Cognitive Development Activities For Preschoolers – Guide

The growth and development of a child carry four major areas in their early childhood, especially in the first five years. They are physical, cognitive, language and communication, and social development. Among them, cognitive development takes a major place in the growth of a child.

It indicates the way kids think, capture, explore, and figure out things. Cognitive development includes the way children understand the world around them and their improvement of skills, knowledge, and problem-solving abilities.

Preschool is the first stage of child education, and kids learn most of the skills from preschool. So preschool plays a major role in contributing to the cognitive development of kids.

Therefore, cognitive development activities for preschoolers are a heavily concerning topic in child development, and preschool teachers should consider the matter more.

If you are a preschool teacher, then you may have this concerns about preschool cognitive development activities.

There are several cognitive development activities that you can use for preschoolers, and some of them are puzzles, memory games, imaginary play, categorizing, reading books, and storytelling. There are lots of activities in addition to them, and you can formulate better activities relevant to your kids’ progress. Moreover, you can follow some tips such as encouraging, rewarding, listening, understanding interests, and allowing mistakes for kids in using cognitive development activities.

From this article, you may be able to understand what the cognitive development of preschoolers is and the best cognitive development activities for preschoolers. After mentioning the activities you can use, I’ll provide you with some tips to follow those activities.

Then finally, let’s understand the benefits of cognitive development activities for preschool children.

Let’s get started!

What is the cognitive development of preschoolers?

Cognition is an act of intellectual process that knowledge is achieved through perception or ideas. Cognitive development is the way that a child understands the world with the improvement of their skills, abilities, and knowledge.

Simply, it is the improvement of the child’s ability to think and reason. According to the psychologist Piaget, a child’s cognitive development is shaped by the mistakes they make and the active attempt they make to sense the world.

Sensations and cognition of a child start from birth, and the cognitive development stages start at the 18 months of a child. It changes cognitive processes and abilities by learning, capturing, acquiring, and organizing new knowledge. 

Cognitive development is one of the major areas of child development in early childhood, and preschool age is a major place here. Preschool is the first place where kids stay for a long period after their home, and it is the beginning of their education as well.

Therefore, preschool is significant for kids’ cognitive development, and numerous changes happen in the character and skills of kids at the preschool. Preschool age is a period where rapid growth in the child’s development can be witnessed in every aspect.

Cognitive development is associated with brain training, and preschool education provides the path to it by improving the core skills of the brain like the ability to think, capture, learn, memorize, reason, read, express, and concentrate.

Therefore, using cognitive development activities for preschoolers is essential, and it will contribute to the child’s growth further.

Best cognitive development activities for preschoolers

There are no standardized preschool cognitive development activities. They differ from preschools and teachers.

However, cognitive development should be concerned by preschool teachers and parents more, and using cognitive development activities for preschool kids is good to experiment. Here are some of such activities. 

1. Puzzles

Puzzles are an easy cognitive development activity that can be used in preschool. Puzzles are convenient to use, and they improve the identification, problem-solving, and logical thinking abilities of kids.

Teachers can use attractive puzzles with nice images, and then kids love to solve them. There is only one option to solve a puzzle, and therefore it is an excellent way for the cognitive development of preschool kids with improving patience and other skills. 

2. Memory games

Memory games can be used as other cognitive development activities for preschoolers. Memory matching games support kids to identify and remember several items by memorizing their features.

Then they will develop the skills of matching similar items by understanding features. Many preschool kids like memory matching activities so much since they are easy to engage in, and finding a similarity makes them feel proud as well.

3. Imaginary play

Imaginary play is a type of symbolic game that you can plan with the engagement of children and their parents.

It is a completely free activity, and it will allow kids to learn new things, develop curiosity about things, and improve their concentration and focus. These imaginary activities may support kids to develop their abilities and interests by improving brain development. 

3. Categorizing

Categorizing is another easy but extremely beneficial cognitive development activity that preschoolers can use.

It allows kids to sort out things and differentiate them with similarities and difficulties. It will support kids to identify, divide, sort out and categorize them with those characteristics. 

4. Reading

You can engage kids in regular reading since it is important for their cognitive development. Reading may improve imaginary skills, grab ideas, concentrate, and think critically.

In addition, making them love reading books since their childhood will be beneficial for their education as well. 

5. Storytelling

Storytelling can be used as another good cognitive development activity that can be used for preschoolers.

You can conduct such activities of building up stories with coordination by adding parts for the start of the story. It will develop the language abilities and imagination of kids. 

Tips to promote cognitive development of preschoolers

Suppose you are a preschool teacher or a parent with a preschool kid. In that case, you have to consider the cognitive development of your kid.

When using cognitive development activities for preschoolers to promote their progress, you can follow more steps. I have mentioned some of those tips and try them with your preschoolers.

1. Encourage more

When your kid has learned a new thing or made a decision individually, encourage them to make more decisions and learn new things further.

Encouragement is essential for your kids since they are very young ages. With the encouragement of you, they will gain the strength to achieve more.

2. Let them make mistakes

Mistakes are the most suitable way to learn things. Kids are always making mistakes since they have no proper understanding of right and wrong.

They learn from mistakes and may try to fix them and find solutions. So, allow them to make mistakes and don’t punish them. 

3. Understand the interests of the kid

You have to understand the interests of your preschoolers to support their cognitive development.

Nurture the field they love the most and provide necessary resources for them in that field. Then they will learn things and improve skills better while engaging in an activity they love.

4. Rewards

Rewards have two sides. It is good to provide rewards for the success of your kid and their achievements. But don’t make kids reward-centered by providing everything they ask.

Within the preschool classroom, you can provide small rewards like stars, stickers for better skills and progress. 

5. Enhance teamwork

Get the kids into teamwork activities and allow them to socialize with other kids together. Cooperation and interaction with others may help to increase cognitive development further.

Teamwork is very important for the future life of kids and enhancing it is good since their childhood.

6. Listen to them

For the cognitive development of your kid, listening to them is important. Ask questions about their day and let them express their ideas and views with you.

It will allow you to identify the communication skills of your kid and the capturing and concentration capacity of them.

Benefits of cognitive development activities for preschool children

Cognitive development is an essential concern in the preschool education system, and it contributes to a large portion of a child’s development.

Using preschool cognitive development activities is beneficial for preschool kids in several ways, and here are some benefits that they can obtain from such activities. 

1. Understand concepts

With cognitive development activities, preschoolers may start to understand the concepts like size, color, shape, quantity, etc.

They will learn the meaning of those concepts and the way they are indicating. Then kids may have the practice of using them. 

2. Compare and contrast

Kids learn to capture things and identify their features through cognitive development activities, and it helps them to observe the similarities and differences of several things.

Through that, they start to compare and contrast things by identifying their qualities and characteristics.

3. Problem-solving abilities

One of the most important benefits achieved from cognitive development activities is the ability to problem-solve. From activities like puzzles, kids learn to solve problems and find solutions by themselves.

It is a highly developed cognitive skill since kids have developed the ability to understand, observe, analyze, make decisions, and find solutions here.  

4. Improve social skills

Cognitive development activities allow kids to improve their social skills like communication, respecting others, listening, cooperation, interacting with others, adapting to situations, etc.

Improving social skills from preschool is beneficial for kids’ future when they are starting to interact with broader social environments later.

5. New knowledge

Most of the things kids learn from cognitive development activities are new knowledge to them. They have no proper knowledge about anything since they are still in their early ages.

They make mistakes, try out tasks, and learn new knowledge from them. 

Conclusion – Preschool cognitive development activities

Now it is clear that preschool cognitive development activities are an essential part of the preschool education procedure, and preschool children are a major age group that needs the development of cognitive skills more.

By reading this article, I guess you have understood the nature of cognitive development for preschoolers and the best cognitive development activities together with the tips that can be followed with them. Then you know how beneficial they are for preschool kids. So, if you are a preschool teacher or a parent of a preschool kid, try the mentioned activities with your kid and enhance their cognitive development.

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