Mon, May 11, 2026

Activities for learning about springtime

Wondering how to teach your child about spring? Spring opens our minds, hearts, and senses. It is a moment when the joy of something new and fresh wakes us up: one season closes under a blanket of snow and another begins with a carpet of color.

With young children in our midst, we get to experience each season as a time of wonder. We show them – and they show us – how it all begins, often in springtime with something small pushing its way toward a just-beginning cycle (and circle) of life.

Spring: learning begins anew

Here are ways to encourage children to notice the growth and change taking place all around them. They will begin to learn the repeating rhythm of things firsthand from season to season, and start to develop awareness of the continuing patterns of nature playing out weekly, monthly, and yearly.

Create a special calendar

An at-home calendar is a simple way to record and document what takes place once spring arrives. Kids can observe, plot, and graph growth while building their own thoughts about the world. They will gradually develop as young nature lovers with ideas about what it takes to maintain health and well-being on earth.

Take spring walks and hikes

Take walks, hikes, and “treasure hunts” to explore and discover mushrooms under deadwood, daffodils under healthy soil, and tadpoles under park waterways.

Go on listening sessions

Do a listening walk through the woods to hear the variety of sounds produced by living things that do not happen to be human: birds rustling in nests: squirrels jumping from branch to branch, wind rustling through leaves. By fine-tuning our senses, we build, strengthen, and inform our understandings, especially through touch, sound, and sight. What we see and hear is not unlike how flora and fauna pick up clues and cues from the natural environment to get on in the world as they grow.

Learn in the garden

Pay close attention to how sprouts develop from seeds and roots develop from plants, making the garden a place to measure and record what happens when water and sunlight are “applied.” Consider setting up a simple butterfly habitat, ant farm, or herb garden to chart what observable changes take place.

Take nature photographs

Borrow a cellphone from a grownup to photograph nature up close, then use the photos to create drawings on paper using pencil, pastels, or watercolors. Or ask for a loan of binoculars for bird sightings, then pull out a pocket field guide to look up and identify birds you see and hear.

Choose books about nature

Find books (both fiction and nonfiction) that tell stories through nature – even “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” is really a just a beautifully told tale of what happens to caterpillars once their chrysalis is shed (we won’t give away the ending here!).

Post a growth chart

Develop a kinship between nature and nurture so children have an idea of life and life cycles (as an example, post a growth chart on the wall to mark and measure a child’s height). What they experience will take root at an early age, helping them watch the changes and phases that give wing to understanding.

Browse our spring book list

These books enhance some of the suggested activities, reinforcing thoughts children form about the annual miracle of spring:

My Five Senses by Aliki

From Caterpillar to Butterfly by Steven Anderson

A Walk in the Forest by Maria Dek

When Green Becomes Tomatoes by Julie Fogliano

Is It Spring? by Kevin Henkes

Little Tree by Loren Long

Over and Under the Pond by Kate Messner

If You Plant a Seed by Kadir Nelson

My Spring Robin by Anne Rockwell

The Listening Walk by Paul Showers

Busy Spring: Nature Wakes Up by Sean Taylor

A Tree Is Nice by Janice May Udry

Purchase these books and see more PLNY book suggestions on our Bookshop.org affiliate page!

Ann Levine’s love of books, words, and reading has steered her career choices: from editorial roles at Meredith Publishing and Hearst Magazines to teaching and administrative positions at the School at Columbia and Preschool of America to assistant manager at Bank Street Bookstore. She received an undergraduate degree in English at Washington University and a graduate degree at Bank Street College of Education. She is still a big believer in the three Rs of learning — reading, reading, and reading.