paper and glue to the top.

Thumb print Fish
Have children press their fingers onto a stamp pad & stamp fingers onto paper. Add features such as fins.

Stuffed Fish
Take 2 pieces of construction paper (white if you would prefer to let the kids color them themselves & colored paper for another look) cut out both of them into fish shapes. Staple them all the way around except for the tail end. Let the kids stuff them with crumpled newspaper till they are completely filled, then staple the tail end together.

Aquarium
Take 2 paper plates and cut the inner circle out. Tape blue cellophane to on to the inside of each plate. Glue or tape fish and seaweed to inside and then tape outside paper plates together.

Fish
Take bubble wrap and cut out two fish shapes and glue both pieces together leaving an opening to stuff. Fill the fish with colored tissue paper and then seal the opening. Hang these from the ceiling and you have a room full of beautiful rainbow fish!

Fish Mural
Cut fish shapes out of white construction paper. Decorate the shapes with crayons or felt-tip markers. Help the children glue their fish shapes onto a piece of butcher paper. Add twisted green crepe-paper streamers for seaweed. Hang the butcher paper on a wall and cover it with blue cellophane to make an underwater scene.

Styrofoam Tray Fish Tank
Materials:
Cleaned Styrofoam trays
Clear Plastic Wrap
Tape
Glue
Scissors
Colored Paper
Crayons
Sand
Have Children cut out Fish and Plant shapes from colored paper and color them. Glue fish and plants to inside of the tray. Glue sand below the fish. Let dry. Wrap the tray with plastic wrap and tape closed on the back side.Variation: Use round Styrofoam plates.Tell the kids they are peeking from the port hole of a submarine! Use the blue tinted plastic wrap for a really neat effect!

 

Fish Games and Activities

Fish in the Sea
There are so many fish in the deep blue sea. What color of fish does _________________see?
Insert child’s name in the blank. Put a different color fish on a finger mitt or flannel board. You could make a big book.

Octopus
Materials:
Brown trash bags
Glue
Scraps of construction paper
Picture of an octopus
Newspaper
Styrofoam packing half circles
Tape
What to do:
As the children are seated for circle time show them a picture of an octopus. Discuss the characteristics of the octopus color; size, how many arms, how it moves.

Make an arm by stuffing a trash bag with newspapers filling only half of the bag lengthwise. Tie the bags. Fold the other side of the trash bag over the stuffed side and tape it, making a large narrow arm.

Using the Styrofoam packing half circles, have the children glue them to the bottom of each arm representing the octopus’ suction cups Make the head by stuffing the entire bag with newspaper and use construction paper scraps to make the facial features of the octopus.

When the eight arms are finished, tie them together and then tie them to the stuffed head.

Display the octopus on the floor for an ocean scene.

Go Fish
Make 6 inch fish from construction paper & write different numerals on each. Attach a paper clip to the nose of each fish. Tie a magnet to a 3 foot string which is tied to a clip. Spread out fish & fish. Variation: Punch a hole in the front of each fish, pass a twist tie through the hole, and bend it into a loop. Can use table as dock or big box as a boat.

Shark Hearing
Sharks have REALLY good hearing in order to find their food. Listen for a moment for all the sounds around us, then name them. Try to figure out how far away things are by the volume of the sound.

Then tell them that we are going to play a listening game. We are going to be sharks looking for our dinner. Have all of the children except one go out of the room where they cannot see inside the your room. The remaining child sets a kitchen timer for 4 minutes, (with adult help), hides it somewhere in the room, then tells the “sharks” that dinner is coming. The kids go into the room VERY quietly, listening for the ticking.

It is funny to watch the face of a child who picks up the sound and starts to zero in on it. The other kids notice and zoom over to that area.

Clothesline Fish
Materials:
Fishing line,Clothespins,Construction paper
Prepare a fishing line with numbered clothespins (one through ten) on it. The clothespins should be in sequential order. Draw and cut out ten fish; write numerals one through ten on them. Have children place numbered fish on the line by matching the correct numerals.

 

Fish Recipes and Snacks

Fish Snack
Needed: Blue napkins, medicine cups, pretzels, gold fish crackers, peanut butter
Open up napkin and place fish in the middle. (The napkin is the ocean.) Have peanut butter in the cup. (This is the bait cup.) Use pretzels for fishing rods. Dip in bait (peanut butter) and catch a fish. Eat fish and bait. keep fishing until all the fish are eaten.

Fish in the Sea
Need: Italian bread or french bread
Cream cheese
Goldfish crackers
Blue food coloring
Bread knife
Bowl
Plastic knives
Waxed paper
Slice bread. Mix blue food color and cream cheese. Spread cream cheese on bread. Put goldfish in the blue sea. EAT

Jello Aquariums
Just get some clear plastic cups, put some Oreo crumbs or “sandy” colored cookie crumbs on the bottom. Get some blue jello & pour over the crumbs, add some gummy fish & when set, this makes a great snack!

 

Fish Songs, Poems and Finger Plays

Five Little Fishes
Five little fishes swimming in a pool,
This one said, “The pool is cool.”
This one said, “The pool is deep.”
This one said, “I’d like to sleep.”
This one said, “I’ll float and dip.”
This one said, “I see a ship.”
The fishing boat comes. The line goes splash. All the little fishes swim away in a flash!

The Whales
(tune of I’m a little teapot)
I’m a humpback whale, I’m very strong.
I leap about And sing a song.
I like to eat my fill In the Northern Sea. But in the winter, South I flee.
I am a beluga, I’m all white.
From head to tail I’m quite a sight.
You can hear me singing Way up north,
Playing and swimming back and forth.
I’m a mighty orca Black and white.
In the sea I’m a beautiful sight.
I’m not very big, But I am sleek.
I hunt for my food, Cause I have teeth.

I’m A Big Whale
(Clementine)
I am swimming, I am swimming, I am swimming in the sea.
I’m a big whale and I’m swimming I am swimming in the sea.
I am singing , I am singing, I am singing in the sea.
I’m a big whale and I’m singing, I am singing in the sea.
I am spouting, I am spouting, I am spouting in the sea.
I’m a big whale and I’m spouting, I am spouting in the sea.

Slippery Fish
Slippery fish, slippery fish, splashing in the water.
Slippery fish, slippery fish, GULP GULP GULP!
OH NO! he was eaten by a octopus!
Octopus, octopus, wiggling in the water.
Octopus, octopus, GULP GULP GULP!
OH NO! he was eaten by a tuna fish!
Tuna fish, tuna fish, gliding through the water.
Tuna fish, tuna fish, GULP GULP GULP!
OH NO! he was eaten by a Great White Shark!
Great White Shark, Great White Shark,lurking in the water
Great White Shark, Great White Shark, GULP GULP GULP!
Oh NO! he was eaten by a humongous whale!
Humongous whale, Humongous whale, spouting in the water
Humongous whale, humongous whale, GULP GULP GULP!
BURP! Pardon me!
(For the slippery fish and the tuna fish, you can cup your hands and make them move through the water. The octopus is a hand with wiggling fingers. The great white shark is an open hand on top of the head. The whale is both hands spread wide. The finger play ends with putting your hand to your mouth to suppress a loud Burp.)

Five Little Fishes
Five little fishes, Swimming in the sea.
Teasing Mr. Shark, You can`t catch me, You can`t catch me.
Along comes Mr. Shark, As quiet as can be… Snap!
Four etc. (tune of 5 little monkeys teasing Mr. Alligator)

 

 

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