5 Little Pumpkins is a classic Halloween rhyme that your preschoolers will love. This rhyme is so much more than a fun song or rhyme, it’s also a valuable teaching tool that can help your kids develop math skills such as number sense, one-to-one correspondence skills, and mathematical fluency. Keep reading to see a video of this activity in action and grab your free pumpkin printable!
Free Pumpkin Printable
Here are the supplies you will need to introduce this activity to your own kids:
- Five Little Pumpkins book
- Metal Cookie Sheet
- Five Pumpkin Foam or Felt Stickers (craft store)
- Magnetic Tape
- Printable 5 frame (see below)
First, print the mat and laminate for durability. Do the same for the printable pumpkins if you’re using them, or add the magnet tape to the back of the foam stickers.
Next, tape the mat to your metal cookie sheet.
Place the pumpkins on the back of the cookie sheet so you can easily add them to the five frame as you say the rhyme.
Pumpkin Printable – 5 Little Pumpkins Counting Activity
To introduce this activity, start by reading the book Five Little Pumpkins by Dan Yaccarino. You will want to read this story for several days, once or twice each day, or as long as it holds the children’s attention.
Next, invite the children to act out the story using their hands as the pumpkins.
Then, invite five children at a time to act out the rhyme during your whole group time. You can use painter’s tape to create a five frame on the floor.
Finally, use the printable below to help the children visualize the quantities of pumpkins as you recite the rhyme together.
Watch the Video
Download your free pumpkin printable below.
You could also put the pumpkins on the ends of clothespins and clip them to a paint stick for some fine motor fun!
More Halloween Resources
- 5 Little Pumpkins Halloween Sensory Bin – Your little learners will have a blast retelling the rhyme Five Little Pumpkins with this Halloween themed sensory bin! They’ll be developing their fine motor and oral language skills as they retell the rhyme. Setting up this sensory bin experience at home or in your preschool classroom is super simple and loads of fun!
- Halloween Sensory Bin with Spaghetti – Need Halloween sensory play ideas for your preschool classroom? You can make this easy colored spaghetti for a super fun Halloween themed sensory bin. This squishy Halloween sensory spaghetti is sure to be a big hit with your kids!
- Halloween Sensory Bottle – Halloween can be loads of fun in the classroom with all the cute crafts and activities. Here’s a super quick and easy Halloween sensory bottle you can make to help kids who may become overstimulated by all the activity in the classroom during this time of year.
- Halloween Fine Motor Activities for Preschool – Kids can use fine motor skills all day, but doing the same thing over and over can cause children to lose interest. These activities are fun experiences for October that will help build fine motor skills. These are perfect for a fall theme or Halloween theme. And, since many of the items are from the dollar store, you can stock up your morning work baskets or centers.
