Exploring Fun Activities for a Sensational Journey of the Five Senses!

 Today, we're going to get on board a sensational journey of the five senses! 

I've compiled some fun and educational five senses activities that include emergent readers that kids will love to read again and again, book recommendations, printables and follow up activities to create a Five Senses Unit or to compliment the unit you already teach.. So, buckle up your sensory seatbelts and let's dive right in!

You will find activities and printables to explore the world of sound with guessing a symphony of everyday sounds, to taste testing and learning where you taste on your tongue, to engaging your sense of smell with an easy to set-up aromatic guessing game! 

In one of our readers, students will learn about being a scientist and using the tools of their body to explore the world. Available in color and black and white for easy printing.

Another reader challenges kids to use their sense of sight to figure out the animal on the next page by seeing just a piece of their body. These easy to print books are copied two to a page.

Check out the Five Senses here.  It’s been update with a fresh look and fun activities. 

Get ready to engage your senses to truly comprehend the wondrous world around us!

Looking for more activities to do at home or in school for the five senses, check these out:

Create a mystery box- put an item inside and have kids reach inside and guess what it is.  This also can work for show and tell.

Blind Drawing: Have one child wear a blindfold and another child directs them what to draw and see if they can create the intended image.

Trust Walk: One partner is blindfolded and their partner guides them through the home or classroom by telling them the directions.

Check out the different scents or herbs, fruits, and flowers, and ask students to identify them with their eyes closed. 

Texture Treasure Hunt- Set up a touch & feel center with different objects with  texture to explore.

Volcano Fun- Make a volcano erupt by exploring the reactions of vinegar and baking soda. 

Nature Walk- Go for a walk in the backyard or neighborhood, and encourage them to notice the sounds, textures, and scents of nature.

Create colorful art with different materials like finger painting, colored sand, or fabric scraps.

Kindergarten Emergent Readers & Activities for Fall

As many of you already know, there's a huge push for reading in kindergarten. When I taught kindergarten, I tried to incorporate art as much as I could into my program.  The children loved the combination of art and reading.  Here are a few you might enjoy!  

Check out below for some creative art ideas for fall.  Each of these could be used with a writing piece or small book as well. 

At The Farm consists of 10 easy to read pages with repetitive text focusing on the sight words- I, see, a, and color word recognition. It also includes follow-up printables and a bonus color by code printable.

You can find it here.

PATTERNS

Why are patterns so important? Since patterns are everywhere, it's important that students start to recognize how things fit together and work. Students will see patterns in math, in art, and patterns in words such as word families.  Here are some easy to set up centers and printables you can use in your room to work on patterns. 

Apples! also includes several printables to work on beginning and ending sounds.  Since each page concentrates on a few letters at a time, it's a great assessment tool after teaching several letters.  

You can grab APPLES!  here.

Here's another set of fall and winter themed activities which utilize patterns as well. You can grab it here!

GRAB THIS FREEBIE FROM PATTERNS HERE!

Below is one of the easy set up centers to practice patterns.

Check out Cater-Pattern!

Sammy the Spider is an interactive emergent reader book which focuses on positional words.  Children read the book to find out where to glue Sammy. This book is part of Octoberfest for Kids! which includes 4 emergent readers (2 non-fiction and 2 fiction texts) in addition to letter-matching activities, syllable sorts, science activities, common core math activities, and more! A total of over 100 pages of activities in all. You can grab it here. 

Grab 2 free color by numbers as well. Here’s one of them- so cute!

Grab this little treat here for free!

SORTING

Sorting and classifying objects helps children learn about attributes and relationships. Practicing sorting promotes logical thinking and applying rules.
Children will be able to make real-life connection by organizing things in the real world such as putting away the utensils in the utensil drawer and sorting laundry.

Here's a fun sorting center activity you can do with your class. I'd suggest laminating the paper for extra durability.

Grab this FREEBIE SAMPLER HERE  and if you like it grab the WHOLE SET here at Josie's Place.

Below are some of the items to sort.

I got a bit into sorting and created the FULL product, SORTING.  The images I used can lead to a multitude of  ways to sort- not just by size and shape. I created work mats and pictures for each season, so children can sort all year round.  I also created FREE pattern task cards which utilize the pictures from the sorting center and children can practice patterns as well!  

The question, How did you sort this basket?  is on every work mat to remind children that they should be able to verbalize how they sorted the objects.

Here's a preview:

If you're looking for a more advanced, out of the box sorting activity, check out Sorting, Learning to Think Out of the Box! It was created for a teacher who wanted her kids to think outside the box and create their own categories to group objects based on the pictures.  My students played it and even I was amazed of the amount/ type of categories they came up with.

LABELING PICTURES!

Labeling is such an important beginning reading and writing skill. The children love to label pictures and it's a great way to introduce them to a non-fiction text feature.

Label It! includes 28 printables (themed for use for throughout the year) and a writing sheet for children to use to practice the skill of labeling. There is also a culminating writing sheet which you can use for all of the printables. You can grab a FREEBIE in the preview here. Label It! Second Edition is now available as well!

Here are some fun and creative fall art ideas that could be used in conjunction with a writing piece or small book.  

Enjoy!

 The season of fall

In second grade, we drew our tree first with pencil, then colored the tree, grass and sky in with colored pencil. Then, we outlined it with a Sharpie marker which seems to give it a little POP! After that, we used Q-tips and made the leaves.  We also did a fall writing on my I'm So Fancy Writing Paper... you can grab this apple one for FREE here!

Here's a super simple way to draw a tree for young kids..sorry for the bad photography =):

Below, is one of my talented artists at work!

As a writing idea, children can create a list of what they see in the fall.

Bus Safety

Children can write or explain a good bus safety rule.

Grab this BUS SAFETY FREEBIE here..

Fire Safety

Children can write a fire safety rule.

Grab the FIRE SAFETY FREEBIE here.

(Kindergarten)

(second grade)

Halloween

It's not too complicated... kids cut out the template below, I trace the boots and have them cut those out. I also cut a thin black strip and children glue it on the top of the triangle and it creates the hat (see above). Then, use cut up egg cartons for the eyes and add hair and broom if desired.

Grab this HALLOWEEN FREEBIE here!

So... all of these Halloween items got me in the mood to post some of my favorite Halloween party snacks from the past.

Ghosts in the graveyard

Pillsbury dough 'bones'

Mini-caramel apples

Pumpkin cupcakes with pretzel stems