Inside: This spring color sorting activity is a hands-on way to work on color recognition! Simply invite your preschoolers to match the colors of the flowers to those on the free printable mats. Then, create a floral arrangement!
During our gardening theme we transform our dramatic play area into a flower market.
Year after year, our toddlers and preschoolers love this pretend play activity.
So this year we extended the flower market into our block area, using our train table as a flower sorting activity.
Such a fun way to work on color recognition through hands-on play!
Spring Color Sorting Activity that Goes with Your Gardening Theme
I will always be grateful for someone letting me know that there was a perfectly good train table that was about to be transported to Goodwill.
I was just about to get our classroom ready for back to school and had the perfect spot for it.
To be honest, I really thought we’d use it mostly for trains.
Little did I know how many different ways we’d use it. (That’s for another post!)
We used it last year to arrange flowers, and this year I decided to add color sorting.
I first taped my rainbow color sorting sheets to the top of the table. (Scroll down to find the link to the free printable.)
I then took some plastic pitchers and color coded them with colored masking tape.
This way if the pitchers were removed from the color sorting sheets (and they were!), the children simply matched the colors of the pitchers to the color sheets taped to the table.
I’ve been asked about the graphic that is propped up on the train table. It’s the book Flower Garden by Eve Bunting. I opened it to the page that shows all the colorful flowers.
I placed an assortment of fake flowers in a basket.
As the children pulled the flowers out of the basket, they could then place them in the matching colored pitchers.
We also added some floral foam blocks and rings to the table for some flower arranging.
(Note: I watched carefully that the foam was not deliberately shredded. It’s very tempting for those little fingers once they realize the foam will start to break up.)
Pressing the flowers into the blocks is a great way to work on fine motor skills, too!
While I was observing this activity, a couple of the children commented on the colors they were sticking into the blocks.
They worked together to arrange certain colors next to each other before adding another.
Communicating while playing is a great way to strengthen language, too.
Then, they would remove the flowers from the foam, returning them to the matching colored pitchers.
Books to read during the time this activity is set up:
More flower ideas:
Fun Preschool Activities Using Flowers
Click on the photo below to get the link to the pdf download:
Flowers and Trees Lesson Plans
I’m so excited to be one of the creators of these hands-on flowers and trees lesson plans for toddlers and preschoolers!
Each activity is easy to follow and includes modifications and adaptations to meet the needs of all learners.
For more information, click on the graphics below:
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