Going On A Leaf Hunt!

Today we read We're Going On A Leaf Hunt by Steve Metzger.  We loved this book!  For anyone who has ever heard the song “Goingon a Bear Hunt” by Greg and Steve, you must check out this book as well and make it a family fall tradition. 

Here’s What the Book is About

Three children set out on a leaf hunt and have to problem solve when they come across big obstacles standing between them and the tree they want to collect leaves from.  They come across a mountain, a waterfall, a river and more.  Part of the problem solving introduces some great prepositions like climbing over the mountain or going around the waterfall.  Also, each tree the children come to is a new type of tree—maple, birch, oak.  Read this story at your home, but watch out for what comes at the end sending the kids running home from their leaf hunt! 

Here’s How We Made It Come to Life

We have been very busy collecting leaves this fall.  Every time we hop in our wagon, the boys like to pick up leaves along the way to stow in their wagon bench.  We enjoy talking about the different shapes, sizes and colors of the leaves, and looking way up into the sky at the tall trees the leaves come from. 

When you read the story you can pat your legs to start the rhythm and do some actions for climbing over, walking around, and going through—it is a great way to practice understanding prepositions and gives your kiddos a visual of what the words mean.  Funny, but embarrassing story, Mr. Big Stuff thought it would be fun to climb over a mountain at our house—only this mountain was made of laundry.  He had fun climbing over it, and sitting on top of it.  I usually tell him to stop, but since he was applying the story I was actually somewhat proud of him. 

A great place to learn about trees in Kansas City is at Burr Oak Woods.  I had been there before when I was younger, but my friend invited us to go in September and we had a blast!  We have been back a few times since then.  They label all the trees and have pamphlets in the nature center and interactive movies, games, books and activities for the kids to learn for families to learn about the flora and fauna of this region.  The snakes are Mr. Big Stuff’s favorite, and My Little Guy likes the helicopter and giant squirrel.  You can also go here, here, here or here to learn a little about the trees mentioned in We’re Going on a Leaf Hunt.  We found a yellow birch tree in our own front yard!

See the pictures below to see what we did with our leaves once we collected them.  What have you done with your leaves this fall?  What types of trees do you have in your area?  In your yard?

First we collected our leaves...

We held each leaf against a paper to figure out what
color it was.  Green? No. Yellow? No. Orange? No.  Red? Yes!

Once we figured out the colors we sorted them.

Then we decided to graph them to compare
how many of each color we found.

Last, we colored in a box to represent each
leaf.  This way was a little more accurate since
our leaves were all different shapes and sizes.

This post is linked to "Show and Share Saturday Link-Up" at