A forest of preschool activities

I gave up trying to decorate my house for fall. It’s just not going to happen.  With planning Baby’s birthday bash and dreaming up Christmas projects it just got away from me. I did get around to doing  something in the basement for the kids though. One of my favorite things about fall is the trees, so I decided to bring that into their little space. I cut out ten tree trucks and taped them to the wall, then I numbered them with notecards {I used both the number and the number word}. Every couple of days we added a new top to the tree. I tried to incorporate learning and art that was suitable for both Monkey {age 4} and Bear {age 2}. Now if I could just keep Baby from tearing the tree trunks off of the wall… Here is a list of the activities we did and a short description to get you started. If you need more detail, just ask. Come to think of it, this is a lot for one post so I’ll give you five today and the rest will follow shortly.

Tree 1: Color sorting and color sight words

Cut different color circles from construction paper and tape to the tree. Then cut leaves out of white paper and write a color word on each leaf, I made two for each color. On the back, put a small mark in the color so your preschooler can self-check themselves.

If you have a younger child, you can cut leaves out of each color and have them match the leaves to the color circle. I laminated the leaves with contact paper and the kids attach them with sticky-tac. I helped them with this the first couple of times, and now they do it themselves!

Tree 2: Apple slice stamping

Apples are super cheap right now, and good for eating and crafting! I cut an apple in half, gave one to each of the kids with a plate of yellow and red paint and let them go to town apple stamping their tree top.

Tree 3: Beginning letter sound picture pairing

I got a poster from the Dollar Tree several months ago with the alphabet and pictures with each letter. Monkey helped me cut out each letter and picture. We glued the letters to the tree top and put sticky-tac on the back of the pictures so Monkey can match the picture with the letter. I have the name of the picture on the back so Monkey can self-check again as per the advice of my early childhood go-to lady {my super-mom-in-law}.

Tree 4: Fall collage

Monkey had a friend over for a playdate and we decided to cut fall pictures out of magazines and glue the to one of the trees. They needed some guidance on what were fall pictures, but I basically let them go with it. Cutting projects are always good practice!

Tree 5: Leaf rubbings 

We used some of the leaves we collected on our fishing trip and made leaf rubbings. Place a leaf on a hard surface, cover with paper, and color over the leaf with the side of a crayon. Then cut around the leaf, or let your kids cut them out.