Kleas: trees for the nature table

(No theme mosaic Monday post today-but you can still see what I'm loving this week here at Flickr!)

Here's what we made at the preschool last week. Wee autumn trees for the nature table.

These are the perfect craft for preschoolers. It's a fairly quick and not very messy project, easy for the children to do on their own and the kids were completely delighted with their creations. What more could a teacher (or parent) ask for?

Here's what we did:

we gathered twigs and branches on our morning walk
each child was given a small handful of air drying clay
they rolled the clay into a ball, then flattened the bottom on a tray
they pushed the twigs into the clay

then we got to enjoy the excited squeals of "look!...I made a tree!"

We let the clay dry for 48 hours then at the next class time each child added autumn colored wool roving for the leaves.

We talked about where these would go on their nature tables at home. It was so fun to hear how each of them have a different set-up...a shelf, a table, a mantle. I've also had the great fortune of going to many of these children's homes so I get to see where all the projects they make at Willow House are displayed.

We found a nice place for my tree on the nature table at the preschool.

We also talked about how to help our tree change with the seasons, by removing the wool roving "leaves" and replacing it with something white as the snow begins to fall.