Dog Themed Learning Activities

I read that May is National Pet Month, so I thought it would be fun to share some animal related learning and craft activities this month. First up is dogs (not because they’re my favorite, just the easiest LOL).

Animal faces and dog bones give us lots of options for adding in a little learning. Keep it simple for little ones with this Dog’s Colorful Day bones color sorting activity from Pre-K Pages. It includes a printable bone shape in different colors to make it easy. Read the book and do this activity with your littles.

Or try the alphabet puppy chow activity that’s also from Pre-K Pages. Here you find letters on the bone and use alphabet magnets to “feed” the dog.

If you have a dog you can use the printable from Sunny Day Family to see what your kid knows about the dog. This is like one of those Mother’s or Father’s Day printables where they say how old the dog is, their (the dog’s) favorite things and what they (the child) likes to do with them. This is one page of their printable dog activity pack that includes labeling parts of a dog, a word search and coloring pages.

Homeschool Preschool has a dog themed memory matching game, which includes fun facts about dogs on the cards.

There are lots of books with dogs as characters, and this activity from Affordable Homeschooling uses If You Give a Dog a Donut to practice sequencing with a free printable.

Harry the Dirty Dog is another fun dog story, about a dog who doesn’t want to take a bath. Homeschool Share has a printable lap book that goes with the story and includes vocabulary, human vs. animal needs, wild vs. domesticated animals, sequencing and more.

If you want to do more activities surrounding dirty dogs, Homeschool Preschool has a printable sequencing activity about giving a dog a bath where kids can trace the sentences for each step and them write them on their own.

And if you have any little plastic dog toys (or any pets for this one) you can get them dirty and wash them with this pet cleaning sensory bin from Pre-K Pages (using mud and water so maybe do this one outside).

My daughter has always liked math, which is a relief to me as someone who never really got math when I was growing up. (As a knitter I use math a lot now and have managed to learn what I need, but not much else.)

For kids who aren’t fans of math who could use a little encouragement and understanding of what math is for, there’s Dear Math, We’re Not Friends by Lina Chopra Haldar with illustrations by Teresa Martinez.

Nikil starts school not liking math and his teacher has him write letters to math. He complains that math makes his tummy hurt but thinks it’s funny when his teacher says talking about shapes and drawing are part of math.

As the year goes on he learns about skip counting, counting backwards, fractions and the special names for different shapes. When he learns about octagons he starts seeing them everywhere. He discovers that math is part of being an astronaut and an artist, two things he might like to be when he grows up.

Math helps him with soccer and helps bees make honey, and he uses it in his art projects, too. In the end he decides that math really is his friend because it helps you make things and understand the world around you.

The book is cute and has full illustrations that literally show math in different environments. It also includes a page about the inspiration for the story and why the author, a math teacher herself, wanted to write a book addressing math anxiety. It has prompts kids can use to write their own letters to math or use in discussions about math, as well as other ideas to help kids feel more confident about math.

This would be a good book for math teachers and others to have on hand for those kids who don’t love math or see a purpose for it outside of the classroom. The target reader is ages 5-8.

About the book: 32 pages, hardcover. Published 2026 by Beaming Books. Suggested retail price $19.99.

Have you read?

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