Life Cycle Activities for Kids

Life cycles have fascinated my kids throughout the years. We often worked on them during springtime, but I would sometimes add them in our animal or plant studies too.  I’m often asked how do I introduce this subject area to my kids and I would always say that it really depends on their age and interest. For the young ones, it’s all about play-based learning and storytelling.  While for older kids, they are drawn towards the details and the science behind them.

To give you an idea, here’s our progressive way of learning the life cycles.

LIFE CYCLE ACTIVITIES FOR TODDLERS

Exposing my then toddler Vito to life cycles was inevitable in our case.  Whenever Mavi and I would work on life cycle activities, he always wanted to join and be part of it, typical for a toddler.  Whenever this happens, you can definitely include him by giving him some simple matching activities.  To introduce your toddler in this subject area, start by reading child-friendly (and age appropriate) books.  Here are my top picks for books:

• Backyard Books series
• Let’s Read and Find Out
• My First Discovery Series

Use animal figures as kids are drawn to these.  We are using Safari Toob life cycle figures and the kids totally love them!  They’re bigger, sturdy, and matches our printables. I highly recommend the following life cycle toy figures:

• honey bee
• bean plant
• ant
• frog
• butterfly
• ladybug
• chicken

We use these figures in so many ways, especially for matching activity and storytelling.

Now for printed materials, I highly recommend our beautiful Life Cycle Mats.  The life cycles included in this file goes along perfectly with Safari Toobs life cycles figures.  There are 8 life cycles included in this learning pack:

• Life Cycle of  a Bean Plant
• Life Cycle of an Ant
• Life Cycle of a Honey Bee
• Life Cycle of a Ladybug
• Life Cycle of a Frog
• Life Cycle of a Butterfly
• Life Cycle of a Sea Turtle
• Life Cycle of a Chicken

The images (clipart) are isolated in a white background so kids can easily identify them.  Here are some examples:


This is what we did in learning the life cycle of a bean plant.


Simply print the mats, laminate them, and cut.  It comes with a control sheet so it’s easier for parents or teachers to check the sequence of the cards.

• Start by reading books, and telling stories about the animals’ life cycle.
• Introduce the learning materials including your figures if you happen to have them.
• Present the life cycle mat, by telling a story of how this animal or plant came to be from egg or seed to adult or grown organism.  This will enhance your kids’ vocabulary, as they learn new words, and associate them with each stage.
• Invite your child to match the figures to the images in the mat. This activity is for visual discrimination, being able to connect concrete materials to the abstract object, which is the image on the card.

LIFE CYCLE ACTIVITIES FOR PRESCHOOLERS

The preschool stage is different from a toddler in the sense that they start asking questions, more on the “what”, “why”, and “how”.  Because they are older, and able to understand the concept much better, I decided to create new sets of learning materials for Vito to satisfy this.

If you are following our IG account, I’ve been posting about our life cycle sequencing cards.  These are different from typical life cycle materials because I didn’t design these for “matching” activities.  These sets are used to guide the child to learn how to order or sequence events via the animals’ or plant’s life cycles.  The child is provided with real-life events and sequences to be able to tell a story.

Here, Vito is ordering the life cycle of a butterfly.  The description cards can be separated from the images if the child is able to read, and have him matched them, the description, to the pictures.  For now, we’re not doing that yet.  I also included labels for each card so Vito can be familiarized with the stages.

Here’s our sequencing cards for the life cycle of a chicken (comes with a poster size).


Here’s the life cycle of a flower plant.


Other available sequencing cards are listed below:

• Ladybug Life Cycle Sequencing Cards
• Human Development Sequencing Cards
• Frog Life Cycle Sequencing Cards
• Butterfly Life Cycle Sequencing Cards
• Penguin Life Cycle Sequencing Cards

We also made some arts and crafts to go along with our butterfly life cycle in the past.

And few years ago, I fell in love with these layered puzzles.  My boys love puzzles and these are wonderful educational materials that can also engage your kids in learning life cycles.  Here are the ones we own:

• Beleduc Layered Frog Puzzle
• Beleduc Layered Butterfly
• Beleduc Apple Life Cycle
• Goki Chicken
• Goki Tree

LIFE CYCLE ACTIVITIES FOR GRADESCHOOLERS

If you haven’t encountered my post on this yet, then you are missing one of my post popular freebies.  I did this with Mavi years ago, and created a comprehensive FREE life cycle material that discussed life cycles of a mammal, reptile, bird, fish, and amphibian so my gradeschooler is able to differentiate the five animal categories.  Also included are the life cycle of insects, and highlights the incomplete and complete metamorphosis stage.  To know more about this, and to avail the free learning material click here.


I find learning life cycles essential to a child, even if they are as young as two years old.  It gives them an understanding of where animals and plants come from.  But as they grow old, and able to grasp more complex information, it is important that our learning activities and materials adapt to their level.  We can’t always give them matching activities.  We need to help them advance in their learning process. So in learning the life cycles for example, we move to naming the stages of each life cycle, identifying the changes in each stage, and identifying which animal comes from an egg, born in the water, or born as a young version of it’s mother.

More learning materials at Pinay Homeschooler Shop.

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