April Showers Preschool Lesson Plans

This week’s lesson plan centers around April Showers. Your child can learn:

• April is the name of the month that follows March
• April is often a rainy month (in the northern hemisphere)
• The rain helps the ground to thaw
• Spring showers and warm sunshine help new plants to sprout
• Leaf buds turn into leaves on trees and bushes
• Grass turns green and starts to grow
• Many animals have new babies in the spring
• Farmers are busy preparing the soil for planting

Many of the activities this week will deal with water, so I hope you don’t mind getting wet! Make sure to locate your umbrellas, so if you get a gentle rain without thunder, you and your young child can go for a walk and explore the magic and mystery of water’s effect on the once-frozen earth.

Nurture a Healthy Respect – Not Fear – For Storms

It is not uncommon for the young child to be afraid of thunderstorms. Perhaps it is because of the loud noise thunder makes, or because an older sibling or relative has demonstrated fearful behavior during a storm. Perhaps it is because whenever there is an evil character in children’s programming, there are thunderstorms and lightning in the background! I have seen this in everything from Disney classics to Carebears and other Saturday morning kid-shows! No matter what the cause, you’ll do yourself and your child a huge favor if you help him through this fear to develop a healthy respect and enjoyment of stormy weather. Yes, we should get in out of the rain – but we do not need to hide under our beds!

If you are lucky enough to have a thunderstorm this week, take time to watch it with your child. Hold him or her lovingly in your arms, and talk about how the rain makes you feel. Be positive. Smile. It’s okay to jump when a loud clap of thunder startles you, but then make a game of it and laugh. Stand in a garage, if possible, with the door open to get a good feel for the powerful rain. Be safe. Remember, that lightning is attracted to tall things, and metal things. Do not stand under the only tree in a clearing, or hold a metal umbrella handle. Get inside out of the thunderstorm.

One young mother tells her daughter that thunderstorms are heavenly parties. The lightning is the pretty party lights and the thunder is how much fun they are having! You can try to explain it to your young child in more scientific terms, but it may be beyond his level of understanding.

This week you and your child will plant some bean seeds, dig in the mud, build moats in the sandbox, make a rainbow collage, go on a picnic and more. Have fun with the lesson plans, but tailor them to meet your schedule as needed. It’s okay if you don’t get through all the activities!

Here are some helps, if you don’t know the songs:
Eentsy Weentsy Spider
Rain, Rain, Go Away
If you’re happy and you know it

Five-Star Picture Books for April Showers:

• Ruby’s Rainy Day by Rosemary Wells
• The Rainy Day by Anna Milbourne
• One Rainy Day by Valeri Gorbachev
• Rainy Day: Get Dressed for Splishy-Splashy Fun from Barron’s Educational Series
• It Looked Like Spilt Milk by Charles G. Shaw
• Little Cloud by Eric Carle

Quality Recordings and Materials for April Showers week (optional)

• Rainy Day Games: Fun with the Animals of Noah’s Ark
• Healing Sounds of Nature – Thunderstorm, Rain and Ocean Waves. Music for Deep Sleep
• Thunderstorm by Atmosphere Collection
• Rachmaninoff for a Rainy Day
• Disney’s Fantasia
• Small Rain Coats, Rain Boots
• Umbrellas
• Doll Rain Coat, Doll Rain Boots
• Garden Tools, Radio-Flyer Wheelbarrow

April Showers Lesson Plans

Related Reading:
Ten Rainy Day Games for Children
Rainy Day Activities

Photo Credits:
Top: photo by Eric Hersman
Middle: photo by GrandmaMusher
Bottom: photo by GrandmaMusher

Tags: acitivites for kids, April, April Showers lesson plans, Eentsie Weentsie Spider, Preschool, preschool lesson plans, Rain, rainy day activities, rainy day preschool, Showers