I’m so pleased to be able to share these fun autumn tree painting ideas for kids with you today, especially as I’ve also got a free tree template to share with you to make it a bit easier for you and your kids to get creative! We love autumn crafts and these ideas are really easy for you to try at home with your children – I’m sure you’ll think of loads more ways to paint an autumn tree too and it’s a great excuse to get the paints out, mixing up those gorgeous autumnal colours and most of all having fun together!

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What You'll Find on This Page

Autumn Tree Painting Ideas for Kids

Autumn is a great time to encourage creativity and the changing colours of the leaves make it perfect for inspiring some painting, especially as you can look at the way the colours mix together.

If you like these ideas make sure that you bookmark this page or pin an image so that you can come back to it – especially if you’re on your phone and you want to print off the free template later!

You’ll also find some more of our most popular autumn crafts for kids at the end of this post so do check them out for more easy ways to keep your kids busy.

Free Autumn Tree Template

Our free tree template can be used for all four seasons and you can print as many copies as you’d like, meaning that you can try out as many of these ideas as you like. We’ve also used this template for our paint splat fall tree craft and this bleeding tissue tree craft both of which are great for autumn art.

Pom Pom Painted Autumn Tree Craft

I love the effect of using pom poms* to paint autumn leaves so much, it’s s simple to do but the result really looks like a full autumn tree to me.

This is a great craft if your child likes doing painting but isn’t so keen on getting messy. You can grab hold of the pom poms with your fingers or if you don’t want to get messy then use a clothes peg* to hold onto it.

Tip: If you are using a peg then it’s easier to use large pom poms rather than small ones. Whichever method you use it might also be fun to mix up using large pom poms and small pom poms.

To create this art idea using your pom poms just dip them into your paint and get printing.

Finger Painting Autumn Tree

If you don’t mind a bit of mess then finger painting is a really sensory way to get creative and to mix the colours up a bit, make sure you keep a cloth nearby to clean up any messy hands afterwards!

You could also do this as a collaborative art project with more than one child and get them each to add their fingerprints.

For younger kids it makes a lovely keepsake too, I love seeing kids finger painting from my kids and seeing how little their fingers look.

If you wanted to you could also try dipping your child’s finger into green paint to make some grass at the bottom of the tree.

Sponge Printing Autumn Tree Craft

I’m never quite sure what these things are called – bath sponges? Shower puffs? Either way they’re a great material to print with and if you don’t have one at home already you can buy them online here.

Sponges are also really easy for young kids to hold onto and they’re pretty easy to clean afterwards so you can pop them away in a draw afterwards to paint with again another day.

I love how the different amounts of paint on the sponge can give a different effect – big splodges or tiny little lines!

Lego Painted Autumn Tree

I’ve shared a Lego printed craft before but I couldn’t resist including the idea again with this and using our tree template. Using the template makes it look so much better than my attempts at drawing a tree!

You can use Lego for this but Duplo will give bigger circles and can be better for little hands to hold too.

Autumn Tree Crafts for Kids

Let your kids create some fun autumn tree art using different printing techniques.

4.67 from 3 votes

Print Pin Rate

Keyword: fall, preschoolers

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Activity Time: 5 minutes

Total Time: 10 minutes

Author: Kate Williams

Equipment

Children's paint in red, yellow, green and orange
Old plate
Shower sponge
Peg
Duplo
Pom poms
Bath sponge

Materials

Free Tree Printable

Instructions

Print the tree trunk printable
Pour the paints onto a reusable plate
Use your child's favourite materials to create autumn coloured leaves on the tree by printing them in the paint.

Notes

Pouring the paints you want to use onto a reusable plate first makes them much easier to access and it doesn't matter if the paints mix up a bit either. You could also choose to use just red and yellow paints and see if your child can mix up an orange to use for their painting.

Tried this?Mention @craftsonsea - we'd love to see and maybe share it!

Autumn Crafts for Kids

Autumn is such a visually stunning time of year that it’s great to try and make the most of it with some easy autumn crafts that celebrate this time of year.

One of my kids favourites are these autumn leaf suncatchers that look great hung up in a window.

This stained glass pumpkin suncatcher is one that my kids originally made for Halloween but by leaving off the Jack O’Lantern details you can absolutely use this as an autumn craft too and it’s another great one for talking about colour mixing.

Or for more decorating fun why not grab our free autumn leaves template with lots of different designs.