For young preschoolers, a simple body part activity would be to have them touch the part of the body the teacher calls out. Lead them if necessary. For instance, the teacher can say, "Where is your nose?" and point to her nose. After leading the children for a few body parts, see if they can do it by themselves. Lead the children in clapping after correctly finding each body part, something preschoolers love to do. For older preschoolers, you can play a game of "Simon Says." Stand in front of the students and say, "Simon says: Touch your elbow," and the children should follow. The only time they are not supposed to follow is when the caller does not say: "Simon Says." If they perform the command without the caller saying "Simon Says", they are supposed to be out of the game, but with preschoolers, you can make it non-competitive by just starting over again.
During reading time, read books to the preschoolers that teach them about their body parts. Examples of age-appropriate books include: "Me and My Amazing Body," by Joan Sweeney, in which a little girl tells readers about the outside and inside parts of the body; "Here are My Hands," by Bill Martin Jr., in which a group of kids celebrate their body parts in rhyming fashion; and "The Best Part of Me: Children Talk About Their Bodies in Pictures and Words," by Wendy Ewald, which features real children making candid observations about their body, skin color and hair.
Teach the students about how their body parts work, staring with an activity on their five senses. Set up five stations around the room -- each for a different sense -- allowing the children to investigate items using that specific sound. For example, the touch station can have baggies of different textured items. The smell station can have fragrant food items such as oranges or chocolate in covered boxes with holes so that they have to sniff to figure out what each item is. Place reflective items such as hand-held mirrors, metal spoons, and water at the sight station to allow the children to explore their reflection. Set up a recording of different animals sounds in the sounds station to allow the children to identify them, and for the taste station, have the children taste and guess what their snack is before seeing what is actually is.
There are other interactive songs the children can sing during circle time in addition to "Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes," which help teach about body parts. The Hokey Pokey is another popular children's song that has the children using their different body parts. The song goes, "You put your left arm in, you put your left arm out, you put your left arm in and you shake it all about. You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself about. That's what it's all about." The song continues with the other arm, with each foot, with head and with the whole body. Another idea is to adapt popular children's songs to create a song about body parts. For example, you can use the tune of "Mulberry Bush," to sing: "This is the way we clap our hand, clap our hand, clap our hands. This is the way we clap our hands so early in the morning." Replace hands with other body parts such as "stomp our feet," and "nod our heads."