Fall Toddler Activities (Part One)

I love Fall!  It's my favorite season!  So of course, this will be one of my favorite units to do.  We will be covering this unit for a two week period.  Then it's on to Halloween!  How time flies!  Watch my video below to see all five of the Fall Projects we are doing this week!

  

1.  Leaf Sorting

I purchased these felt leaves from Hobby Lobby as part of their Fall 2016 craft line.  Their are 4 different shapes and colored leaves.  I have been using them throughout the week for sorting.  I started the week by only lining up 2 leaves, and having E find the matching leaves, and have then moved on to using all 4.  I have mixed them up, pulled out one, and had her find the other 3 matches, and she has worked on her fine motor skills by picking up the leaves and attempting to line them up in rows. It has also been a good activity for shape discrimination and color recognition.

2.  Pumpkin and Acorn Stickers

This pack of Fall stickers was purchased at Hobby Lobby.  It contains 120 stickers, an assortment of pumpkins, turkeys, glitter acorns, and stickers that say 'give thanks'.  We used a few of the pumpkin and acorn stickers to decorate a piece of green construction paper.  It was hard word for E to get the backings off the stickers, but she worked very diligently.  She needed a bit of help with the small acorn stickers, but it was good practice for her fine motor skills, and it was a good exercise in peeling.

3.  Table Scatter Sorting  

Surprise, these items were also purchased at Hobby Lobby (did I mention that's my favorite store?). The plastic pumpkin containers came in a 3 pack, the lids come off (good practice for hand eye coordination).  The table scatter consists of leaves and different colored acorns.  (WARNING:  These items are very very small and pose a choking hazard, watch your child at all times!).  I used different items from the bag, and put a different one in each container, then had E sort through the bag and find matches to add to the containers.  This would be great to use with the Learning Resources Fine Motor Tool Set, but this time, we just used our fingers.  

4.  Pumpkin Washing

This activity is pretty straight forward.  We used a plastic tub and filled it with soapy water.  I have E a scrub brush, and small pumpkins, then showed her how to carefully scrub the pumpkins clean.  This was a very nice practical life activity.  While we don't wash pumpkins typically, it is a larger surface than other foods we do scrub so it was good practice.  It was also festive!  Then we practiced rinsing, and drying the pumpkins with a cloth.

5.  Table Scatter Sensory Bin

This activity was really fun!  I used the same bin that we washed the pumpkins in, and the same table scatter from the sorting project.  I put the table scatter and a few other fall objects (outdoor leaves, sticks, etc) in the tub, and let E play with it all!  I gave her the scooper tool from the Learning Resources Fine Motor Tool Set to see if she could pick up the table scatter out of the water.  It's still a very difficult skill for her, but she had fun trying.