Create Colourful Leaf Art | Ontario Science Centre

What you’ll need:

Paper
Crayons or pencil crayons
Different types of leaves
A heavy book (optional)

A pair of shoes in a pile of fall leaves.

Activity setup:

Gather leaves from the ground outside. Look for fallen leaves from different types of trees, and try to choose leaves that are flat and not too crisp. Tip: If you need to flatten your leaves, put them between two pieces of paper, place a heavy book on top and leave it overnight.
Take a leaf and place it on a smooth, flat surface, then place a piece of paper over it.
While holding the paper firmly over the leaf, grab a crayon or pencil crayon and hold it at an angle over the paper. Then, lightly rub it over the entire leaf, right to the edges. You’ll notice the veins of the leaf first, but keep going to see the whole leaf!
Keep colouring until you can see the entire leaf clearly. Note that if you make your work too dark, the veins in the leaf won’t show up.
Practice makes perfect! Try again with different leaves, paper and colours.

How does it work?

There are many different species of trees, and they all have their own unique leaves. One way to identify
different tree species is to understand what that tree’s leaves look like. Sometimes, there are small variations in leaves across the same tree species.

You can also identify a tree type based on the pattern of veins in the tree’s leaves. These are the visible thin
lines you see on the leaf. The veins carry water and nutrients from the roots of the tree to the leaves. They
also deliver sugar starches made in the leaves to the rest of the tree.