Critical Thinking Activities for Kids
These critical thinking activities for kids ages 3–12 can be done at home or in the classroom with little to no preparation or materials.
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Critical Thinking Activities for Ages 3–4
For preschoolers, critical thinking can grow naturally out of everyday experiences. Ask children to predict what might happen next in a story or activity. When they encounter an everyday problem, encourage them to try different solutions and adjust their approach if something doesn’t work. There’s no need to introduce formal terms at this age.
Jump to an activity:
Activity 1: What Will Happen If...?
This simple activity teaches young children to make predictions and check whether they were right.
During play or everyday activities, pause and ask, "What do you think will happen if...?"
For example:
- What do you think will happen if we put another block on top of this tower?
- What do you think will happen if we push the toy car harder?
- What do you think will happen if we put this ice cube in the sun?
- What do you think will happen if we pour the water from this big cup into the smaller cup?
Let your child make a prediction, then test it.
If their prediction is wrong, avoid treating it as a mistake. Instead, compare what they expected with what actually happened.
Activity 2: Everyday Problem Solving
This activity gives children practice trying different solutions.
When a small problem comes up in everyday life, use it as an opportunity to problem-solve together. For example, maybe a ball keeps rolling away. Ask, “What could we change?” and encourage your child to come up with an idea.
If their solution doesn’t work, resist the urge to solve the problem for them. Instead, ask, “What else could we try?”
When possible, let them test several ideas. The goal is less about finding the right solution than about learning that when one approach doesn’t work, we can try another.
Activity 3: Choose Your Solution
This works well for children who need more guidance than in Activity 2. When a problem or challenge arises, give children a few possible solutions to choose from.
For example:
- We spilled some water. Should we use a towel or a toy to clean it up?
- We need to carry six blocks. Would a bag or a spoon work better?
- We want to stop this ball from rolling away. Should we put a book or a piece of paper in front of it?
Ask your child which option they think will work and then let them test it.
You can make this harder by offering two options that could both work and asking which one might work better. This encourages children to compare possible solutions instead of simply deciding whether something works or doesn't.
Critical Thinking Activities for Ages 5–7
By ages 5–7, children are often ready for more structured critical thinking activities.
Jump to an activity:
Activity 1: Another Explanation
This activity helps kids get in the habit of considering various possibilities instead of jumping to conclusions.
Give your child a simple everyday mystery, such as:
- You hear a scratching noise coming from the kitchen.
- The dog suddenly starts barking at the window.
- A toy that was on the table is now on the floor.
Ask them to think of at least three possible explanations.
Made-up situations are good practice, but you can also use this activity when something happens in real life. For example, if a friend doesn't say hello, encourage your child to think of several possible explanations instead of immediately assuming the friend is upset with them.
Activity 2: The Desert Island
In this guessing game, children have to work out a secret rule from examples.
Say:
"I'm going to a desert island, but there's a secret rule about what I'm allowed to bring."
Choose a simple rule without telling the child what it is.
For example, perhaps you can only bring:
- things that are red
- things you can eat
- things beginning with B
- things with wheels
- things that are two syllables
If your rule is "things beginning with B," you might say:
"I can bring a banana and a book, but I can't bring an apple or a magazine."
The child now suggests things they want to bring.
You respond only by telling them whether each item is allowed:
"Can I bring a bicycle?"
"Yes."
"Can I bring a tent?"
"No."
They keep testing possibilities until they think they know your rule.
Then switch roles and have the child invent a secret rule for you to figure out.
Activity 3: The Silly Robot
This teaches children to notice ambiguity, identify missing information, and communicate more precisely.
For this activity, pretend to be a robot who follows instructions exactly—and interprets unclear instructions in the silliest reasonable way possible.
Choose a very simple task, such as putting on shoes. The child has to tell the "robot" exactly how to complete the task. Follow the instructions as literally as possible.
For example, suppose the child is trying to get the robot to put on a pair of shoes.
Child: “Put on your shoes.”
The robot puts both shoes on top of its head.
Child: “Put the shoes on your feet.”
The robot places the shoes on top of its feet without putting its feet inside them.
Child: “Put each foot inside a shoe.”
The robot puts both feet into the same shoe.
The child has to keep making the instructions more precise until the robot can complete the task correctly.
Explore more critical thinking resources for ages 5–7.
Critical Thinking Activities for Ages 8–12
Older children can start thinking more explicitly about evidence, uncertainty, strategy, arguments, and the reasons behind their beliefs.
Jump to an activity:
- How Sure Are You?
- Play Nim
- Switch Sides
- Strategic Twenty Questions
- Philosophical Conversation Starters
Activity 1: How Sure Are You?
This activity teaches children to think about beliefs in terms of degrees of confidence, while also considering how new information can affect that confidence.
Choose a low-stakes claim or prediction.
For example:
- Dogs are smarter than cats.
- Our team will win its next game.
- There is life somewhere else in the universe.
Ask your child to rate how confident they are that the claim is true from 0% to 100%.
Ask:
- Why did you choose that number?
- What could you discover that would make your confidence go up?
- What could make it go down?
Some predictions can be revisited later to compare what actually happened.
Activity 2: Play Nim
Nim is a simple two-player strategy game that can be played with coins, stones, pieces of cereal, or any other small objects.
How to play:
Arrange the objects into several piles. A classic starting arrangement is three piles containing 3, 4, and 5 objects.
Players take turns removing objects.
On each turn:
- You must remove at least one object.
- You can remove as many objects as you want from one pile.
- You cannot take objects from more than one pile.
The person who takes the last object wins.
Play several games and ask them to look for patterns and build a strategy.
This simple game has surprising mathematical depth, which you can read about here.
Activity 3: Switch Sides
This activity challenges children to make a strong argument for a position they don't initially agree with.
Choose a question with at least two reasonable sides.
For example:
- Should homework be banned?
- Should school uniforms be required?
- Should children have a set bedtime?
- Should students be allowed to use phones at school?
- Should school recess be longer?
Have the child argue for whichever side they actually prefer.
Ask them to give two or three reasons supporting their position.
Now switch: They must make the strongest argument they can for the opposite position.
Encourage them to imagine what someone who genuinely holds that view would say rather than deliberately making the opposing argument weak.
Activity 4: Strategic Twenty Questions
Most kids already know Twenty Questions: One person secretly chooses a person, place, animal, or object, and the other player can ask up to twenty yes-or-no questions to figure out what it is.
This game can be turned into a critical thinking lesson about narrow vs. broad questions.
For example, if your child asks, “Is it a dog?” at the beginning, explain that this only checks one possibility. Then compare it with, “Is it alive?” That question gives much more information because it can rule out lots of possibilities at once.
Play a round together. If your child gets stuck, offer two possible questions and ask which one would be more useful.
Then play again and encourage your child to start with broader questions before moving to more specific ones.
The goal is to help them notice that some questions give us much more useful information than others.
Activity 5: Philosophical Conversation Starters
Use these questions at the dinner table, in classroom discussions, or as writing prompts.
- If two people remember the same event differently, does that mean one of them is lying?
- Can breaking a rule ever be the right thing to do?
- If someone does something good by accident, should they get credit for it?
- What makes someone a good friend?
- Is it possible for two people to disagree but both have good reasons for what they believe?
- If you copy something without knowing that copying isn't allowed, have you cheated?
- Is it better to be completely honest if telling the truth will hurt someone's feelings?
Encourage children to explain why they think what they think.
Want more critical thinking activities for kids?
Critikid’s Kids Bundle includes online interactive courses, worksheets, and lesson plans for children ages 8-12.
Explore more critical thinking resources for ages 8–12.
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