Setting Up the Toddler and Preschool Beach Theme

Last Updated on May 25, 2024 by Sheryl Cooper

Inside: We like to have our preschool beach theme just as we are wrapping up the school year, when the weather is warmer and some children have experienced beach outings with their families.

There is so much learning taking place when we have our toddler and preschool beach theme!

Over the years we have acquired a nice collection of various shells and pretend ocean animals. These allow us to create several learning centers where we explore textures and sizes, as well as small world activities that invite the children to have fun with pretend play.

We have bins with water, fish, and nets.

Our dramatic play area has been turned into a beach scene, with hats and sunglasses and ice cream.

There are fiction and non-fiction beach and ocean books displayed in our reading area and seahorses to color at the writing table. (Scroll down for free printables!)

Setting Up the Toddler and Preschool Beach Theme

It’s always nice when children can explore the real thing during any theme. While we couldn’t take the children to the beach, we did have opportunities to visit the fish aquarium in our preschool’s building.

Setting Up the Beach Theme in the Toddler and Preschool Classroom

Sensory Bin

After we visited the real aquarium in our hallway, we explored pretend sea life in our sensory bin.

We filled the bin with water, added the ocean animals, and provided nets for catching and releasing them.

You can see more here: Super Simple Toddler Ocean Sensory Bin

Beach Small World

We turned our train table into a beach theme by covering it with blue and tan paper and adding lots of loose parts, plastic boats, shells, and sea animals.

Dramatic Play

It was beach day in our dramatic play area!

We had sunglasses and beach hats, ocean stuffed animals and puppets, and our brand-new ice cream cone set.

This tied in nicely with the beach day we had that week when we made real ice cream!

Grab our ice cream shop packet!

We also had sand pails to fill and carry around the classroom.

Going Fishing

We took our favorite magnetic fishing activity and turned it into color sorting fun.

I cut and laminated paper that were the same colors as the fish.

As the children pulled the fish out of the water, they placed them on the matching colored rectangles.

Table Activities

We had more skill-building happening at our activity table.

Fish Art

I used the fish template printable (scroll down to find it) and cut out fish in different colors of construction paper.

The children then stamped paint onto them using empty thread spools.

You can read more about how we made these fish here.

We also painted seahorse-shaped paper on the easel. (But, as you can see in the photo below, the children also painted around the seahorse, too, which is why we placed a big sheet of paper behind it.)