Earth Day is coming up next week and while our students are at home, it can be a great time to focus on a little bit of nature. Specifically, I like to talk with my students about the importance of trees. In this blog post, I wanted to share some of my favorite books to read to learn about trees and share a fun and free tree craft students can complete on their own at home!

Before I dive in, I wanted to let you know that you can actually view this information in my latest YouTube video as well. Just click below to watch. If you want to read instead, go ahead and keep scrolling!

Over the years, I have gathered up quite a few books about trees that I have loved and first, I want to share 5 of my favorites with you:

Tell Me, Tree by Gail Gibbons

I love all of Gail Gibbons’ nonfiction books and this one is no different! This book shares many different tree facts that are written in child-friendly language.

Kate, Who Tamed the Wind by Liz Scanlon

This book is a great fiction read to share the importance of trees and how they can help us as humans. A girl, Kate, is on a mission to help a neighbor whose house keeps getting blown by the wind! See how she uses trees to help.

Be a Friend to Trees by Patricia Lauber

Another nonfiction book to share all sorts of tree facts.

Our Tree Named Steve by Alan Zweibel

This is such a sweet story about a family who has a big beautiful tree in their backyard and their journey with this tree.

The Tree Lady by H. Joseph Hopkins

This book is based on a true story about a young woman who goes to college in San Diego and helps plant a ton of new trees all around the area.

If you can’t get your hands on any of these books, you can also send students to Carly’s Corner over on the Arbor Day website where they can explore and learn all sorts of facts about trees!

After my students have learned some facts about trees, I have them share what they’ve learned with this little craft:

This one (and the ones from my classroom) have the words “Tell Me, Tree” on the trunks because we had just read that book in class before we completed this. In the free craft, there is a blank option as well!

Here are some more examples from my classroom:

Students will simply write a fact they learned about trees onto each of the leaves and glue them onto the trunk to create their own tree! I had them glue it onto blue construction paper so they could also decorate around it.

You can grab this free craft below:

Some other ideas:

After learning all different tree facts, you could have students create their own tree painting or coloring by going outside and looking at a tree near them to try and recreate. They could also do this from their own imagination!

If you happen to live near a lot of trees and nature, students could also go on a nature walk and try to observe and identify all the different types of trees around them!

I hope you enjoyed some of these ideas for how your kids can celebrate Earth Day at home.

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