Reception Investigative skills worksheets
What colour are your eyes?
Let’s find out which eye colour is the most common amongst your family and friends! You can record your results on this pictogram.
Moving fish race
Can you move this fish across the carpet without touching it? Let's have a race...
Investigating sound
Fill a glass or some empty glass bottles with water halfway to the top. Now tap the side of the glass with a teaspoon. Can you describe the sound that you hear?
Grow a grass head
It’s easy to make your very own grass head. You can keep your head on the window sill, and you’ll be amazed at how fast it grows!
Find patterns all around you
There are patterns all around us. Take a large piece of white paper and a crayon and see if you can capture some!
Who’s living in your tree?
Put a large white sheet under a tree or a bush and give the tree a good shake. Lots of little bugs living in your tree/bush should fall onto the sheet for you to look at carefully under a magnifying glass. Can you draw some of the bugs you can see? Can you identify any of them?
Tree treasure hunt
Play a game with all the different trees in your garden or a park. First, walk around the garden with an adult. What is the same about the trees and what is different? Now try to complete these challenges.
That’s my stone!
How good are your observation skills? Have a go at this game which tests how good you are at spotting the similarities and differences between objects.
On-the-ground investigation
Throw a hoop or a circle of string around an area of grass and look really carefully at all the different things you can see there. Make a list or draw pictures of all the different things you can see. It might include bugs, different types of grasses, soil, flowers and stones. You can also do this with a friend to see if they can find different items to you.
Investigating bugs
Arm yourself with some small containers (see-through if possible) and a magnifying glass and find out what bugs live in your garden. Lift up stones and logs, look in dark corners near sheds, dig around in the soil and find cobwebs on the window sill. See if you can catch some bugs in your containers and talk to an adult about what each bug looks like.
How cool are you?
Go for a hunt around your house and find which places are the warmest and which are the coolest. Write the names of each place on these cards, or can you draw a picture showing the place? Can you put the cards in order from the warmest to the coolest place?
Be a poo detective
Poo is always a fascinating subject for children and definitely gets their attention! Why not go for a nature walk and find out which animals have left their smelly remains then answer these questions?
All about worms
Go into your garden and dig up two earthworms. Put them next to each other and see if you can find things that are the same about them and things that are different. Look at their length, their patterns, their colour Can you draw pictures of them both, showing the difference between them? You could also try building your own wormery.
Identify the loudest sound
A fabulous game to encourage discussion and develop your child's reasoning skills whilst learning more about sounds.
Draw a route map
This worksheet encourages your child to think about and draw the journey they take to school with sense of 'aerial perspective'.
Starting to collect data
Encourage your child to ask people about their favourite toys and record the information on this simple table.