Children enjoy matching upper and lower case letters with this fun activity

This is a great time of year to pick up the makings of an inexpensive, colourful learning aid – at your neighbourhood dollar store. Easter merchandise is starting to appear and we want the multi-coloured two-part Easter eggs. Normally these are filled with candies but we are going to do something altogether different. We are going to use a permanent ink pen to print an upper case letter on one half of an egg and and the corresponding lower case letter on the other half. Children really enjoy searching through the ‘broken’ eggs to find a match ultimately assembling twenty-six whole eggs. I like the activity because using five or six colors makes finding a match fairly easy and also makes the activity somewhat self-checking.

For older children, compound words, rhyming words or antonyms could be used.

For more ways to help children learn the alphabet, check out our fee alphabet printables and our page about alphabet recognition.

A word of caution: This activity is not intended for children younger than age 3. Also, to ensure the activity is safe, please use eggs that are large enough to eliminate a risk of choking. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission has determined: ‘Any ball with a diameter of 1.75 inches (44.4mm) or less that is intended for use by children younger than 3 years of age is banned.’ This is an excellent guideline – please check the size of the eggs before purchasing them.

Sharing some fun St. Patrick’s Day resources

Too Many Leprechauns Or How the Pot o’ Gold Got to the End of the Rainbow
Written by Stephen Krensky and illustrated by Dan Andreasen
Picture book for St. Patrick’s Day published by Simon and Schuster Kids

Finn returns to his hometown only to discover that leprechauns have taken over! They are making shoes day and night and the tap, tap, tapping is keeping everyone awake. Finn comes up with a clever plan. He finds the perfect place to hide a pot o‘ gold and restores peace to Dingle. Delightful illustrations compliment a very enjoyable folklore tale.

Primary School resource – using Too Many Leprechauns to teach making predictions

Too Many Leprechauns at Amazon.com

Too Many Leprechauns st Amazon.ca

You may also be interested in our free St. Patrick’s Day printables:

Our early literacy printables, including our free St. Patrick’s Day printables are in PDF format, if you don’t already have Adobe Reader, you will need to download it to access the free printables.

Please note: some of our early literacy printables are available to Storytime Standouts members only. To become a member of the website (without cost or obligation), please click on the “Members” tab and register as a user.

St. Patrick’s Day Interlined paper

  Interlined Paper - St Patrick's Day Pot of Gold
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Storytime Standouts offers interlined paper for (almost) every occasion, check out the entire collection by visiting our Interlined Paper page.


St. Patrick’s Day Wordsearch

  St. Patrick's Day Wordsearch
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St. Patrick’s Day Words together with pictures

  St. Patrick's Day Picture Dictionary
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If you appreciate our printable early literacy resources, please support this site by visiting and purchasing from Amazon.com or Amazon.ca.

We’ve just added three new PDF downloads to the site to help youngsters celebrate Cinco de Mayo, Mother’s Day and kite flying.

  Interlined Paper - Mother's Day

  Interlined Paper - Kite
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  Interlined Paper - Cinco de Mayo
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Storytime Standouts offers interlined paper for (almost) every occasion, check out the entire collection by visiting our Interlined Paper page.

Our early literacy printables, including our spring printables are in PDF format, if you don’t already use Adobe Reader, you will need to use it to access the downloads.

Please note: some of our early literacy printables are available to Storytime Standouts members only. To become a member of the website (without cost or obligation), please click on the “Members” tab and register as a user.

You will find our selection of free printable alphabets here and all of our early literacy printables here.

If you appreciate our early literacy printables, please support this site by visiting and purchasing from Amazon.com or Amazon.ca.

Storytime Standouts offers more than two hundred free PDF printables. Today, we are highlighting Easter and Springtime printables that you can download and use with young children.

Our early literacy printables, including our Easter and Springtime printables are in PDF format, if you don’t already use Adobe Reader, you will need to use it to access the downloads.

Please note: some of our early literacy printables are available to Storytime Standouts members only. To become a member of the website (without cost or obligation), please click on the “Members” tab and register as a user.

~ We have a new page with resources about gardening with children. Please check it out.

Easter and Spring Interlined Paper Downloads –
These are three of many interlined paper pages available on this site. Please be sure to check out our “Interlined Paper” page for many more.

  Interlined Paper - Pussy Willow
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  Interlined Paper - Spring
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  Interlined Paper - Easter
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  Interlined Paper - Easter Basket
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Spring and Easter Poems, Songs, Chants -
Adapt these chants and poems as felt board activities and/or use them at circle time.

Spring

  Pussy Willow Poem
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  Springtime Fingerplay and Song
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  Little Rabbit
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  The Rain
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  I Love the Flowers

  Tulips

  A Little Seed

  Little Peter Rabbit
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  Five Little Ducks
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  Little Robin Red Breast
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Easter

  Five Little Easter Eggs
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  Easter Bunny
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  Five Brown Eggs
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  Easter Everywhere
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For the Five Little Easter Eggs chant, ask your child, “What color is left over after Mommy, Daddy, Brother and Sister eat their eggs?”

Spring Picture Dictionary – Pictures together with Words
Our free vocabulary printables are great and so versatile. Print onto cardstock. Laminate if you wish. Then, cut apart and create a matching activity or encourage your child to “read” the word (using picture clues). As well, beginning writers love to practice printing the words.

You can create your own categorized picture dictionary if you print more than one. We have many available. Check out our Words for Beginning Readers and Writers page.

  Spring Picture Dictionary
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Sequencing activity -
Sequencing activities are great for building comprehension skills

  Planting a Flower Garden Sequencing Activity

Easter Crossword Puzzle for Children -

  Easter Crossword
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Plus – be sure to check out our suggestion for using plastic Easter eggs to learn upper and lower case letters or opposites!…

We would love to hear about great Easter and Spring resources, please let us know what you have discovered!

If you appreciate our free Easter and Springtime printables, please support this site by visiting and purchasing from Amazon.com or Amazon.ca.

Amazon.com Easter and Spring books for Children
Amazon.ca Easter and Spring Books for Children

Here is a fun, easy-to-make activity for learning letters. Check out your neighbourhood dollar store for seasonal banners. The two I found are each nearly three feet long. They each have a series of Easter bunnies on them. The first one I prepared, was for children who are learning letters. I added alphabet stickers and laminated it.

Have a child gently grip one end of the banner, close their eyes and say, “Go, go, go, STOP.” As the child says, “Go, go, go,” slide the banner through their fingers. When they say, “STOP,” ask them to open their eyes and read the letter on the nearest bunny. For older children, make it more difficult by asking them to read the letter and say a word that starts with it.

For children who can read, print words on the bunnies. I used the “ot” family for my bunnies and carrots banner.

For all sorts of printable alphabets, The Alphabet Song and activities to help your child learn letters, be sure to check out our Alphabet Recognition page.

Our early literacy printables, including our learning letters printables are in PDF format, if you don’t already use Adobe Reader, you will need to use it to access the downloads.

Please note: some of our early literacy printables are available to Storytime Standouts members only. To become a member of the website (without cost or obligation), please click on the “Members” tab and register as a user.

You will find our selection of free printable alphabets here and all of our early literacy printables here.

If you appreciate our early literacy printables, please support this site by visiting and purchasing from Amazon.com or Amazon.ca.

Splish, Splash Spring written by Jan Carr and illustrated by Dorothy Donohue

Bright, cheerful illustrations made from felt highlight this happy tribute to a blowy and showery spring. Splish, Splash, Spring includes all sorts of great details for young children to discover and explore: mother robin feeding her peeping babies, frogs swimming in a stream, spiders and ladybugs near the bright yellow crocuses. Would be a great tie-in to making and flying kites.

Best for preschool children

Kites are swooping
Loop-de-looping
Snapping, flapping
Look at me!

Be sure to visit the illustrator’s website (link above) for details on how she creates the eye-catching illustrations from felt.

Kite Making For Child Flyers from My Best Kite

Scholastic’s lesson plan for Splish Splash Spring

Splish, Splash, Spring at Amazon.com

Splish, Splash, Spring at Amazon.ca

Celebrate warmer days with some kindergarten springtime fun

Here are some ideas to help you celebrate the first days of spring…

Choose a “spring” word and see how many words you can spell with the letters -
For example: daffodils fad, fads, oil, soil, foil, Dad, lid, lids, slid

Make a Venn diagram and compare Spring with Fall – what do you see in Spring but not in Fall? What do you see in both Spring and Fall?

See how many Spring compound words you can discover? Here are some to get you started – buttercup, butterfly, ladybug, raindrop, raincoat, rainbow, sunshine

Try one of these story starters –
The first sign of spring…. Planting a magic seed…. My friend’s amazing umbrella… Five new baby chicks… When I looked up at the clouds… Jumping in puddles on my way home… Yesterday we saw a rainbow…

Make a colourful poster and advertise Spring. Use words and pictures to explain what is special about spring.

Don’t forget to download some of our Spring resources:

  Spring Picture Dictionary
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  Springtime Fingerplay and Song
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  Interlined Paper - Spring
Please become a member of Storytime Standouts to download this file.

Our early literacy printables, including our kindergarten springtime printables are in PDF format, if you don’t already use Adobe Reader, you will need to use it to access the downloads.

Please note: some of our early literacy printables are available to Storytime Standouts members only. To become a member of the website (without cost or obligation), please click on the “Members” tab and register as a user.

You will find our selection of free printable alphabets here and all of our early literacy printables here.

If you appreciate our free early literacy printables,
including these Spring-theme kindergarten printables,
please support this site by visiting and purchasing from Amazon.com or Amazon.ca.

Starting to look forward to warm, spring days so thought I would post some new spring printables for kindergarten today.

Why not make some pussy willow pictures? Begin by drawing or painting stems using brown paint, markers or crayons. Allow to dry. Dip a fingertip into light grey or white paint and add “fingerprints’ along the stems. Alternatively, cotton balls or pieces of puffed rice can be glued to the stems.

Enjoy our downloads: a traditional poem, “Pussy Willow” and some coordinating interlined paper.

  Interlined Paper - Pussy Willow
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  Pussy Willow Poem
Please become a member of Storytime Standouts to download this file.

Our early literacy printables, including our spring printables for kindergarten are in PDF format, if you don’t already use Adobe Reader, you will need to use it to access our early literacy resources.

Please note: some of our early literacy printables are available to Storytime Standouts members only. To become a member of the website (without cost or obligation), please click on the “Members” tab and register as a user.

You will find all of our early literacy printables here.

If you appreciate our spring printables for kindergarten, please support this site by visiting and purchasing from Amazon.com or Amazon.ca.