Teaching kids about ocean animals is very important, you know why? Because 75% of Earth’s surface is covered with Ocean. They can affect weather, food, temperature, and even our life- as between 70%-80% of oxygen is supplied by marine plants.
Also Read – Interesting and fun facts about animals for kids
Kids always get excited to learn about the ocean, ocean animals, beach, sea animals, sea activities, sharks, shells, and much more. I will answer few frequently asked questions below.
What should I teach my toddler about the ocean?
Teaching a toddler about the ocean can be a fun and educational experience. Here are a few things you can teach your toddler about the ocean:
- Colors: Teach your toddler the different colors of the ocean, such as blue, green, and turquoise. Point out these colors in pictures or while you’re at the beach.
- Animals: Introduce your toddler to some of the common ocean animals, such as fish, dolphins, whales, and turtles. Show them pictures or videos of these animals and talk about what makes each one special.
- Sounds: Teach your toddler the sounds that different ocean animals make, such as the chirping of seagulls or the splashing of waves.
- Safety: Teach your toddler about being safe in and around the ocean, such as never swimming alone and always wearing a life jacket.
- Respect: Teach your toddler to respect the ocean and its creatures by not littering or disturbing the wildlife.
Sure! Here’s a more engaging way to present the same information to your toddler about the ocean:
- Colorful Creatures: Let’s go on a colorful adventure and discover the beautiful blues, greens, and turquoises of the ocean! Can you find these colors in the pictures we have or at the beach?
- Ocean Buddies: Have you heard of the fun friends that live in the ocean? Let’s meet some fish, dolphins, whales, and turtles! Which one is your favorite? Can you make the sound they make?
- Sounds of the Sea: Listen closely! Can you hear the seagulls chirping or the waves splashing? Let’s pretend to be the ocean animals and make their sounds together!
- Safe Swimming: When we go to the ocean, we want to be safe and have fun! Always remember to never swim alone and wear a life jacket. Can you show me how you’ll stay safe in the water?
- Respectful Visitors: The ocean and its creatures are amazing, and we need to take care of them. Can you help by not littering and being gentle with the wildlife? Let’s show the ocean and its animals how much we appreciate them!
This way, your toddler can learn about the ocean while having fun and being engaged.
Now The Concern Is: How Should I Teach My Toddler About The Ocean?
Before starting a formal introduction about Oceans, start with the language activities that will let them understand what is Ocean? Show a globe to your child and ask him to identify the ocean. Teach them by pointing out that the largest area of our planet Earth is covered with blue color water, and that is Ocean and seas. There are 5 oceans: Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, Arctic, and the Antarctic. Talk about oceans, seas, rivers, and lakes with them.
Here are some engaging ways to teach your toddler about about the ocean:
- Colorful Creatures: Let’s go on a colorful adventure and discover the beautiful blues, greens, and turquoises of the ocean! Can you find these colors in the pictures we have or at the beach?
- Ocean Buddies: Have you heard of the fun friends that live in the ocean? Let’s meet some fish, dolphins, whales, and turtles! Which one is your favorite? Can you make the sound they make?
- Sounds of the Sea: Listen closely! Can you hear the seagulls chirping or the waves splashing? Let’s pretend to be the ocean animals and make their sounds together!
- Safe Swimming: When we go to the ocean, we want to be safe and have fun! Always remember to never swim alone and wear a life jacket. Can you show me how you’ll stay safe in the water?
- Respectful Visitors: The ocean and its creatures are amazing, and we need to take care of them. Can you help by not littering and being gentle with the wildlife? Let’s show the ocean and its animals how much we appreciate them!
This way, your toddler can learn about the ocean while having fun and being engaged
Also you can check out our Under the sea printables bundle. Click here to get it for your child.
Have you seen Under the Sea Printables Bundle ?
Thi is the perfect way to bring the magic of the ocean into your home! Designed for young children, this bundle includes a variety of fun and educational activities that will keep your little ones entertained for hours.
With colorful and engaging illustrations, your child will love learning about different ocean animals, practicing their counting and tracing skills, and discovering the beauty of the ocean through coloring pages and puzzles.
This bundle is perfect for parents, teachers, and caregivers who want to provide engaging and educational activities for young children. Whether you’re looking for a fun and educational activity for home, a lesson plan for the classroom, or a way to keep your child entertained on a long car ride, the Under the Sea Printables Bundle has you covered.
And the best part? You can print out as many copies as you need, so your child can enjoy these activities again and again. Order your Under the Sea Printables Bundle today and start exploring the ocean with your little one!
10 Under The Sea/Ocean Themed Fun Learning Ideas
There are so many fun ways to teach about ocean animals to kids. Create curiosity about ocean animals while teaching and use engaging resources like:
Teach Through Ocean Rhyme
Five Oceans
We have five oceans
that cover the earth, you see,
Can you name them all with me?
Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, Arctic,
and the Antarctic make five,
I can’t wait to discover the ocean.
I’m ready to dive!
Through Pictures of Ocean Creatures
Create a collage by pasting pictures of some strange ocean animals, making a numbered list for kids, and seeing how many ocean animals they can make out. I used an ocean animal picture chart from our Under The Sea Printable
Introduce Sea Animals Vocabulary
Pick two new ocean animals for a week, and teach your kid about their life by reading books, playing games, making crafts, and doing activities. Like we used a few activities from the Sea Animal Bundle to learn about fish that covered lots of skills from alphabet recognition, and number counting to logical development, and visual discrimination.
The topic for the week: Fish
Revise Concepts Using Ocean Theme Activity Worksheets
You can check our Ocean Themed Resource Bundle which has a collection of activities to help kids learn about sea creatures in a fun way. The bundle covers everything from basic learning to skilled mastery topics that a 3-year-old needs to learn and practice.
Read Ocean Animal Related Books
Below are some amazing ocean theme books that will surely help your child learn about sea, ocean, ocean animals, sea creatures, and much more in a great way.
Best Books for Sealife/Sea Animals/ Ocean Life
SEA LIFE – Under the SEA Coloring Book for kids
Under the Sea Mini Coloring Roll
WHO’S UNDER THE SEA
Under the Sea Sticker Activity Book
Look and Find Puzzles Under the Sea
The Circus Under the Sea
Little First Colouring Under the Sea
Hide and Seek Under the Sea
Little Lift and Look Under the Sea
Puzzle Book Under the Sea
Make Ocean Animal Crafts
Check below a few amazing ocean craft ideas. These activities are inspired and curated from amazing parents’ social media pages. We have tried to give due credit, but if you think there is a mistake or we have not given the credit, do connect with us.
DIY Recycling Ocean Craft- The Flying Fishes
This is a simple under the sea art activity made with all recyclables like milk bottles, fruits and vegetable peels, and old crayons molded to make fish. The underwater world was created to show how these little flyings adapt to their surroundings. The corals where they live to how they modify their fins to wings and to their final flight.
Check more details on Manjari’s Instagram page.
Nature Jellyfish Craft
Jellyfish body is made from a cardboard piece, handpainted with watercolor, and finally decorated with some fallen dried leaves and flowers. The arms were made from beads and tentacles to complete the look. for more details, check this post by Surbhi
Under The Sea Turtle Craft Activity
Used a paper plate to make turtle body, covered with bits of colorful origami paper. Add the head, hand, and feet cuttings and finally add googly eyes. You can get googly Eyes here
Activity idea from tinytotsplayandlearn
Fish Paper Plate Craft Activity
Cut a triangle piece from a paper plate, stick it to one end of the circular edge to make it look like a fish. Decorate the body with colorful paper cuttings and add googly eyes.
Crab Craft Making Activity
Draw a hand outline on red cardstock paper cut two similar cutouts and stick them together to make it look like a crab body. Decorate it with googly eyes and mouth.
Under The Sea Scuba Diving Craft
A super fun ocean theme craft activity by learncraftgrow made from a paper plate, origami paper, seashells, and paints. Check the picture below to see a detailed view. There is an amazing deal on Craft Paper here.
Ocean Animal Foil Craft Activity
Take rectangular cardboard cuttings, and draw outlines of ocean animals with a hot glue gun on each. Cover the pieces with foil paper and make some colorful under the sea animal by painting with watercolors- a fun learning way to teach about ocean animals. Check this activity on Instagram by la_nemina
Ocean Animal Finger Puppet Crafts
Want to know how to make these cute sea creature puppets, check this post by baby_and_beyond
Ocean Craft Activity
This activity was shared by Punya of Chronicle.of.k check out her interesting Instagram feed.
Octopus Craft Activity
Cut head shape and 8 rectangular strips (as arms) from a white chart. Paint them purple and glue the arms with the head. Decorate arms with dot stickers and complete the final look by adding eyes and mouth.
Shark Craft Activity
The shark made from left-out paper cuttings is a great under the sea craft activity to teach toddlers about ocean animals.
Play Fun Interactive Under The Sea Activities For Toddlers
To make learning a fun experience for kids, you can plan ocean-themed physical activities with bare minimum supplies available at home itself. Check out some wonderful under the sea project ideas created by so many amazing moms-
3D Aquarium Under the sea activity
3D Aquarium made using a paper plate, fish cutouts, Blue paint, and horse gram.
Teach Odd & Even Numbers With Mermaid
When the fun is incorporated with learning, it gives hands-on experience to the child. Check this beautiful under the sea maths activity by Nikita, she used this activity to teach odd and even numbers to her 4-year-old.
Sand art Jellyfish
Things Required
– Sand
– Cardstock Paper
– Paints
– White glue
– Paintbrush
How To Make it- check more details here
👉Firstly create your drawing, next add white glue.
👉Start adding sand over the white glue.
👉Remove the extra sand from the paper.
👉Once it dries, allow your toddler to color it.
Alternatively, we can also color the sand or use colored sand.
Jellyfish In A Bottle
It’s so interesting to watch the jellyfish float back to the top no matter whichever way we turn the bottle. Do try this under the sea science activity to help your toddler learn about sea animals in a fun way.
What we need:
Empty bottle
Polythene Bag
Scissors
Dental floss
Water
Blue Food coloring
How To Make:
1. First add a few drops of food color into the water.
Next, make a jellyfish using plastic paper.
2. Place the plastic paper onto a glass, and add a few drops of water just enough to fill the head of the jellyfish. (Make sure to keep the head of the jellyfish smaller than the bottle hole for easy accessibility)
3. Squeeze the jellyfish in the bottle.
What do you see?
The jellyfish magically moves to the top of the bottle.
It’s so relaxing to watch the jellyfish rise up.
You can check more details here on Surbhi’s Instagram
Teach About Layers Of Ocean
If you are looking for ways to teach about layers of oceans to toddlers, then you must check this cool idea by Shibani all hand-painted and decorated by your little one.
Under The Sea Animal Craft Collage Activity
You can get the details of this beautiful setup here
Ocean Theme Animal Craft Scissor Skill
Check out this beautiful craft activity by kiddietales
You can get Kids Craft scissor here.
Ocean Theme Salad Plate
This activity is by Garima of learningwithG2
Beach Erosion Demonstration
We found this amazing set-up at Nikita’s Instagram page, take more inspiration from VNMOMSCHOOL
Create Ocean Theme Sensory Bins
Sensory plays are a great way to boost kids’ creative learning with hand-on experience. Check out these under the sea sensory activities for toddlers:
Ocean Theme Sensory Tray
Things Required:
Sago Seeds (Sabudana)
Blue Food Color
Aquarium stones
Fish made from balloons and paper
Check this above activity here on intagram
Ocean Creatures Sensory Play
Learn about the ocean and the different creatures found in the ocean in a fun way by creating this sensory bin by sunshinesanaya. Get Ocean animal figurines
Ocean Themed Bookish Play
Materials Used:
- Dragonfruit skin and leaves-corals
- Seeds with fruit- fish
- Kinetic sand
- Animal figurines
- Marbles for turtle eggs
- Leaves
- Stones
- Food colour
The above activity is by the creative zestymommy
Create My Ocean Animal Fact Book
You can have your child create Ocean Theme Fact Book with their own hand-drawn ocean animals along with the facts learned.
What Are The Benefits Of Learning About Sea Animals For Toddlers?
Oceans- the largest part of our Earth is covered with blue water and that’s known as Sea or Ocean. So, it’s quite important for a child to learn about Oceans and Ocean Life. From fundamental aspects to practical learning, there are many things that a child should learn about. Like how sea animals are adapted to live in the oceans? What are the most known ocean animals?
Social & Emotional Skills
While learning about under the sea creatures, the kids will develop a relationship with sea creatures helping them develop a strong sense of empathy and respect for animals. They will start to work on their social skills with no pressure.
Increased Self-Esteem
The way kids show their love and affection to animals is beyond anyone’s reach. We as adults may get frightened but kids being the purest soul are bestowed with more love and attention by animals they feel special about. This helps increase their self-esteem in life.
Makes Them Responsible
Kids are more capable of showing their love and affection for animals when asked for. They always took over the responsibility of feeding, giving water, and cleaning the animals on regular basis. This is a valuable skill for these tiny minds!
Teaching About Sea Creatures With SoeStoreKids Under the Sea printables pack
We have designed a fun resource bundle that will help teach under the sea activities to kindergarten in a fun way. The bundle includes a great collection of under the sea activity printables. This complete pack of ocean theme activities will save your research time and make learning about sea creatures a fun and enjoyable task for toddlers.
Example Lesson plan for using the Under the Sea Printables Bundle:
Objective: To introduce young children to the ocean and its inhabitants through a variety of educational activities.
Materials: Under the Sea Printables Bundle, crayons or colored pencils, scissors, and glue (optional).
Procedure:
- Introduction: Begin by showing your students a picture of the ocean and asking them if they have ever been to the beach. Ask if they know what kinds of animals live in the ocean.
- Coloring Pages: Distribute the coloring pages from the printables bundle and have the students color in their favorite ocean animals. Encourage them to use their imagination and be creative.
- Animal Matching: Cut out the animal cards from the printables bundle and have the students match each animal to its corresponding picture. Encourage them to name the animals and say something they know about them.
- Counting and Tracing: Have the students complete the counting and tracing activities from the printables bundle. Encourage them to count the number of ocean animals and practice their tracing skills.
- Puzzle Time: Distribute the puzzles from the printables bundle and have the students work together to put them together. Encourage them to talk about the different ocean animals they see in the puzzles.
- Conclusion: Review what the students have learned about the ocean and its inhabitants. Ask them to share their favorite ocean animal and why they like it.
Extension: If desired, you can have the students create their own ocean scene using the coloring pages, animal cards, and puzzle pieces. Encourage them to be creative and use their imagination.
This lesson plan provides a fun and educational way for young children to learn about the ocean and its inhabitants. The Under the Sea Printables Bundle is a great tool for making learning about the ocean engaging and memorable for students.
In conclusion, teaching your child about the ocean and life at the ocean can be a fun and engaging experience. The simple play ideas provided in this guide allow you to incorporate effective learning into your child’s playtime. From coloring pages to animal matching games, your child will have the opportunity to learn about the different ocean animals, practice important skills such as counting and tracing, and engage in imaginative play.
So, whether you’re at home or at the beach, make the most of your time and use these simple play ideas to help your child explore the vast and fascinating world of the ocean. With each activity, your child will develop a greater appreciation for the ocean and its inhabitants and gain a deeper understanding of the unique and diverse ecosystem that exists beneath the waves.
Remember, the key to effective learning is to make it enjoyable and memorable. So, get creative, have fun, and watch as your child’s love for the ocean grows with each new discovery.
