Kids pretend they are walking on a tight rope in this game. Run a strip of masking or duct tape on the ground. Have children form a line behind the strip of masking tape. On your mark, children walk across the tape -- or tight rope -- one at a time. Time children as they cross the tight rope. The child with who crosses the line the quickest wins. This game promotes gross motor development in children -- an important part of preschool curriculum.
This noncompetitive game teaches the pre-math skill of sorting. Draw or print out pictures of various circus-related items in different sizes and on colored paper and cut them out. Examples of items include elephants, lions, popcorn, cotton candy and a tent. Place the cut-out images in a jumbled up pile. Instruct children to sort the images based on attributes -- animals and non-animals, colors and size.
Have kids play a bean bag toss game. Write the letters of the alphabet on index cards, and place them on the ground. Provide children with bean bags. One at a time, children throw their bean bags, trying to get them to land on an index card. They must state the name of the letter the bean bag lands on and provide a word that starts with the letter. If they have difficulty recognizing the letter or thinking of the sound it makes, provide them with help. This game reinforces letter-sound recognition.
Reinforce number recognition with this noncompetitive game. Cut out 10 construction paper triangles. Write the numbers one through 10 on the triangles. Cut out 10 construction paper circles. Draw one through 10 dots on the circles. Children count the dots to match the circles -- or cotton candy -- to the corresponding triangle -- or cotton candy holder. This game can also be adapted to reinforce letter recognition. Instead of writing numbers and drawing dots, write upper- and lowercase letters on the circles and triangles. Children have to match the uppercase letters to the lowercase letters.