Preschool children often love to move around, and most preschools provide some kind of free play or recess time. It is still important, though, that children find other ways to move and use their bodies throughout the day, too. When you begin your unit on left and right, give each child a rubber bracelet. If your preschool has school colors, use that color, or possibly the color of a popular nearby sports team. Place the bracelets on students’ right hands for the entire unit so that they have a visual for which hand to use. A rubber bracelet might be too big for small preschool wrists, so you can use yarn instead if needed. Do the Hokey Pokey with students and tell them to put the arm in with the bracelet for the right side parts, and the side without the bracelet for the left side parts.
At the beginning of the unit, label everything in the classroom as right or left. For instance, place a placard that says “right” and one that says “left” on each side of the chalkboard. The right and left should be as students would see it and not as a mirror image, as that could be difficult for students to understand. The child should be able to face the chalkboard, for example, and hold up her wrist and see that the sign that says “right” is also on the same side as her bracelet. This will also be good practice for letter recognition, as students will have to know which word says which.
Place pictures on a worksheet, and ask students which way the pictures are facing. One theme could be animals. Put several pictures of animals on the page, some facing the right side of the page and some facing the left. Ask students to circle the animals that are facing toward their bracelet, which is the right side.
Preschool children might not fully grasp the concept of left and right until they are closer to kindergarten age. Some students enter preschool as young as two, and it is important not to expect these students to understand and memorize left and right. You can, though, still practice and introduce the concept to them. The University of Illinois Extension says that children learn left and right around the age of five, so work on the concept with your older preschool students to prepare them for kindergarten.