Push or Pull Worksheet: Identify Actions!
Deciding whether an action shown in a picture is a push or a pull introduces children ages 3-5 to a basic physics concept, force and motion, by having them classify everyday actions like opening a door or pulling a wagon. This early science reasoning requires children to picture the direction an object is moving relative to the person acting on it, which builds spatial thinking alongside scientific vocabulary. Learning to categorize actions this way is a first step toward understanding cause and effect in the physical world.
Part of the pack
Month 10: Learning & Development | Ages 5-6Curriculum
How to use this worksheet
Look at the first picture together and ask your child to describe what's happening, then act out the motion themselves if possible, like miming pushing a shopping cart or pulling a rope. Ask whether the action moves something toward the person or away from them, and use that to decide if it's a push or a pull. Have your child tick the correct box for that picture, then move on to the next one. Continue through the page, encouraging your child to act out each action before answering whenever they're unsure.
Materials needed
- Pencil
Extension activities
- •Act out real pushing and pulling actions around the house, like pushing a chair in or pulling open a drawer.
- •Sort a set of toy pictures or real objects into 'push' and 'pull' piles based on how you'd use them.
- •Play tug-of-war with a rope or towel to physically feel what a pull force is like.
- •Go on a walk and point out real examples of pushing and pulling, like a stroller being pushed or a leash being pulled.
- •Draw two pictures, one of a push action and one of a pull action, and label them.
Tips for parents and teachers
If your child struggles to decide between push and pull, have them physically act out the motion with their own hands, since the kinesthetic feeling often clarifies the direction better than looking at a picture alone. Some actions, like opening a door, can be either a push or a pull depending on the direction, so talk through the specific picture rather than assuming one answer. Connecting the concept to real objects at home makes the abstract physics vocabulary stick much better than pictures alone.
Written by
Hemsweta Jain · Teacher Cheena
MBA and Early Childhood Educator, teaching since 2014 · Founder of RaisoActive, Mumbai
Every RaisoActive worksheet is designed and checked by the founder before publishing.
Published · Last reviewed
Related worksheets
Push or Pull Worksheet: Identifying Actions!
This worksheet introduces a basic physics concept to children ages 3-5 by having them identify whether an action shown in each picture is a push or a pull, building early scientific observation skills around force and motion. Learning to name these two opposite actions also strengthens comparative vocabulary and lays groundwork for more formal physics concepts later in school.
Push and Pull Worksheet for Preschoolers
Deciding whether each pictured action is a push or a pull introduces children ages 3-5 to an early physics concept: that forces move objects toward or away from us. Sorting actions this way builds observational skills and gives children the vocabulary to describe motion they see every day.
Clothing Pattern Match Worksheet for Preschoolers
This worksheet has children ages 3-5 study repeating patterns on clothing items — stripes, polka dots, or checks — and match each item to its identical twin, building visual discrimination and early pattern-sequencing skills. Distinguishing between similar-looking patterns also sharpens attention to detail, a skill that later supports letter and word recognition.
Taste Bud Sorting Worksheet: Identify and Sort Foods by Taste!
This worksheet introduces children ages 4-6 to four basic taste categories — salty, sour, bitter, and sweet — by having them sort pictured foods into the correct group. Beyond taste vocabulary, sorting foods by an invisible property like flavor (rather than an obvious one like color or shape) pushes children to draw on memory and prior experience, building more advanced classification skills.
Elephant Shapes: Fun Sorting Worksheet for Preschoolers!
This playful sorting worksheet has children ages 3-5 use an elephant's 'trunk' (their own hand reaching through a cut circle) to pick and sort shapes, building both shape recognition and simple classification skills. Physically selecting and grouping shapes by type, rather than just naming them on sight, helps solidify the concept that shapes can share a category even when their size or color differs.
Coding Kites Worksheet: Match the Bows!
This activity sharpens visual observation in children ages 3-5 as they compare color sequences on each kite to a set of loose bows and find the exact match. Careful, systematic comparison — checking each color in order rather than glancing quickly — builds an attention-to-detail habit that transfers directly to early reading and number work.
Pac-Man Maze Worksheet: Count and Move!
This dice-counting maze gives children ages 3-5 repeated practice matching a rolled number to the correct number of moves, reinforcing accurate counting under a bit of playful pressure. Tracking Pac-Man's current position after each roll also builds short-term spatial memory, since children must remember where they left off before moving again.
Stick Man Emotions Worksheet: Happy, Sad, Angry, and Surprised!
Children ages 4-6 practice reading facial expressions on this worksheet, matching stick-figure faces to their correct emotion labels by noticing details like mouth shape and eyebrow position. This strengthens emotional literacy — the ability to name and recognize feelings in others — which supports empathy and smoother social interactions as children move into more group play and classroom settings.
Guides for this topic
Best Worksheets for 3-Year-Olds: What Works and What to Avoid
What works on worksheets for 3-year-olds: short sessions, crayons, tracing lines, matching, cutting, a free weekly plan, and signs one is too advanced.
Age-Appropriate Problem-Solving Activities: Building Critical Thinkers from the Ground Up
Discover fun, age-appropriate problem-solving activities for children ages 1-8. Build critical thinking, logic, and reasoning skills through play-based learning.
Critical Thinking Activities That Actually Work for Young Children: Building Tomorrow's Thinkers Today
Discover proven critical thinking activities for young children. Age-wise logic games, questioning techniques, and hands-on ideas to build thinking skills at home.
Reviews
Every worksheet for ages 3–5, no watermark
Members download the full library of 1,000+ worksheets and every activity pack without watermarks or daily limits. One year costs ₹1,000 in India or $20 elsewhere.
See membership plansOr download any worksheet free with a watermark (5 a day).