Easy No Carve Pumpkin Decorating Ideas for Kids

With Halloween right around the corner as I write this, you might be looking for some ways to decorate pumpkins for kids without carving. Whether you’re doing this as a classroom or at home, there are a lot of fun ways to decorate pumpkins that don’t require sharp instruments.

Painting: A couple of years ago my daughter decided she wanted to paint a scene on our pumpkin instead of carving. She’s a teen and legitimately an artist, so it turned out beautiful, but kids of any age and artistic skill level can paint a pumpkin (and we definitely have had some more chaotic versions over the years). If you’re looking for some specific ideas on painting pumpkins, this post from Parents has a view good ideas. I love the emojis and the mini pumpkins painted as doughnuts, shown above.

Add Accessories: Easy Peasy and Fun has a great collection of (mostly) simple painted pumpkins that are embellished in different ways to make them a little more fun. I love this little bat, which only requires painting the pumpkin black and adding embellishments made with construction paper.

Drawing: If you don’t want to get out the paint, using markers (or paint pens, or oil pastels) to draw on a pumpkin can also be a lot of fun. This is especially effective on a light-colored pumpkin. (The photo above is from Casolia, by the way.)

Stickers: It’s almost universal that kids love sticking stickers to things, so why not give them a pumpkin and whatever stickers you have lying around (seasonally appropriate ones or eyes would be great, but not essential) and let them go to town.

Googly eyes: Speaking of eyes, if you’ve got a supply of peel and stick googly eyes (or the patience to use glue), adding eyes to a pumpkin is a fun and easy way to make a pumpkin spooky with very little work. This version comes from She Wears Many Hats.

You can also combine any of these ideas, so start with painting, then add stickers and/or eyes and just keep building from there. Maybe throw in some feathers and your pumpkin will be all set for Thanksgiving, too.

How do you like to decorate pumpkins with kids? I’d love to hear your ideas!

Fall is a great time to learn about and observe the birds in your area, but you can do this any time of year. Whether you’re watching from a backyard or a playground, you’re sure to find a few birds and can learn about the birds that are native to your region in any case.

If you do see birds at home or where your classroom is, the Merlin app is a great one (if your school allows phones). If you don’t already know it, it listens to the sounds around you and can identify birds based on their calls. Very cool and a reason for kids to be quiet while you’re observing nature. Having an old fashioned paper guidebook to the birds where you live is also a great idea because kids can use it to look up birds and it’s just fun to have in the science center.

The specific birds involved in your learning will vary depending on where you live, but here are some bird activities you can do with your kids at home or in the classroom.

Natural Beach Living set up a simple bird nature study center that includes bird books and feathers in front of a big window. There are also some printables you’ll find links to in this post including three part cards and bird observation charts for birds local to them and a bird unit study with lots of great printables (this is a paid resource).

Adventure in a Box has a printable birds of the world bingo game, which might inspire you to learn more about some of the 48 different birds included, from emu to snowy owl, grackle to Atlantic puffin.

If you’re American you’ll enjoy these state bird coloring pages from Flanders Family Home Life. If I can count, only 48 states are listed (which I wouldn’t have noticed except Arkansas isn’t there; it’s one of many whose state bird is the mockingbird). Print out all of them or just your home state, or give each child a bird to research and color to do a presentation in the classroom.

And you can learn more about the different types of bird nests and see if you can observe any of them on a nature walk with this guide to bird nests from Fun Mom Printables on Etsy. It includes information about eight types of nests with drawings and three part cards.

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