Nature Art Collage and Color Hunt

Summer is here and that means we take most of our learning and exploration outside. I didn’t really have a master plan with this activity other than my daughter finding bits of nature to stick to the tree but as we roamed around our yard it became obvious we could make a rainbow. That was all the direction she needed. Looking for colors on an outdoor color hunt, or items for a backyard alphabet hunt isn’t just about reinforcing color or letter recognition it’s about transferring those concepts into a new environment. It’s also about exploring that new environment. Your backyard might not be new but sometimes when we have a specific task in a familiar environment we see things we never noticed before. We noticed that we had a rainbow of colors right in our yard and made some nature art!

Gather your materials. You will need some contact paper, painter’s tape, and scissors. You will also need a container to hold the petals and a green space to explore. No need to make a rainbow, you can make patterns or designs with fewer colors. 

Start by wrapping some contact paper around a tree sticky side out. I secured mine with painter’s tape. I inched the backing off a little at a time from each side. 

Time for a color hunt.  We went backward starting with purple lavender and then quickly ran around the yard finding blue hydrangeas, green leaves, yellow daisies, orange poppies, and red roses that I had to stand on my tippy toes to grab. Before going to the sticky tree, we looked at all the flowers, smelled them, compared their textures, and chose favorites. 

Time to add them to the tree.  I asked her what color was the first and off she went! Although she happily made a rainbow if your child isn’t interested in making such an orderly creation do not push, let them create. 

Some of the petals were hard to push on but after holding them there they stuck ( and most are still on days later… it’s too pretty to take down!)