It’s always a great idea to explore the outdoors, gather up things found in nature and use them for art activities for kids. And this is exactly what we did a few weeks ago, which then led us to this activity: Leaf Painting for Preschoolers.
Gathering ‘Paint Materials’
On one of those beautiful sunny days we were at the park, I asked the kids to try and find things that we can use for a leaf painting activity. They excitedly explored – a lot more excited than I expected actually. They picked up things from the ground, went through bushes and pulled a few leaves from a tree (uh oh, poor tree – I stopped them before they pulled out any more). It was wonderful watching them observe every little detail. They noticed the shape of big leaves, how little leaves were bunched together, long stems, wide barks… all because they were trying to figure out if each item they picked up was going to be useful for our leaf painting activity.
Leaf Painting for Preschoolers
All you really need for this leaf painting activity are…
- Leaves, stems, bark or anything from nature
- Paint
- Optional: paint brushes
- And lots of imagination!
The fun things my preschooler did with the collected leaves…
My 3 year old took the biggest leaf we found. She painted this using many different colors, then stamped this leaf onto paper…
She also took medium sized leaves, and painted each one a different color. Then she stamped these leaves onto paper, creating colorful leaf patterns… 
Yup, the kids managed to get long stemmed weeds too. And well, they were great to use as a paint brush!
And this small bunch of leaves got dunked in paint and dotted all over paper. It wasn’t as popular as the leaf stamping activities though.
This was such a fun activity. Lots of bonding time outdoors as we gathered our ‘paint materials’ from nature. And lots of creative fun at home as my preschooler made her leaf painting artwork.
Will your little ones like this activity, Leaf Painting for Preschoolers? To get more art activities for kids, please Follow Kidz Activities on Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram.
This post is part of the 2015 PAINT-A-THON! 35 Fantastic Bloggers bringing you 101+ Painting Ideas for Kids!
These came out great! The Paint-a-Thon has been such a fun series… thank you for sharing at It’s Friday, We’re In Love! Stay tuned for our Leaves Round-Up coming next month.
We definitely had fun doing this for Paint-a-Thon. Thanks for including this in the leaves round up 🙂
This is awesome! My little one and I just did some leaf rubbing with crayons last week. This would be a great follow up activity.
Leaf rubbing is really fun for little ones too! 🙂 Hope you enjoy this activity
What a great idea! My toddler has been finding lots of big leaves recently and they’ve been left in a pile under the buggy but I think we will have to get the paint out! #toddlerfunfriday
That’s great! Collecting leaves is half the fun! 🙂
Leaf painting is always lots of fun!