What Does Autumn Look Like?

Using Our Senses to Enjoy Autumn

The most beautiful sight in Autumn is the changing colors of the leaves. This provides opportunities to create leaf rubbings and other leaf related crafts. We can rake leaves together, which naturally leads to jumping in leaf piles! Kids also love collecting acorns and seed pods, watching migrating birds, and seeing the harvest moon. Other fun things my 19-month old charge just loves watching are the squirrels gather acorns for winter.

Ask kids:
What is happening to the grass and flowers?
What are the insects and animals doing?
Do you see acorns, walnuts, and seed pods?
What are migrating birds doing?
Have you seen a Harvest Moon?

Children's Books About What We See in Autumn:
Collect colorful leaves to make projects with activities from the book Look What I Did With a A Leaf! by Morteza E. Sohi., recommended by nanny Andrea Flagg and reviewed by Elain Magliaro.

Hello, Harvest Moon by Ralph Fletcher
While tired farmers and their families are in bed, the harvest moon silently climbs into the sky and starts working its magic. For some, it is the nightly signal to rise and shine. It is time to hunt, to work, or to play in the shadows. For a little girl and her cat, it is an invitation to enjoy the wonders of the night and a last flood of light before the short days of winter set in. With an evocative text and radiant illustrations, this companion to Twilight Comes Twice offers a glimpse of nature's nightlife long after bedtime.



Animals in the Fall by Gail Saunders
Simple text and photographs present the behavior changes of animals as winter approaches, such as growing thicker fur, migrating, and hibernating.



Earl the Squirrel by Don Freeman
Earl the Squirrel doesn't think of himself as spoiled, but his mother does. She decides it's high time Earl learns to find acorns for himself. There's only one problem -- he doesn't know where to look. Earl's friend Jill offers to help, but that's not what Earl's mother had in mind. So, wearing his bright red scarf, Earl sets off on his own for an action-packed acorn finding mission. Striking black-and-white scratch board art is accented by Earl's crimson scarf. The effect is classic, clean, and thoroughly recognizable as Don Freeman's signature style.



Leaves by David Ezra Stein
In this adorable book, a little bear sees leaves fall during his first autumn and is confused. He tries to put them back on the trees to no avail. As he ponders the situation, he grows sleepy and before long he is hibernating through winter. When he awakens, he's delighted to see new leaves unfolding on the trees.