Leaf Identification when walking/hiking with the kids

I don't know diddly about plants, so I have been trying to learn this past month so I can help my girls along as we are out and about as a family. I have a found a number of wonderful blogs and websites that provide great ideas. I have adopted many and will link them as I go. One of the things I have been working on with my 4 year old are tree types. There are primarily two kinds of trees; conifers and deciduous trees. I'm not really on board with simply teaching them the names of things. Richard Feynman, one of my favorite late scientists, spoke of how cool it was that his dad taught him so much and he went beyond the names of things. This makes sense to me. Is not a rose still a rose by any other name? Yada yada. Given that I am trying to differentiate conifers and deciduous trees.

Since the word conifer is infinitely easier to say for a 4-year-old, compared to the tongue twisting deciduous, we tend to talk about conifers. I'll ask her "what is Santa's favorite tree?"

In the beginning if she didn't say gravity (her answer to most things) she would say Christmas trees!!! Only yesterday and today has she recalled "conifer". I think she knows the name. She does not yet seem to understand how to differentiate between the tree types. We're working on it!