The season that puts a little spring back into my step is almost here. Being outdoors just makes me happy, and after a long, cold winter, I am ready to whip out my flip flops and head into the beautiful sunshine of spring. Let’s hope these spring activities will bring about some joy and fun in your classroom as we head into a wonderful, hopeful time of year. Here’s a look at our week exploring the season of spring:
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Spring: Books We Love
When Spring Comes by Kevin Henkes delivers a story filled with captivating language to tell about the wonders of spring – if you can wait for them. The birds will hatch, the sprouts will grow, the rain will come, and the world will turn green. I especially love the pages filled with alliteration talking about all of the things that come with spring.
Bird Builds a Nest by Martin Jenkins tells the story from start to finish of a bird building her nest. She has to gather the twigs, weave them together, and add soft grass and feathers to her nest. After a hard day’s work, her nest is complete and ready for…eggs! I love how this book explains how a nest is made in clear, easy-to-understand language for our little learners.
Next, we read Up in the Garden and Down in the Dirt by Kate Messner. Up in the garden, the sprouts are growing, the flowers are blossoming, and the vegetables are ripening. And below, we get to explore the hidden world of animals and insects living and burrowing down in the dirt. I love how we get to take a peek into something that is so familiar; yet, we have never really seen with our own eyes.
Next up, we read And Then It’s Spring by Julie Fogliano. In this story, a boy and his dog plant many seeds and plants and wait expectantly for something – anything to sprout in this brown world. After such a long time, everything suddenly turns green and then it’s spring.
Last, we ended the week by reading Fletcher and the Springtime Blossoms by Julia Rawlinson. Even though the weather is warming up, Fletcher spots snow in the orchard and warns all of his friends to prepare for another winter. Just as everyone starts to get ready, they discover another surprise – the snow was just one of spring’s astonishments: blossoms.
Spring Activities: Literacy
Puddle Jumping
Puddle jumping is so much fun! I just love that this Puddle Jumping activity gets the kids up and stomping, pretending to jump from puddle to puddle while practicing letter identification. It’s always good to get up and moving! We sang the “Puddle Jumping” song, and when the song ended, we jumped to the closest letter to trace on our recording sheet. A splashing good time!
Rabbit Syllables
Any time we get to pretend to feed animals, it is instantly engaging. Also, little ones and containers. Need I say more? This week, we practiced counting the syllables in the words pictured on carrots. Then, we fed them to the rabbit with the matching number of syllables on their ear. I love how this Rabbit Syllables activity built our spring vocabulary and phonemic awareness at the same time.
Rainbow Writing
I am so excited that we finally made a sensory bottle in which we could discover letters. Twirling and shaking the bottle around was thrilling! After we found a colorful letter in the rainbow rice, we traced the letter on the recording sheet to match the color of the letter found. Perfect activity to practice letter formation during your spring preschool theme, and even better – it’s FREE! Grab yours here!
Fly a Kite ABC
This next activity brings back many memories of flying (and flopping) kites around the beaches of Lake McConaughy with my grandma. So let’s go fly through initial sound practice with Fly a Kite ABC. I just added pipe cleaner kite tails, and we laced on lettered beads to match the initial sounds. Fine motor flying fun!
Spring Opposites
This Spring Opposites booklet is the perfect way to practice opposites and coloring! One page asks the reader to name the opposite of the pictured word. Then, flip the page to find the answer. Make as a class and keep in the literacy center to practice!
Spring Activities: Math
Measure the Tulips
I love when my tulips blossom in my yard. It just makes me happy, hopeful, and excited for the long summer nights. In this activity, we used snap cubes to measure the different tulips. Then, we wrote the height in the box using a dry erase marker. Easy math center to set up. Also included is a tulip life cycle to incorporate some more science into our learning with Measure the Tulips.
Feed the Birds
Combining sensory bins with learning? Oh, most definitely! The kids loved scooping and counting the matching number of scoops of birdseed into each bird’s mouth. Counting: check! Colors: check! Sensory activity: check! Scooping and pouring: check! Loads of fun: check! Grab your Feed the Birds here!
Warning: I will say that this was my first time using birdseed, and it is incredibly messy. Not so sure I will use it again. Also, I had to check every single label because of allergies, so just beware of that. Next time, I may just use sunflower seeds mixed with popcorn kernels. Easier to pick up.
Up in the Garden
Have you read Up in the Garden and Down in the Dirt by Kate Messner? If not, I just love how it brings the reader into the unseen world below the garden to explore the animals and insects that live there, unknown to us up above. That book inspired this activity: Up in the Garden. We first counted the fruits, vegetables, or flowers up in the garden. Then, we add insect, fruit, or veggie counters in the ten frame below to match. Love using different counters for activities and love that we are building the foundation of number sense.
Rain Gauge
With spring comes rain (depending on where you live), so we talked about how rain gauges are used to collect rainfall to measure how much it rained. We used test tubes as our rain gauges, and dropped the corresponding number of blue gems into each tube. Then, we talked about which amount was greater, less, and if there were any amounts that were equal. Grab your Rain Gauge activity here!
Note: My test tubes were actually old sprinkles containers, but here is a link to one that I will probably buy for future activities.
Worm Graph
Kids and magnets are naturally attracted to one another. Who am I kidding? I love magnets as an adult! We incorporated our magnetic wands into math this week by swiping them through the soil (dried black beans) to collect different colored pipe cleaner worms. Then, we placed the worms on the graph to determine which color had the most, the least, and if any were equal. We also counted how many of each color we had before dropping them back into the sensory bin. So much math in this Worm Graph activity!
Spring Activities: Other
Strawberry Picking Dramatic Play
The dramatic play this week was our jam – strawberry jam, that is! Love, love, love everything about this one! The kids chose their roles: customer, farmer, or cashier and used the checklists to guide them through play. First, the customer put on a hat and sunblock, picked strawberries from the field, weighed them on the scale, and then paid one dollar per ounce. The customers could also buy extra strawberry snacks such as strawberry lemonade, chocolate strawberries, strawberry jam, or strawberry cake, which the cashier prepared for them. The cashier then checked them out by counting the money. Finally, the farmer took the strawberries back to the field to pretend to plant them again and water them with the watering can. Strawberry Picking has all of the printables, checklists, labels, and name tags to make it easy for you to set up!
Robin Life Cycle
Hands-on? Yes, please! Kids remember so much more when they actually are acting things out themselves, so we learned all about the life cycle of a robin through this hands-on life cycle! First, we pretended to built the nest by adding twigs to the one I made out of paper bags. I will say that I just basically made up the nest as I went, so my instructions are not that great. The kids loved pretending that the clothespins were the bird’s beaks. Then, we laid eggs in the nest – blue, of course, for robins. Next, we pretended to sit on the eggs until they hatched with our adorable pompom baby robins. We fed the fledglings worms and then taught them how to fly. Such a great way to learn about birds!
Worms & Clothespins
Since the robin life cycle with the clothespin bird beak was such a hit, we just added another fine motor activity to our morning. I spread worms, magnetic numbers, and clothespins out on our grass mat to fine tune those fine motor skills. The kids pretended they were birds hunting for worms in the grass. Easy and fun!
Spring Baby Animals
The more I teach, the more I learn. I was astounded to find out that farm animals aren’t just born in the spring; they are born throughout different times of the year, too. Take a look at these close-up photographs of animals that are primarily born in the spring. Guess which animal it is and then flip it open to find out. There are even some fun facts about each animal to share with your students on the inside!
Foaming Rainbow
We always hope to see a rainbow with all of those spring showers, so this week we made our own fizzing rainbow with this simple science reaction: baking soda and vinegar. I just added food coloring to vinegar for the kids to drop into a sensory bin full of baking soda. Tip: Adding rainbow erasers only makes clean-up harder.
Spring Activities: Bundle
My goal: to make activities that the kids can’t wait to do, and this week was a success! Add a little bounce and fun to your spring theme with these activities. The whole entire unit is bundled to add in savings for you, so grab your Spring Bundle here!
If there is ever anything you need to make these activities work for you and your students, please let me know here, and I would be happy to help with anything I can!
