Storywalk - The Leaf Thief

The Leaf Thief by Alice Hemming

Squirrel enjoys looking at the beautiful, colorful leaves, but everyday more and more disappear which makes him think someone is stealing them.

What is StoryWalk®?

CONTINUE THE FUN

Explore With Your Senses:

Fall is a great time to be outside! Go outside and talk about what you observe – use your different senses!  What do you see, hear, and smell….

• What color leaves do you see? What animals do you see?
  • What else can you see?
• Do you hear animals that you don’t see?
  • What else do you hear?
• What do you smell?
• Do you feel the sun or the wind?
  • What else can you feel?

Sing! (Sing along with us in this YouTube video)

Let’s Sing “The Leaves on the Trees”  (to the tune of “The Wheels on the Bus”)

The leaves on the trees turn red, and orange
Red and orange
Red and orange
The leaves on the trees turn red and orange
All around the town.

Other verses:

The leaves on the trees come twirling down
The leaves on the ground go swish, swish, swish

Let’s Sing “Leaves are Falling”
(to the tune of Frère Jacques)

Leaves are falling, Leaves are falling (wiggle fingers and lower them slowly)
To the ground, To the ground (wave hands over the ground)
All the leaves are falling, All the leaves are falling (wiggle fingers and lower them slowly) Crunch crunch crunch, Crunch crunch crunch (stomp feet)

Yoga:

Squirrel needs to relax! He is trying yoga. Let’s try tree pose with him.

Standing Tree Pose:

1. Shift your weight onto one foot and bring your other foot to your ankle, shin, or thigh (do not place your foot on the side of your knee)
2. Bring your arms up over your head, hold your hands together at your chest, or lift your arms out in front of you with palms facing each other
3. Hold for a few breaths

Ideas for modifications:

• If you have limited flexibility, instead of lifting your leg, place the ball of your foot on the floor and place your heel on your inner shin.
• If you are worried about balance, hold onto the back of a chair for balance and lift one arm
• Seated Tree pose: for Step 1, place your foot on your opposite knee, or just skip to step 2

Calming Breathing:

Breathing exercises are another way Squirrel can calm down.  Let’s breath with him.  Trace your finger along the sides of a square and breathe in and out as you go.  Breathe in on one side, exhale on the next side as you go around the square.

What other shapes could you draw and practice calm breathing? Give it a try!

Squirrel has tried yoga and calm breathing – what other things could he do to try to calm himself down?

Make Art with Leaves!

Mouse made a leaf into a boat. Woodpecker and Bird made decorations.

What can you make with leaves?

Collect Leaves!

Collect different leaves from your yard, your neighbor’s yard (ask first!), while you are out on a walk.

• How many different ways can you sort them – by color, by shape, by size?
• Can you identify what type of tree they came from?  Borrow a tree identification book to help you!
   

Make a Leaf Rubbing

• Collect leaves of various shapes and sizes – you can use fresh leaves or dried fallen ones!
• Place a leaf with its bottom side facing up and put a thin sheet of paper (like a piece of white printer paper) on top of the leaf
• Rub a crayon over the area of the leave – continue until you’ve rubbed over the entire leaf
• Remove the leaf from under the paper
• Make more leaf rubbings using other colors and different leaf shapes

Squirrel Watch!

Be a scientist and observe the squirrels!  Watch the squirrels in your yard, or in a part on a regular basis and record what they do and how they interact with other squirrels, animals and people.

Get a notebook to record your observations.

Ask questions and make some hypothesis (ideas)

Find a tree where squirrels regularly live hear your house and sit on the ground about 25 feet away and them quietly for about 15 minutes, at the same time of day, 2 – 3 times a week.  You can watch them longer or more often – just make sure you write down your date and times of observation – and be sure to be quiet so you don’t frighten them.

Record in your notebook what the squirrels are doing. You can also draw pictures – but make notes too so that you can remember what they were doing.

Read your notes and make comparisons. Note changes over time. What surprised you? What did you learn about squirrels by watching them?

Investigate the Wind

There are lots of different experiments you can do to explore the wind!

• Make a windsock
• Make and Fly a kite
• Fly paper airplanes outdoors
• Play with bubbles outside
• Make a pinwheel