autumn
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Autumn manipulatives for the preschool room
Autumn is my favorite time of year to use seasonal manipulatives because there are so many different options. The items on the list below are great for math games, patterning, sensory tables, tactile language activities, the block area, and fine motor exercises. Some autumn manipulatives you can include in your activities and center include: Leaves Acorns Miniature pumpkins Soy beans Corn kernels Popcorn Sunflower seeds Candy corn Pumpkin seeds Seasonal confetti Seed pods Orange, yellow, and brown gems Apples Apple seeds Pinecones I’d love to know how you use some of these items in your classroom, share your ideas in the comments!
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Preschool activities do to with leaves
One of my favorite fall activities to do with preschoolers is to collect leaves. I give each child a grocery bag and we go on a nice long walk to make sure that we pass a variety of trees and we try to get leaves of all shapes, colors, and sizes. We have some really great conversations during our walk; we try to decide which leaves have fallen from which trees, and we watch squirrels collect acorns and bury them for the winter. After we collect as many leaves as we can we take them back to the classroom we start exploring. Here are some great activities that you can…
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Ideas for Observing Trees with Preschoolers
Trees offer great opportunities for seasonal observations because; They are readily available and can often be observed from inside the classroom simply by looking out the window. They offer obvious visual examples of seasonal changes. They can easily be revisited over an extended period of time. Observing trees is completely free. Start your observations by having your class help choose a tree that they want to make “their tree.” Check on the tree every couple of weeks. During some points throughout the year the changes will happen more rapidly, revisit the tree more often during these periods. As you engage the children in observations, consider doing some of these activities:…
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Friday Freebie – Leaf Patterning
Happy Friday! Somehow it’s already the second week in September, and because of the strange weather we’ve had this summer, our leaves have already started to change. Nothing like messing with my seasons! This freebie is a cute patterning activity that uses different colored leaves. This would be a great center or a fun activity to send home for families to work on together. Download your copy here and enjoy your weekend!
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Great autumn activities for centers
Autumn is a great season to explore in the classroom because there are so many natural materials the you can bring into your environment. This also means that it is really important to have other materials in your centers that are related to those natural materials. Here are some of my favorite autumn centers; Autumn vocabulary cards– These are great for reinforcing the new vocabulary words that students are learning. This set includes the words acorn, apple, leaf, corn, leaves, pumpkin, tree, orchard, squirrel, and turkey and are wonderful for a writing center. Acorn matching set – This set includes letter matching, number matching, and color matching, making it easy for…
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Autumn observations to use in the classroom
Autumn is the perfect time of year to help children practice making observations. There are so many things happening right outside our windows, encourage the children to sit and watch, or go for a walk and do some exploring. Here are some things the the children might notice: Leaves changing Leaves falling off trees Summer flowers starting to disappear The air getting cooler Squirrels and birds preparing for winter Different kinds of plants growing (pumpkins, squashes, mums) Fall or Halloween decorations appearing Having to wear jackets outside Each of these observations can lead to wonderful conversations about the seasons, and how we prepare for seasons to change. These kinds of…
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Starting a child-led apple investigation
It’s almost that time of year – time to explore all things apples and pumpkins. I don’t know what it is about apples, but we can’t seem to make it through a school year without some kind of apple activity or snack. I’m all for exploring these fall favorites, but lets let the children determine what they want to learn. The best way to start a child-led investigation is incredibly easy; just put some apples on a table and see what happens. I do suggest a number of different kinds and colors of apples, because these will lead to a number of different conversations. Young children are curious about EVERYTHING,…
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Friday Freebie – Leaves
Yay for Friday! I’ve been looking forward to this particular Friday for months because I have the day off to attend my Brother-in-law’s wedding. I am so excited to spend the long weekend celebrating with family and great friends (and it just so happens to be taking places in one of my favorite places to visit – Ohio’s Amish Country – so bring on the baked goods!). To celebrate, I’m sharing two freebies with you today! The first is a really cute leaf silhouette match from Totschooling. This is a great activity even for the youngest children, they have to look at the colored leaf cards and see if they…
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Natural Materials for the Preschool Classroom – Autumn
It’s no secret that I love autumn, so it should come as no surprise that I like to include autumn-related natural materials in the classroom for the children to explore. In fact, we spend a lot of time outside collecting these materials to bring into the classroom. I’ve found that the children are more like to explore these things inside, when they get to be a part of finding them outside. This also gives them a frame of reference for each of these items because they can remember where they were collected. Here is a list of some of the things that you can typically find in my classroom during…
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Book Talk Tuesday – Leaf Man
Mrs. Jump’s Class Hi everyone! It’s Tuesday so I’m linking up with Mrs. Jump’s Class for Book Talk Tuesday. Today I’m sharing one of my favorite fall books – luckily I have enough favorites to get me through every week of autumn – but today it’s Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert. All of Lois’ books are amazing, her illustrating style is unique and it really speaks to children, and encourages their own creativity. This book in particular contains illustrations that are made out of leaves. This story opens up children’s imaginations to all of the possible places that leaves can fly on the wind. There are a number of activities…
