Nature Faces – Self-Portrait Art for Preschoolers using Items Found in Nature

This is a fantastic self-portrait art activity for young children, using flowers and leaves and natural items collected on a nature walk or from around your yard and garden.

This is a really cool nature craft for toddlers and preschoolers, and a great boredom buster for a spring or summer day.

My daycare kids love creating self-portrait art. They also love crafting with flowers and leaves that we collect in the yard or while walking in the neighbourhood.

These “nature faces” are the perfect combination of both activities.

Your kids can create self portraits (or images of themselves) using the natural items they collect when playing outside.

Turn a walk into a treasure hunt

Looking for these treasures when you’re out for a walk or a hike with your toddlers and preschoolers can turn an ordinary stroll around the neighbourhood into an exciting and magical adventure.

We often head out for our walks armed with baskets, buckets or even plastic bags so the hooligans can collect interesting natural items to make art with when we get home.

Sometimes we don’t even leave the yard for this. We’ll just wander around, plucking things from the lawn and garden that pique our interest.

This morning, we set off on a neighbourhood hike that took us into the green space behind our neighbourhood.

The kids had a great play and collected an assortment of treasures: grasses, flowers, leaves, buds, and maple keys.

Making art with our treasures

When we got back home, I thought it would be fun for the kids to make some faces with their findings.

I cut some ovals out of cardboard, spread our goodies out on the mat, and the Hooligans got down to work.

The older preschoolers didn’t require any help figuring out where their eyes, noses and mouths would go in order to construct a face similar to their own.

A tip for the toddlers:

To help the little ones figure out where to glue their leaves and flowers, we lightly marked the facial features on their cardboard with a pencil. That helped them to know where to squeeze their glue

Speaking of gluing, it’s amazing how much the toddlers’ crafting skills have developed in the short time they’ve been here in our daycare. When they first started out, they didn’t have the strength to squeeze the glue bottles without assistance.  Now they’re old pros at it.

What do you think of our “nature faces”?

Aren’t they sweet?

Another free and easy idea for you and your kiddos to enjoy together, and a great excuse to get out of the house for a stroll around your neighbourhood.

Don’t you love a creative activity that doesn’t cost a thing?

Check out the rest of our self portrait art activities here!

More fun Summer Activities for Kids:

Here are 100 fun and easy activities that kids can do at home in summertime. Print the checklist for your fridge and they’ll never be bored again!

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