Connecting Children with Nature...The current generation of children are more disconnected from nature than any previous generation. Building a loving relationship with nature is vital for the health of our children, as well as the future of our planet.
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Building connections with nature in Kindergarten...
A glimpse in the classroom.
Our first project:
Learning about wolves…
The children were excited about the ‘blood moon’, and drawing pictures of wolves howling at the moon. I asked them if they wanted to learn about wolves or moons. They emphatically chose wolves. We charted what we knew about wolves, and what we wanted to know. I was surprised by some of the concepts the children had, that wolves only come out at night, are monsters that attack people, and live on mountain tops. Other children were able to draw on stories from family of wolf encounters, or sightings near their homes or on hikes. These children were to quick to correct misconceptions with what they knew. The discussions were really quite fascinating.
We started our research, discussing the internet and search engines. One of our first discoveries was that dogs descended from wolves. The children started a book to display what they were learning about wolves (using power point). They chose illustrations and wrote the text themselves, as we discussed the roles of authors and illustrators.
I invited the children to bring in molds of their pet dogs paw prints in play dough. The children with pets brought them in for discussion. We discussed how scientists observe and compare. They compared their paw prints, and realized that they all had the same formation, but were different sizes. We talked about what that might mean about the dogs. They even discussed how the clear molds showed a patient dog, and the messier ones showed a hyper or fearful dog.
We then compared our molds to photos of wolf prints in the mud and snow, provided by our families. We looked at photos of wolves from the area surrounding Grande Prairie and learned that wolves live in the forest surrounding our city. The children loved that the prints were the same formation as their dog prints but much larger, and they deduced that wolves are larger in size.
Next they investigated wolf fur. There was quite a bit of debate about what wolf fur might feel like, soft and silky, or more coarse. Our research told us it had fluffy fur near the skin for warmth, and longer coarse hairs further out for protection. We brought in wolf skins for the children to investigate.
We then researched the reasons wolves howl. one of the children recalled a 'Cat in the Hat' video that said they call to locate other members of their pack. We found the video and watched it, then compared it to articles about wolves, and listened to recording of wolves howling in sanctuaries.
We wrapped up our project by watching the movie 'Alpha and Omega'. We discussed packs and wolf families. Then we researched the ideas we had from the movie to see if they were true for real wolf packs.
Next...
Worms!
The children were finding worms on the playground, and one of the older grades had a bucket full of worms they were willing to lend us. We started by exploring what we wanted to know about worms. This led us into how worms move, and we had many movement breaks wiggling across the classroom floor. We learned their body parts, and what they eat, and we fed and cared for them. The children still ask me to play the 'Herman the Worm' song, a great numeracy link we discovered during our research!
Next we started our experiments to answer these questions:
*Do they like wet conditions or dry?
- The children discussed evidence they had seen. Wet because I have seen them shrivelled in the sun. Not too wet though, because they come out of the ground when it rains so the ground must be too soggy for them.
We set up a pan that had wet paper towel on one side and dry on the other. All the worms went to the wet side. Next we soaked the dirt but put a wooden block in for a dryer area. The worms worked their way to the drier spot.
The children had a blast with our art exploration, 'Painting with worms'. We cut 'worms' out of string, and dipped them in paint exploring the different marks we could make in our painting.
Fall Explorations...
Our class discussed what we knew about the seasons. We then set out to look at evidence around our school, exploring signs of Autumn.
The children had been making alphabet letters with their bodies and were excited to pick out the shapes of letters in trees!
This led to discussions on the importance of trees for us and for animals. We read 'Picture a Tree' by Barbara Reid as we made our connections. We decided to use our found Autumn materials to create art work inspired by trees.
The project allowed the children to discuss colors they see in this season, practice their scissor skills, blow paint through straws, and catch the essence of Autumn in their found materials!
Making Rainbows...
One of my students is fascinated by rainbows, so we decided to focus on them around Saint Patrick's Day. The children built a rainbow out of lego, and wrote about leprechaun's and gold at the end of the rainbow. We then talked about the colors and how some fade into others, while looking at photos of rainbows.
We set up an experiment with primary colors using food colouring and water. The children made predictions about whether the coloured water would travel to the empty cup via the paper towel, if it did what colors would it create, and if we changed the size of the containers how would it effect the outcome.
The water traveled the paper towel and the colors mixed. The most exciting discovery was that the water traveled until the cups had equal amounts of liquid, and then the secondary color went back up the towel until the half way mark. We made the rule that 'nature loves balance' and it has come up again and again in our learning. We used the died water to paint and pipe onto coffee filters, which became our butterfly wings. The butterflies were connected to the story of Jesus' life at Easter, and sent home in homemade chrysalis' to share the story with our parents.
This has led us to our current project observing caterpillars transforming into butterflies. The children have mixed the food and readied the cups, and transferred the small larvae into their own cups.
Volcano...
One of my students wants to be a volcanologist. We sang volcano songs, and discussed what volcanos do. We looked at the positives like new land formation, and watched videos showing the different types of eruptions.
We decided to do a volcano experiment in the snow. We put two pop bottles in the snow, and piled the snow up around the bottles to make the cone shapes. We then made predictions about how many menthos to drop in, and if the different flavours would effect the outcome. The children loved the big eruptions! We used the remaining soda to sound out and print the letters for 'volcano' into fresh snow that had not been stepped on, and then the children ate the sugared snow.
When we came in we made 'volcano' pictures practicing tearing paper, and spraying our paint with spray bottle to mimic the lava erupting.
Under the Sea...
One of our big math book pages was titled 'Under the Sea'. It depicted small groups shells, fish, and seaweed, for the children to count. We decided we needed a bigger challenge so I asked the children to divide everything in the picture up according to a Venn diagram, with 'Animal', 'Plant' and to place anything that was 'Other/Unknown' in the middle. The children made two large groups but were not certain about shells, and the anemone plant. Some felt the anemone was a plant while a few felt certain it was more (references to 'Finding Nemo' were discussed in length). We decided to use the internet, to find a picture of the anemone (they did not know it's name at the time) by typing in the objects characteristics and doing an image search. We then found one that matched our picture, and read up on what it was. The children LOVED that it was really an animal, with a mouth hiding on its underside and able to move across the ocean floor! The article mentioned they were at risk from fishing practices that drag nets across the ocean floor. We discussed how fishermen need to fish, but people can use their creativity to invent new fishing tools and practices that are less destructive.
In this discussion we kept the emphasis on the importance of creative problem solving. I told them we were going to make sea creatures out of paper but that I would not tell them how to draw them. Instead, there was no wrong way to do it. We pulled up images of real sea creatures they wanted to make. They had to be creative, and explore, and if it didn't look good they would try a different way. They were encouraged to share their exploration process with friends, and I held up many examples of things the other children were making so they could see what some of the bravest children were trying. One child made a shark fin 3d by gluing two triangles up. As they asked questions, or thought of an animal we researched if it lived in the sea, and what it ate... anything they were curious to know.
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