Explore “Mountains and Forests” Curriculum With This At-Home Activity

At Little Sunshine’s Playhouse, our Creatively Shine® curriculum theme for March, Mountains and Forests, invites children to explore the natural world through imagination, discovery, and creative expression. As children journey through towering mountains and peaceful forests, they begin to understand how plants, animals, and landscapes work together to create living ecosystems.

To bring this exploration home, we’re sharing a playful, open-ended at-home activity your family can enjoy together: Create Your Own Forest & Mountain World.

This experience invites children to design, build, and imagine a miniature environment using everyday materials, turning simple items into peaks, trails, trees, and habitats through creativity and problem-solving.

What You’ll Need

(Use what you have. This activity is meant to be flexible and inventive!)

Base Materials

• A shallow box, cardboard tray, baking sheet, or large piece of cardboard
• Paper plates or scrap cardboard (for building layers and elevation)

Building & Structure Ideas

• Paper towel or toilet paper rolls (trees, tunnels, lookout towers)
• Small boxes or egg cartons (caves, animal shelters, mountain ledges)
• Crumpled paper or newspaper (rocky hills, snow-covered peaks)
• Craft sticks, straws, or cardboard strips (bridges, fences, trails)

Creative & Decorative Materials

• Construction paper, tissue paper, or magazine scraps
• Markers, crayons, paint, or colored pencils
• Aluminum foil (shimmering rivers, rocky cliffs, snowcaps)
• Cotton balls (clouds, fog, snowy mountaintops)

Loose Parts & Natural Touches (optional)

• Pinecones, sticks, pebbles, leaves, acorns
• Bottle caps, buttons, yarn, fabric scraps

Finishing Touches

• Toy animals, people, or vehicles
• Or invite your child to draw and cut out their own creatures and explorers

Step-by-Step Guide

Set the Stage

Invite your child to imagine they are creating a brand-new place inspired by forests and mountains. Use an open invitation like:

What kind of place do you want to build today?

Is it a quiet forest, a tall mountain range, or both?

Let your child know this world can change over time. There’s no “finished” version.

Build the Landscape

Encourage your child to start shaping the land. Mountains can rise from stacked cardboard or crumpled paper. Forest floors might be flat and full of tiny details. Rivers can wind, hills can overlap, and paths can appear anywhere.

As they build, respond with curiosity:

• Tell me about this part.

• What made you put that there?

Avoid correcting or “fixing”. The goal is exploration, not realism.

Add Life & Details

Now invite your child to think about who or what lives in this environment. Animals might need hiding spots, food, or water. Explorers might need bridges or trails.

Try asking:

• Where would animals feel safest?

• How do they move through the mountains or forest?

Create Stories, Trails, and Adventures

Once the environment is built, the play can deepen. Your child might:

• Map a hiking trail or camping site
• Pretend to fish, hike, or explore
• Tell a story about an animal’s day
• Add signs, labels, or landmarks

Ask open-ended questions like:

• What happens when the weather changes?

• How does this place look in different seasons?

Pause, Reflect, and Extend

Take a moment to observe the world together. Ask:

• What’s your favorite part so far?

• Is there anything you’d like to add tomorrow?

This project can stay out for days, growing as new ideas emerge.

Celebrate the Process

When your child is ready to pause, focus on the thinking and creativity behind their work:

• You used so many different materials in clever ways.
• I loved watching your ideas grow as you built.

The Learning Behind the Play

This activity supports creativity, early science concepts, problem-solving, and imaginative thinking. As children design environments, they explore habitats, life cycles, and relationships within ecosystems, all while practicing planning, flexibility, and storytelling.

Through the Mountains and Forests theme, children learn that nature is something to wonder about, care for, and reimagine. By creating their own miniature world at home, they deepen their understanding through play.

This emphasis on child-led exploration is a core tenant of our Reggio Emilia–inspired philosophy. To extend the experience, invite your child to revisit their environment over several days, adding new features or stories as ideas evolve. Display it at their eye level in a shared family space and watch their creativity continue to shine.