Leaf Man Art

The Virtual Book Club for Kids is featuring Lois Ehlert as September’s author of the month. We checked out many of her books from the library and enjoyed reading them all. I get commissions for purchases made through affiliate links in this post. Our favorites were Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf, Boo to You!, Feathers for Lunch , and. We had to read them over and over again. The book that most requested by Aiden was Leaf Man. On walks, he had to examine every leaf he saw. I asked him if he wanted to make his own leaf man. He was very excited about this possibility. He couldn’t stop talking about it.

Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert

All of the scenes in Leaf Man are made from photocopies of leaves Lois Ehlert collected when preparing to write Red Leaf, Yellow Leaf. Leaf Man has disappeared and the author wonders where he has gone. As you turn the pages of the book, you view possible places he has traveled. Did the wind blow him across a farm? Or maybe over an orchard? Did Leaf Man spend some time flying with birds? At the end you see where he has landed.

Leaf Collecting in Summer?

Before we could make our leaf man, we had to go collect some leaves. On a normal year, we wouldn’t begin to see the leaves fall from the trees in Missouri until late October. (The Missouri Department of Conservation tracks the changes in leaf color in Missouri. They’ll have fall color updates in late September.) This year we’ve had a horrible drought. Many trees have been dropping at least some of their leaves throughout the summer. They are mostly shades of brown and yellow. The trees dropped their leaves because they did not have enough water.

Leaf Man Art: Creating Pictures with Leaves

At first, Aiden tried to make his leaf man by just putting a bunch of random leaves and pinecones down. We looked through the book at the different leaf animals and at the leaf men to get a better idea of what we wanted to make. I showed Aiden how to make a leaf man. I modeled my thought process as I went. “I’m going to choose this leaf for the body. I think this leaf would make a good head. Now I need legs…”

I also asked Aiden to help me choose leaves to make different animals.

When he seemed to get the hang of it, Aiden chose leaves, seed pods, pinecones, and pine needles to make his leaf man.

Try creating your own leaf man art, animals, and scenes just like Lois Ehlert did in the book, Leaf Man. We had a lot of fun with this activity. I’ll share more about our leaf collecting adventures tomorrow.

Here are the blogs co-hosting the Virtual Book Club for Kids. Be sure to see what Lois Ehlert book and activities they chose.

Now it’s your turn! Link up your posts about a Lois Ehlert book you read and your related activity {project, craft, recipe, etc.}.

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