— Creative Fun With Foraged Leaves
Today we follow up last month’s leaves scavenger hunt and explore some wonderful creative activities that children can undertake using leaves they have foraged. It’s great timing too, with Autumn having arrived during September. While last month’s article focused on scavenging and learning to recognise different leaves, today’s activity highlights how children can use some of those leaves to get creative and use their imaginations. Such activities combine aspects of Forest School with art, design, and mark-making, so they will be fun, educational, and help children develop various skills. This is also a great way to bring the results of an outdoor, nature-based activity indoors. And, with featured activities including leaf pressing, leaf rubbing, collage, painting, and more, what’s not to love!
Let’s get creative with leaves in the first of our suggested activities for children: leaf printing.
Printing With Leaves
| What’s needed: children will need some leaves with attractive shapes and well-defined structures (e.g. sycamore, oak, maple/acer, beech), some paper, a medium-sized paintbrush, and coloured poster paints. A little hand roller will also help, if available. |
What to do: Printing with leaves is simple, quick, fun, and effective. All children need to do is paint the most textured side of each leaf and then, while the paint is still wet, turn the leaf over, lay it carefully on a paper sheet, and press all areas of it against the paper. That’s where the little hand roller may be useful, if available, otherwise it can be achieved by hand or by dabbing a wad of tissues or fabric against the back of the leaf. Then, carefully peel off the leaf to reveal an intricate leaf print. It’s almost like magic, and the results are often fabulous! Children can experiment with multiple leaf prints, different colours, various leaf shapes and sizes, and generate different designs. Encourage them to experiment to get their creative juices flowing.
Leaf Pressing
| What’s needed: To press leaves, children will need a selection of attractive leaves and something to press the leaves between, e.g. sheets of paper, newsprint, or indeed the pages or a large notepad or book. One or two books will also be useful as weights, although any other reasonably weighty object that has a flat underside will do. |
What to do: Place each leaf, or indeed small flowers, individually between the sheets of paper. Loose newsprint or paper sheets can work, but perhaps the easiest way is to use a large notepad or book; these lend themselves to multiple leaves being pressed at the same time via the double-page spreads within. Lay the closed book (or pile of sheets) on a table and place a flat weighted object on top (an adult may need to supervise young children for this part). Such an object can be anything that’s reasonably weighty and has a flat underside — books are a natural contender for such a purpose. After a few days or a week, your child can check to see if the leaves have dried and flattened. If not, they should check again a few days later. Once flat and dry, your child’s leaves are ready! They are now in a long-lasting state, so make wonderful mementos like bookmarks, and indeed can be used as the key elements for our next activity suggestion below.
Make a Collage with Leaves
| What’s needed: Your child will need some sheets of paper, some child-safe glue, and some leaves. The leaves can be freshly-foraged, although dried and pressed ones are also an excellent choice and may glue more efficiently. |
What to do: The challenge with this activity is for the child to make a nice design on the paper using leaves. So, they could be arranged in an attractive pattern, or as a picture to depict a scene or object. Each leaf simply needs to be glued carefully in place. Designs can also be augmented with extra details using things like twigs, flowers (dried or pressed ones will last longer), leaf stalks, or even extras like lichen or moss. The only limits are the child’s creativity and imagination. Check out some of the examples on this page for inspiration — and get started.
Painted Leaves
| What’s needed: Children will need some reasonably flat leaves, some coloured poster paints, and some paper. |
What to do: This is an easy but effective activity where children simply paint one side of each leaf with coloured paint. Once painted, they look very attractive as art objects but can also be used, once the paint is dry, as part of a picture, display, or collage. This activity is a great opportunity for children to experiment with mixing colours, making new ones, and learning how to choose colours that either contrast or complement one another. Children will soon discover that whichever colour palette is chosen can give the final result a specific mood and feel, whether happy and sunny or muted and cool, for example, depending on the colour combinations.
The Magic of Leaf Rubbings
| What’s needed: This activity requires one or more leaves that have a well-defined structure, ideally with raised ‘veins’ and well-defined surface textures. Children will also need some sheets of thin paper plus either soft pencils, wax crayons, charcoal sticks, or oil pastels. |
What to do: Working on a flat surface like a table or desk, children should lay a leaf, with its most textured side uppermost, under a sheet of the thin paper. Then, bearing in mind the location of the leaf under the sheet, the child should shade from side to side repeatedly over the top to reveal the texture and structure of the underlying leaf. A soft pencil will give better results than a hard one, and using the side of the drawing tip rather than the point will also be easier. Even better is using the side of a stick of charcoal, wax crayon, or oil pastel, as more area can be covered in each single stroke. A variety of colours will help enrich the results, but black and white results are also highly effective. Children can experiment with different media in this way, try using different pressures, different colours, and differently shaped leaves. This task is a particularly good way for children to hone mark-making and fine motor skills.
Draw (or Paint) a Leaf
| What’s needed: Children will need one or more leaves as visual reference (the more attractive the better), and some paints or coloured pencils. |
What to do: The idea of this activity is simply for children to try to draw or paint their own representation of one or more leaves. They can position the leaves somewhere close, like on their desk or table, and see if they can draw them accurately on a sheet of cartridge or sketch paper. It’s a great way for children to practise their powers of observation and hand-eye coordination. How accurately can they accomplish their picture? Alternatively, how well can they achieve different styles of art in their representations? Perhaps showing them some examples of art styles from the Internet or from an art book may inspire them.
Endless Creative Opportunities Using Leaves
The possibilities are endless when it comes to creating art and design inspired by leaves. As well as making attractive designs with leaves, it’s also possible to take things a few steps further. For example, can your child find a leaf shaped like a heart and use it as the key element in a Valentine’s Day card? Can they make an attractive birthday card using leaves arranged to look like a big flower?
Can they incorporate leaves into a collage depicting a scene in a park, with leaves upturned as trees, moss as grass, a flower as the sun, and little twigs or pencil lines added to represent stick people? Can children use pressed flowers to make a lovely bookmark or keepsake for a friend or relative? The list of possibilities is immense! It’s also all great fun and highly creative, while helping children master new skills, use their imaginations, and support multiple areas of the EYFS. And, as we said in last month’s post, it’s something different for children to do indoors, yet still involving nature and elements of Forest School.
Nursery Places for Under-5s in Clayton-le-Woods
High-Quality Weekday Childcare Near Chorley
Little Acorns is a fabulous childcare nursery in Clayton-le-Woods, near Chorley, Lancashire. We cater for children from 3 months to primary school age, and give babies, toddlers, and pre-schoolers a wonderful start in life. Attending this high-quality childcare setting ensures that children are as school-ready as possible by the time they leave us — ready for success!
Little Acorns Nursery has a ‘Good’ Ofsted rating and supports funded childcare hours for eligible children as young as just 9 months. Forest School sessions are popular at Little Acorns Nursery, as are our comprehensive facilities that include a brand new Sensory Room. The nursery opens early, at 7:30 a.m., and stays open until 6:00 p.m. — very convenient for working families.
Register for a nursery place today, or simply get in touch with any queries or to arrange a guided visit with your child:
Little Acorns is a childcare nursery in Clayton-le-Woods, near Chorley, representing a convenient choice for anyone living nearby in towns and villages that include Clayton Brook, Clayton Green, Penwortham, Farington, Bamber Bridge, Whittle-le-Woods, Lostock Hall, Leyland, Pippin Street, Buckshaw Village, Thorpe Green and Euxton.
Summer and autumn are particularly good seasons for children to get outdoors, breathe in fresh air, and enjoy all the benefits of the natural world. Nature is incredibly important to children, and it’s one reason why Little Acorns Nursery runs 
Children may already be familiar with some of the leaves featured on the poster. They may be able to identify oak leaves, for example, especially when acorns are growing amongst them. They may also be able to identify ‘conker tree’ leaves from horse chestnut trees, and perhaps even those from their close relatives, sweet chestnuts — but ensure they’re careful of the spikey sweet chestnut cases! Sycamore leaves, ivy leaves, and hawthorn leaves may also be fairly easy for children to recognise — or soon get to know.
Some types of leaves may be more challenging for children to differentiate between than others. However, that’s all part of the fun and the educational challenge. Hazel and Lime leaves are similar to each other, for example, although unlike hazel leaves, lime leaves have a sheen and the incredibly beautiful seed fronds that you can see on the poster in the third row. Elder and Ash leaves are also similar to one another, although the quite different number of leaves per stem will help children identify which is which (see the first row). Acers (a.k.a. Maples) are often found growing in gardens and parks. Their leaves are very pretty and come in a variety of colours, from deep burgundy or bright green to golden yellow depending on the variety and time of year. Our acer example in the first row should give children a good idea of what kind of shape to look out for in the main, although some acers are even more fancy!
Nature is incredibly important to human beings. Both children and adults experience an incredible array of benefits through spending time in and around the natural world — which is why we have 
In a follow-up to today’s leaf scavenger hunt, and in view of autumn beginning in September, we have also published a post that outlines some fun, highly creative activities that use leaves. From leaf painting and leaf rubbing to leaf collages, leaf pressing, and more, check out our wonderful 
For most families, electronic screens are everywhere. Across the country, there are TVs in living rooms, with many households also having them in kitchens, dining rooms, and even bedrooms. Smartphone use is also prolific. Additionally, we have tablets, computers, game consoles, e-readers, and even wearable smartwatches that have screens. So, rather like the movie title, “Everything Everywhere All at Once,” electronic screens are nothing short of ubiquitous. But what effect does watching such screens have on people, particularly children? And is there an argument for taking a significant break from them once in a while? Today’s post explores the topic and explains Why Every Family Should Try a Digital Detox, whether for a day, a week, or significantly longer. Let’s dive in.
Common sense alone would dictate that spending hours watching electronic screens is, at the very least, unnatural for children. When you think about it logically, time spent staring at one spot, remaining physically inactive, cannot be good for young – or even old – brains and bodies. Indeed, studies have revealed some unsurprising findings relating to excessive screen use, especially for children, whose young brains and bodies are still in their infancy. Those under five are undergoing rapid brain development, so it’s a particularly crucial time for them. Indeed, 
A decrease in levels of stress, anxiety, and other emotional difficulties;
Unplugging from electronic screens has been shown to benefit families as a whole. Days and evenings together seem more relaxed and often feel significantly longer when screens are switched off. Then, families are soon likely to increase levels of connection and presence. Away from screens, there is likely to be more spontaneity and creativity too, with more talking, reading, playing, drawing, and making. Children will often display excitement about beginning each new activity, too. The overall family mood is often also improved, leading to a healthy and congenial atmosphere, with noticeably more laughter. What’s more, everyone becomes more aware of each other, engaging in group or sibling activities more readily, and being overall more attentive to one another. Then, when it’s time for bed, everyone feels more rested, and children will generally fall asleep more easily than ever before. Incredibly, all such benefits and this newfound quality time are achieved simply by stepping away from electronic screens.
When children and families unplug from electronic screens, it becomes natural for them to spend more time outdoors, closer to nature. That’s important because both outdoor play and a closer proximity to nature have incredibly significant benefits all of their own. To demonstrate that using just one example, studies showed that a mere 20 minutes spent closer to nature will improve a child’s happiness. In fact, nature boosts mental health so significantly that even just a view of nature through a window has been shown to boost academic grades, test results, and overall academic focus — incredible!
It’s wonderful for families when spring arrives: the coldest weather is behind us, the sun is out more often, and there is so much beauty to see outdoors. As spring progresses, more and more flowers appear, providing colourful displays, and all kinds of plants and leaves are sprouting forth. Following spring’s arrival, we’ll see more animals, birds and insects too. They’re likely to include delightful bumblebees attracted by newly-blossoming flowers, adorable snails and minibeasts on the look-out for food, and swifts flying acrobatically through the air, having returned to the UK after wintering overseas. Everywhere we look, nature is teaming with life once again.
With this in mind, it’s a wonderful opportunity to encourage children to get outside once more, enjoy nature and the fresh air, and embark on a Spring Nature Hunt. The activity is both fun and educational for little ones. Spending time in nature is also very good for children’s health and well-being. And the icing on the cake? Today’s activity comes with an attractive reference poster depicting 25 natural things for children to look out for — and it’s free for families to download.
We’re delighted to share some very exciting news: 
Our nursery is surrounded by 
Forest School is a child-centred approach to learning that takes place outdoors and encourages children to explore, investigate, and learn about the natural world through hands-on experiences. Sessions are led by trained practitioners and are carefully planned to be age-appropriate for under-fives. They allow children to learn about nature, build new skills, learn to assess risks, and grow in confidence and independence.
Forest School offers rich opportunities for learning across all areas of the Early Years Foundation Stage. As children climb, balance, build, dig, collect and create, they naturally develop physical strength, coordination and problem-solving skills. They learn to communicate with one another, take turns, share ideas and work together, supporting social and emotional development in a meaningful context.
Forest School is not limited to time spent outdoors for children at Little Acorns Nursery. The Forest School approach is also reflected throughout our nursery environment, both indoors and in our garden and grounds. Natural materials, open-ended resources and opportunities for exploration are woven into everyday play, allowing children to continue their connection with nature — whether indoors or outside.
For families already with us, Forest School adds another enriching layer to the care and education your child receives. For those considering joining our nursery, it’s one of the many reasons we believe our setting offers something truly special. Being able to offer Forest School — especially as a nursery that pioneered it locally — reflects our commitment to high-quality, thoughtful early years practice.
As the bright days of summer give way to crisp autumn air, parks, gardens, and pavements begin to fill with a carpet of crunchy leaves. For children and under-fives, autumn is one of the most exciting times of the year. With the landscape so full of textures, sounds, and colours, it’s the perfect time to get outdoors, explore, and learn about the natural world. It’s also the ideal time for them to begin a simple but deeply rewarding project: composting. In today’s post, we outline how children can approach this wonderful activity and explain its significant benefits.
Composting is a wonderfully simple, hands-on activity that provides children of all ages with an opportunity to enjoy the outdoors and connect with nature. It will introduce big ideas about recycling and responsibility in a child-friendly way, teach patience, and make good use of all those autumn leaves. Best of all, it’s fun, messy in all the right ways, and will lead to fascinating discoveries — from the changing smells of the compost heap to the tiny minibeasts that wriggle in to help the process along. Composting is also an activity that can be done with just a little guidance from grown-ups.
Spending time outdoors gathering materials will not only help children understand where natural resources come from, but it will also give them valuable time in the fresh air, where they can move, play, and make discoveries. At this age, such experiences are vital for confidence and development. And because composting is a gentle, ongoing project, children can revisit it over weeks and months, and watch as nature slowly transforms what they collected into something new and incredibly useful.
It encourages children to care for the environment and understand recycling in its most natural form.
Composting shows children how cycles work in nature — how things grow, fall, break down, and then help new life grow again. This is an early introduction to science and sustainability in action.
Head outdoors with a small bucket or bag and invite your child to gather leaves, twigs, and other natural “treasures.” Encourage them to notice the crunch, colour, and shapes of the leaves. Kitchen scraps can also be sourced from indoors, for example, apple cores, banana skins, and vegetable peelings from mealtimes.
Show them how to tip the scraps into your compost heap, bin, or tub. Explain that the pile needs a mix of “green” (like fruit and vegetable peelings and grass cuttings) and “brown” (like dry leaves and cardboard) to work properly. Young children will enjoy the action of sprinkling, layering, and patting it all down. It’s a great moment to remind them that all living things eventually return to the earth — and through composting, they can see that process step by step.
Sometimes compost can dry out. You might therefore encourage your child to sprinkle a little water with a small watering can. Every few weeks, show them how to “stir” the compost gently, for example, with a small trowel or child’s spade — this lets in air and helps it break down.
Encourage your child to check the compost regularly. Ask what they can see, smell, and feel. Over time, the compost heap will shrink and darken in colour. Your child may begin to spot minibeasts like worms, beetles, woodlice, and centipedes — all busy at work breaking down the compost pile. This is a brilliant moment to draw your child’s attention to our 
After a few months, the compost turns into a dark, crumbly, earthy material. This is the finished product, which is perfect for feeding plants. Involving your child in scooping and spreading it onto flowerbeds or into plant pots helps them see the complete cycle: from scraps to soil, and then back into growing things again. This is a lovely moment of achievement — through their endeavours, they have produced something valuable that will feed plants in the year ahead. It’s the perfect way to show children the cycle of seasons and how nature gives back when we take care of it.
By introducing composting at a young age, you’ll plant more than just seeds in the soil — you’ll plant ideas in your child’s mind. They’ll learn that waste can have value, that patience is rewarded, and that nature is full of tiny helpers working behind the scenes.
Summer is a wonderful time for children to get outdoors. There, they can breathe the fresh air, benefit from being closer to the natural world, and escape from electronic screens. Nature is incredibly good for children as well as adults (more about that later). A simple way to encourage little ones outdoors is to take them on an exciting and educational nature hunt! There are many fascinating things to look out for during the summer months including butterflies, caterpillars, bees, beautiful wildflowers and much more. A summer nature hunt will open their eyes and minds to the wonders of nature’s flora and fauna, lead to educational conversations with accompanying adults, and be an enjoyable and educational activity. Within all that in mind, we’ve put together a free Summer Nature Hunt poster that will give children and families an idea of what to look out for during the warmer months of summer — and serve as useful visual reference. The poster is free to download right here in this blog post (see below). Once printed out, it can be displayed large on children’s bedroom walls or taken along during the activity — perhaps reduced to a convenient size like A5. Children can use the little tick boxes to tick off each item that’s been spotted. So, venture out little ones — see how many wonderful things you can spot in the natural world this summer!
Many of the adorable creatures featured in the poster will be easy to spot at this time of year. Bees, hoverflies, and other pollinators are common to see where flowers are blooming. Butterflies are both stunningly beautiful and at their most abundant during July and August each year, so are sure to delight children with their fabulous colours and patterns. Delightful ladybirds are also rather abundant right now (time of writing: mid-July). Wildflowers like poppies and daisies always make the world a more beautiful place, so they’re a wonderful thing for children to discover too.
Has your little one ever seen apples growing on a tree? All that blossom from earlier in the year has now given way to little green apples that will grow and ripen as we head further into the year — eventually becoming ready to fall or be eaten come autumn. It’s a great example to show under-fives where some food comes from and explain why pollinators are so important.
As we said in the introduction, spending time in and around nature is incredibly beneficial to children of all ages. Studies have proven a myriad of benefits, in fact. Just a few examples include a lowering of stress and anxiety, improved motor skills, greater knowledge of the world (and children’s place within it), improved empathy for other living things, a feeling of greater responsibility for nature’s flora and fauna, a development of often lifelong greener values and choices, and even improved academic grades! These are just a few examples — the benefits of spending time closer to nature are incredible. Learn more about 
National Children’s Gardening Week arrives in late May and is the perfect time for young children to get involved in gardening activities. In celebration of the event, we describe a wonderful gardening-related activity that’s small-scale, easy, fun, and educational — perfect for little ones! The finished result is also rather magical and, once complete, lends itself to imaginative play. Today, we outline how children can make their own miniature fairy gardens. These are a great way to introduce little ones to creative gardening at a child-friendly scale. Under parent supervision* and largely using scavenged materials from outdoors, under-fives can let their imaginations run free and get creative! What’s more, the results are simply enchanting and will bring magic and a whole lot of delight to young children!
National Children’s Gardening Week begins on the 23rd of May for 2026 and runs until the 31st. The timing is no coincidence as it’s generally a warm week and therefore perfect for gardening and growing plants and flowers. What’s more, it also spans the half-term school holiday that most schools recognise in the last week of May.
Little learners, get ready – it’s almost time to buzz into action for World Bee Day! The annual event arrives in May and it’s a brilliant opportunity for children and families to get involved in something meaningful, fun, and full of learning opportunities.
World Bee Day is celebrated every year on 20th May to raise awareness of the vital role that bees and other pollinators play in our world. From helping plants grow and supporting the food we eat every day, bees are some of nature’s hardest workers – and they need our help to survive and thrive.
“Bee together for people and the planet”
Getting involved in World Bee Day isn’t just fun — it also supports many areas of the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS), helping children learn and grow in meaningful, hands-on ways. Here are just a few ways bee-related activities can support early development:
Expressive Arts and Design: Making bee crafts, drawing flowers, role-playing as working bees, or moving like insects in a dance — all help develop creativity and imagination.
There are so many fun and simple ways for little learners to join in with World Bee Day! Here are a few activities that are perfect for children under five — each one encourages creativity, curiosity, and care for nature while also supporting the EYFS.
Using paper plates, cardboard tubes, egg cartons or recycled materials, children can create their own bees! Add wings, stripes, googly eyes and antennae for a hands-on creative session. These are wonderfully creative activities that will boost several areas of the EYFS including Expressive Arts & Design and Physical Development.
Explore the garden or outdoor space and, without disturbing them, see what pollinators your child can spot. Can they see any bees? What colours and flowers do they seem to like best? Are they collecting nectar? What type of bees are they? Bumblebees are super cute. Honey bees are super-hard workers and do so much for the world. A bee-spotting activity is a great opportunity to explore areas of the EYFS that include Understanding the World and Communication & Language.
Children will love creating wildlife art. Whether it’s drawing animals and plants, making a collage, or constructing an animal out of cardboard or origami, wildlife art is a wonderful way to get children involved. What’s more, they will get a sense of satisfaction from the activity and it can help them appreciate wildlife more.
Another incredibly worthwhile activity that children can get involved in is fundraising for a wildlife-related charity. This can be done, for example, through a sponsored activity of some kind. That could be a sponsored walk, hop, swim, or whatever children and families choose (under supervision, of course, for the youngest). A sponsored fundraising activity will not only raise funds for a wildlife charity of choice but also spread the word. Furthermore, children will get an enormous sense of achievement at the end when their actions raise vital funds for animals or conservation. Volunteering for local wildlife charities is also hugely worthwhile, of course, but it is more suited to when children are older.
World Wildlife Day brings into focus the enormous challenges that affect nature’s flora and fauna. Sadly, many of those challenges are caused by humans, whether it’s due to habitat loss, global warming, or something else. By raising awareness through World Wildlife Day activities, children and families can also challenge themselves to live more sustainably. This is a whole topic in itself! However, some easy measures can be things like:
Children can also get closer to wild flora and fauna if they live near a wildlife sanctuary (or zoo) or somewhere like a national park. Nothing can really replace seeing animals and plants in real life and so it’s worth researching to find somewhere to visit close by. In Lancashire, just five miles from Little Acorns Nursery, for example, is 
Teaching children how to grow their own plants and, better still, food is a wonderfully educational and fulfilling activity. As well as learning to appreciate wild plants growing in parks and the countryside, learning how to grow their own, at home, is also great fun. Luckily, we have a whole blog post dedicated to 
A nature scavenger hunt is also great fun and is sure to get children interested in nature, wildlife, and the outdoors. The activity involves looking out for specific natural things, for example, a pine cone, a robin, a squirrel’s drey (i.e. nest), a winged seed, or animal tracks. It will also 
Encouraging (and supervising, where appropriate) an activity where children try to see different types of animals, birds, and insects is also a wonderful way to get them interested in nature. To make it easier, we have published some free, downloadable reference sheets, which also double as posters, for families to use during this activity. These include 
If children like the idea of attracting birds and other wildlife to their own garden, there are many easy ways to make this possible. As well as putting out suitable food to attract birds, children can help make a quiet, wild area with a compost heap to attract minibeasts. There are so many ways to attract wildlife so, to get you started, check out our 
