Weekly Activities

Creating A Wood Bug Habitat Off to the forest we went to search for wood bugs and items to make their habitat.  The list of items to find included: wood bugs leaves soil a piece of decaying tree  After gathering the times, the children put together the habit.  Since wood bugs thrive in a moist habitat, the children needed to mist the items with water.  It is the responsibility of the children to check on the habitat daily to ensure that the habitat does not dry out. We have added one more rule: always wash your hands after handling the bugs.  The children are making a poster of the different rules as well as what they know about wood bugs to share with the class.  They will present it to the class when finished.

The Life Cycle of the Butterfly Form - Features of crawling creatures What are the features of crawling creatures? The children shared with me their knowledge of butterflies. They told me that butterflies eat nectar, that they have wings, legs and that they are beautiful.  I  asked the children if they knew anything about caterpillars. They responded with: Sofia: They are fuzzy Sasha: I like them Connor: I saw one at Pender Harbour I then asked "did you know a caterpillar turns into a butterfly?"  The children all responded with NO.  We watched a you tube video showing a time lapse of the life cycle of the Monarch Butterfly. http://youtu.be/7AUeM8MbaIk The children were in awe of this transformation and wanted to learn more.  Using books, we explored the life  cycle  in more detail learning the different  stages of  a butterfly and used this information to make a life cycle poster.  

During our scavenger hunt, the children notice bees among the plants.  Grace asked if we could learn more about bees.  What do the children know about bees: Tyreese: they are yellow Jayla: they have a stinger Sophie: they fly Examining a flower Grace and Oliver: they make honey. We couldn't answer how honey is made so we had to do some research. First, we watched a video of a bee pollinating a flower. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CdoBCEEpz4 Showing his book We had to watch it a few times to get a good look at the bee and what was happening.  We read some books to learn more about the relationship between bees and flowers.  We concluded with the children each making a flap book using what they learned and observed. The honey taste test!

The Fire Group enjoys the outside and always asks "can we have group time outside?" Today was an outdoor activity, we went on a plant scavenger hunt!  We borrowed Mary's photo cards of  plants found in the Pacific Spirit Park.  The children were so excited to explore and  seek out these plants.  Each child was given different pictures of the  plants to find.  When a plant was found, the group would run over and examine the find paying close attention to detail to see if the plant matched the photo.  For more information on the plants found in Pacific Spirit Park please see  http://ecoreserves.bc.ca/2012/03/11/plants-and-fungi-of-er-74-pacific-spirit-regional-park-1992-2012/

Music, art, photography, poetry and stories are different ways to share information about a topic. The children researched these different ways of expressing knowledge in relation to plants. The book "The Tree in the Ancient Forest" by Carol Reed-Jones had the children talking about the roots and their function. An image of a hollow tree in the book provoked a conversation as to what may have happened to that tree to cause it to die. Jayla noticed that the tree was still important because a squirrel was living in it. The children used watercolours to paint their own picture and share their knowledge about plants. Some of the children sang "What a Wonderful World" as they painted. After the paintings were completed, each child wrote a poem to describe their image.  Here are their pictures and poems: Squirrel Brown, Fast Hiding, Sleeping, Eating He lives there Tree By Oliver My garden growing Cold windy day Blowing the seeds Beautiful By Grace ...

A few weeks ago, the children put a flower (with no roots) into some soil with a potted plant.  We have been monitoring the flower and today the children noticed that it has dried up but the plant is thriving. The children concluded that the even with water this flower could not survive without roots. From this, we checked on the beans we have been germinating as well as the carrots and pumpkins. The carrots and pumpkins are not showing any visible signs of growth yet.  The beans, on  the other hand, have begun to display roots.  The children took the seed coats off the beans and were able to see where the roots and the plant itself are beginning to grow.  We will plant the rest of the beans and monitor the growth. Our discussions over the past week have related to the life cycle of the plant. Today the children made a book depicting this cycle.

Dandelion seeds The previous actives related to  roots and leaves led the children to asked to study seeds.  A "helicopter" see Looking for seeds We read the book "Flip, Float, Fly: Seeds on the Move" by JoAnn Early Macken. The book taught us all the different ways seeds travel to how they root and the plant cycle begins again.    The children were keen to explore  the forest and eagerly went on a seed hunt. We brought the seed collection back to the centre to explore what plants they came from.  The collection consisted of dandelion seeds, maple seeds and pine cones. The children asked to grow seeds. Before we could become gardeners, we needed to identify what was needed to grow a plant. The children knew that they needed seeds, water, soil, and sun for plants to grow. The children were confident that they could grow a plant and planted pumpkin and carrot seeds.  We also wrapped beans in wet paper towels to see if the beans would g...