Activities for Teaching Preschoolers About Disability Awareness

If they haven't been already, preschool children will likely be around disabled adults and children at some point in their lives. Because of their young age, many preschoolers don't understand what it means to be disabled. Disability awareness activities can increase their knowledge of disabilities and teach them to be sensitive toward others who are different.

Hide an object in the room and ask one child to go look for it. After he has found it, put a blind fold on him and ask him to find another object in the room. Allow the other students to give him directions. At the end of the activity, discuss with the preschooler how much more difficult it was to find the object with a blind fold. This activity helps preschoolers understand what it is like to be blind.

This activity teaches preschoolers to accept others and allows them to be creative as well. Give each preschooler some clay, a paper plate and craft sticks. Instruct the preschoolers to sculpt something, such as a person or a dog. After they have sculpted for a couple of minutes, ask them to use only one hand to sculpt. After they're finished, ask them how much more difficult it was to sculpt with just one hand. Explain to them that some people don't have both of their arms or legs and have to face many challenges every day.

For this activity, ask one of the preschoolers to put two pairs of socks on each hand. Instruct him to remove one raisin at a time from a box and eat it. Ask another preschooler to put two pairs of socks on each hand and unwrap a piece of candy and eat it. At the end of the activity, ask them how difficult it was to do these tasks with socks on their hands. Explain to your preschoolers that people with a muscular mobility disability deal with these types of challenges every day.

Have half of the preschoolers put on earphones. Conduct lessons and activities like normal. After 30 minutes, have them take the earphones off and ask the other half of the preschoolers to put them on. At the end of the activity, ask the preschoolers to discuss how they felt not being able to hear anything. Tell them that deaf people can't hear anything, and many of them use sign language to communicate with others.