Preschool Spring Bee and Butterfly Trays for Colors and Counting (Free Printables)

When we made Spring flowers from egg cartons I starting thinking about how else we could use them. Ultimately they ended up inspired 3 math and matching activities...

Butterfly and Flower Color Matching 

 We used this tray for two activities

I told a story about how each butterfly wanted to visit a flower that was the same color they were. Mini Piwi then 'helped the butterflies' by matching each card with their matching flower. Later on in the day I turned the cards and the flowers over and we played memory match with them.

 Buzzy Bee Pollen count and Clip

 This one was extra fun because Mini Piwi and I made the Bee clips together.

We made bee pegs 0-10 so the activity can grow along with Mini Piwi. Right now she is only starting out with recognizing numerals and counting objects so to begin with I only included 4 flowers. I placed the 'pollen grains' into the flowers and together we counted them and choose the correct bee peg to clip to visit the flower. Once she got the hand of the pegs Mini Piwi thought it was great fun!

Would you like to make your own version?

You are welcome to print the bees, pollen and butterflies I made for the above trays....Pre K Bees and Butterflies Match and Clip (free printable)

You will also need 10 flowers in colors to match the butterflies on the printable.
I explained how we made them in DIY Ballerina Hair Garland from Egg Cartons but you could use real flowers, silk flowers, paper flowers, the sky's (and your craft supply's) are the limit. I'd love to see what you come up with!
 If you don't have pegs then you can match the bee number cards to your flower the way we did with the butterflies. I just happen to have some pegs leftover from another project.

We read one of my favorites to go with our bee activity...I think you might recognize it :-)  

By chance I also found a new book at the Library: Butterfly colors and Counting  (by Jerry Pallotta, illustrated by Shennen Bersani).  I think Mini Piwi thought it had been written just for her and her butterflies and flowers!

What are your favorite Bee or Butterfly books?