This is a kids craft activity that is fun for the whole class to do as a group. This activity an excellent way to teach body parts to your little ones, and it’s also a great learning tool for teaching the seasons and appropriate clothing for different types of weather. First use a giant 36″ corrugated “super person” to point out all the body parts. Don’t limit yourself to head, eyes, nose, mouth, hands, feet, arms and legs. Help your students add body parts. (They’ll need to make the facial features, for instance, out of colored paper, but they can also add hair, ears, a belly button – the sky’s the limit!) You can point out on yourself, on the kids, and on the “super-person” everything from elbows and knees to chins and necks, to fingers and toes. You can call on children to point out a body part. “Joe, point to your nose.” “Sally, point to Joe’s ear.” “Freddy, point to Miss Lorie’s chin,” “Jane, point to our person (feel free to name him/her)’s elbow.” Some great interactive games that will help reinforce this subject are “Simon Says” and “The Hokey Pokey.”

The seasons are a-changing once again. The air outside is getting cold and blustery, and snow is on its way if it hasn’t already begun to fall where you live. It’s time to teach your students all about the seasons and different kinds of weather. I love making kids crafts with blank books because the possibilities are endless. Every year when I’m teaching about weather, I make a weather book with my students. (Although sometimes I change it around and present the theme at a different time of year.) This weather craft is perfect anytime you’re teaching the seasons: at the beginning of the school year when the leaves are changing, now as winter is approaching, or in March or April when the snow melts and the flowers start to bloom.

Here’s one more shape-themed kids craft before we move on to our upcoming holiday-related projects. This is a favorite with my kids because it’s so easy and fun. They don’t even realize they’re learning! As we learn shapes, we use them to build all kinds of vehicles. At the same time, this is a great opportunity to talk about road safety.

Teachers love toilet paper roll crafts because toilet paper rolls come in such great abundance. Here is a simple and fun kids craft that will help you use up your toilet paper and paper towel rolls, and continues on our theme of shapes.

Some of my favorite kids crafts begin with colorful blank books. They leave so much room for creativity, allowing a child’s imagination to run wild and go in any direction it may take them. The ABCs are an important theme in any preschool, and ABC books are a great craft project that helps children learn the alphabet and practice letter recognition.

Routine is essential in any classroom or home, especially one with young children in it. Knowing what to expect makes preschoolers feel at ease and as though they have some control over what is going on around them. Circle Time activities are a great way to get your students used to their daily routine. This particular preschool activity teaches the days of the week, the months of the year, and different types of weather.

My son Alex, three, can not pass a single leaf on the ground – let alone a pile of leaves – without stomping on it. Whenever this happens, our whole family breaks out into a song I learned when I was in kindergarten. “Crunchy, crunchy, hear the noise/ made in leaves by girls and boys. /Oh what fun to walk in leaves/ that have fallen from the trees/ crunchy, crunchy hear the sound/ fallen leaves upon the ground.” This time of year always makes me want to do fall crafts for kids at home and with my preschoolers in the classroom as well.

I’m a bit of an amateur (very) photography buff. I love to snap shots of my students (and obviously my kids) and make collages, scrapbooks, yearbooks, wall hangings, and what-have-you, for keepsakes and memorabilia from year to year. I also know that there’s nothing kids (and adults for that matter) like more than looking at pictures of themselves. Photos on the wall draw children into the classroom, especially during their first months when they’re still transitioning into the preschool classroom routine. My photo obsession combined with my crafts supplies and Hygloss specialty papers have produced some wonderful results over the years, one of which I repeatedly do for its fun and flair: framed silhouettes with silhouette paper.

Seventeen adorable children are my responsibility this year. They came to school on the first day in a huge array of different states of mind: excited, reluctant, curious, scared, energetic, and . . . . homesick. That seemed to be the predominant theme these first few days of school – “I want to go home.” Okay, it happens sometimes. And I have the remedy right on my shelf: The Kissing Hand, by Audrey Penn and Velour Paper Kisses, consoling kids craft.