In this activity, the Halloween poem “Five Little Pumpkins” is used to work on counting, matching, fine motor skills, and visual attention. The image on the right shows a pumpkin with press-on light to make it glow, and 5 mini pumpkins velcroed to an All-in-One Board with switch for story. Objects for door, tree, shoe, and sun are also pictured.
Materials
- orange pumpkin bucket
- numbers 0-5 cut out and covered with different colors of mylar
- shoe
- sun prop
- press-on light
- APH All-in-One Board
- 5 mini pumpkins
- tree and door made from cardstock
Procedure
Begin with the poem:
5 little pumpkins sitting by a door, 1 rolled away and now there are 4.
4 little pumpkins sitting by a tree, 1 rolled away and now there are 3.
3 little pumpkins sitting by a shoe, 1 rolled away and now there are 2.
2 little pumpkins sitting in the sun, 1 rolled away and now there is 1.
1 little pumpkin looking for fun!
- Record the poem on a Step-by-Step switch.
- Students take turns pressing the switch to play the poem.
- Students take turns taking one pumpkin off and dropping it in the pumpkin bucket.
- Ask students to find the various objects and numbers and set them up on the All-in-One Board.
Variations
- Light up a jack-o-lantern and encourage children with low vision to locate it and reach out to touch it.
- 5 Little Bats, skeletons, spiders, eyeballs and more to follow this month!
