Leaf Man is an adorable book with beautiful illustrations by Lois Ehlert. The story begins with the narrator discovering a pile of leaves, where a few of them have come together to form a figure known as Leaf Man. When the wind blows, Leaf Man is carried away, and throughout the book, the narrator imagines all the places he might travel—over pumpkin patches and squash fields, through orchards, and even along rivers. Ehlert’s unique use of leaf art adds a creative and engaging visual element to the story, making it perfect for an autumn read-aloud when the leaves are falling. Read on for fun Leaf Man book activities. If you don’t have this adorable book, get to your local library, or purchase Leaf Man on Amazon.
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Leaf Man Reading Lesson
Introduce the book by explaining that sometimes when leaves fall they create a picture. Point to the cover of the book as you ask, “What do the leaves make here? Does it look like a man? This book is called Leaf Man.” As you read the story, stop and ask text dependent questions such as:
- What has Leaf Man blown past?
- Do you think Leaf Man feels lonely?
Text dependent questions help to build students’ comprehension. For a little fun, have your kids join you in reading the repetitive phrase; Leaf Man’s got to go where the wind blows.
If you are looking for more detailed reading lessons that enhance with this book, check out our Leaf Man interactive read aloud resource. This 3 day resource has detailed lesson plans for each day, common core standards, vocabulary, book introduction and text dependent questions. It also includes 14 differentiated writing pages, story elements anchor charts and an adorable Leaf Man craft activity.
Leaf Man Writing Activity
Reread Leaf Man, but before you begin, ask students to pay attention to the different creatures they see made out of leaves. After reading the book, ask students which leaf creature was their favorite. Then have students draw a picture and write about it. Use our free writing templates for this Leaf Man writing activity.
Leaf Sorting
Colorful leaves can make a fun math sorting activity. Collect and bring a bunch of leaves to class, and have your kids sort them by color, shape, and size. Create a chart to display your class’s leaf sorting.
Science Leaf Walk
One of our favorite things to do in the fall is take a leaf walk with our students. Line up your students and take a walk around the neighborhood and look for colorful leaves. It’s always helpful to have at least one other adult with you on your leaf walk. Ask parents to volunteer. The more the merrier. Have your students take our free Leaf Tally page, a clipboard, and a pencil on the leaf walk to record the different color leaves. For more Fall Science activities, be sure to read Fantastic Kindergarten Fall Activities.
Leaf Man Craft
Of course, you have to make Leaf Man, or an animal out of leaves. This Leaf Man activity will require lots of leaves for all your students to create a Leaf Man shape. Send a note home a few days ahead of time, asking students to bring in leaves from home. Let your kids creativity flourish as they create their own Leaf Man creature. See the Leaf Man pictures below for some inspiration. If you don’t have leaves on hand and want to do this Leaf Man project, we have leaf papers that are perfect for this activity included in our Interactive Read Aloud resource.
Leaf Snack Idea
The easiest snack idea is to go to your local grocery store and buy leaf shaped cookies. If there are none and you don’t mind a little work, get some leaf cookie cutters, and make some sugar cookies in the shape of leaves. You can bring some fall leaf colored icing to school with your leaf cookies, and let your kids add the icing to their cookies. If you don’t like the idea of cookies, you can use the leaf cookie cutters for cheese slices.
More Resourceful Read Alouds
We love using fantastic children’s books and creating fun activities that are all focused on the theme of the book. Check out some of our other favorites like, Pumpkin Pumpkin Kindergarten Activities or Adorable Activities for The Kissing Hand. Our Awesome October Read Alouds for Kindergarten blog will fill you in on all the books we love to read during this colorful leafy month.
FAQs
Gather up a bunch of leaves of different sizes. Get a few small for the hands and feet, some long and thin for the arms and legs and a couple bigger pieces for the head and body. Arrange them to form Leaf Man. They don’t have to be perfect, and that’s part of the fun of using real leaves.
That’s ok. You can use all the same color leaves to create Leaf Man or any other fun leaf creatures. And if you don’t want to use real leaves, you can purchase our Leaf Man Interactive Read Aloud. This product includes leaf pages that you can print out and use to form leaf creatures.
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