School is in…and so is the harvest! Fall is a great time of year to visit a local garden or farm to dig for potatoes, pull up carrots, or pick cherry tomatoes from the vine.  Weigh-in on these harvest activities to add some hands-on fun to your harvest theme.

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Harvest activities provide lots of opportunity for exploring hands-on. Kids can touch bristly leaves and stalks, and cut open fresh tomatoes to see the seeds inside. 

If a field trip is not an option in your area, or you want to extend the harvest theme, try planting a few seeds or plants in large pots.

 

 

Many vegetables such as tomatoes and yellow beans grow well in containers.

 

 

Cherry tomatoes are ripening on a tomato plant. Look closely to pick out the red and green tomatoes.

 

 

Children’s names were etched into a pumpkin or zucchini early in the season........and the letters grew with the gourd!

 

 

 

Promote early math skills with counting and sorting, measuring and weighing.

• Sort fruit and vegetables by color, size, and shape.

• Measure by length.

• Compare weights of different types of produce.

 

 

Wrap a few tomatoes in newspaper or brown paper.

Place them in a convenient location where kids can easily unwrap and check them.

Observe them until they ripen to a bright red, then wash and enjoy in a salad, or on their own at snack time.

 

Activities to add to your Fall Harvest Theme:

Music and Movement:
(tune: Here we go Round the Mulberry Bush)
 

This is the way we dig the rows (make digging motions as if with a garden hoe).

This is the way we plant the seeds (walk up and down the "rows" sprinkling seeds).

This is the way the rain will fall (wiggle fingers like raindrops falling from the sky).

This is the way the sun will shine (raise arms, join hands to make a big circle overhead).

This is the way the garden grows (crouch low, slowly rise up until standing on tiptoe with arms reaching up to the sky).

Menu:

Serve homemade soup for snack or lunch. Can you spot the carrots and celery in the soup? 

Books to read:

Cows are in the Corn by James Young

Up We Grow!: A Year in the Life of a Small Local Farm by Deborah Hodge

 

 

More harvest theme activities from kid-friendly bloggers

 

Harvesting in the Carrot Patch / Powerful Mothering

Harvest Sensory Bin / Little Bins for Little Hands

Harvest Theme for Preschool and Kindergarten / The Preschool Toolbox

Harvest Preschool Activities: A Social Studies Lesson / The Educators Spin On It

 

 Follow our Seasonal:Fall Pinterest board for amazing fall crafts and activities!