Grandfriends This Week

                       
During today’s visit to our grand friends’ home we made pumpkin pancakes. 
        I learned that baking together helps us all be more at ease.
          
 
While the children prepared the batter they shared the ingredients with the seniors.  The seniors asked them what they were doing and made comments about what they saw.

We practiced including everyone in the experience.  Taking turns and passing the bowl around the table.
               
                  
            After the pancakes were cooked we shared them together. 
Some of the grandfriends really want to care for the children and are extra attentive.
     
These pictures show the children’s level of comfort with the seniors.  After visiting for four weeks they eagerly come into the room, say hi to the grand friends, ask their name and take their hand to walk together.
      
             The grand friends are relaxing and enjoying the children. 
                They participate more during play and music time.

Using Our Animal Senses

Last Friday we had a visit with Natasha from West Coast Environmental Education Society.  She taught us how to use our animal senses when we are out in the forest.

                 
We learned about different animals and the senses they use to survive.  The mole uses his big claws to dig.  The deer has great ears for hearing.  The eagle has sharp eyes for seeing.  A butterfly uses it’s feet for tasting.  And the bear uses his nose to smell.
          
   With that bit of instruction we were ready to head into the forest behind
                                        our school.
    
                         The first sense we used was smell. 
             Just like a bear we sniffed the sap seeping out of this tree.
                         
         We used our eagle eyes to find cones lying on the ground.
 
             Natasha introduced us to deciduous and coniferous trees. 
          A coniferous tree has cones and we found lots on the ground.
                   
   
           We used our mole hands when we found some fungus on a log. 
           We dug into the log where it was rotting and changing into dirt.
     
   We used our butterfly touch to explore orange jelly fungus.  It felt squishy. 
               
   Using our deer ears we heard a frog.  One child spotted this frog under a leaf.

  
                     The children’s eagle eyes spotted some little bones. 
           What animal were they from?  What happened to the animal? 
                                 Lots of questions to explore.
 
    We found a banana slug.  He traveled with us for the rest of the walk.
 
It was a little wet that morning but Natasha was prepared.  She had covered our outdoor classroom with a tarp.  We played a guessing game.  The children put their hand in a container that they couldn’t see into then they had to try to guess what they touched.
          
The containers had cones in them.  Natasha showed us how each were different
and what tree they came from.  Each of these trees grow in our forest.
    
  
                      
                         We were able to find others to match.
            
We finally said goodbye to the banana slug and headed back to the school.  Thanks to Natasha for another wonderful Nature & Science lesson.

Spin a Turkey Tail

            
I pulled out the lazy susan turntables this morning with the thought of squeezing paint onto paper circles to make turkey tail feathers.  But I got busy with other things and just put out markers, pencils and crayons.  They worked better than I thought.
      
In the past we have done this activity using paint and the children had difficulty adding the paint and spinning the turntables by themselves.
 
       With the markers, pencils and crayons they could manage it.
  
     Occasionally parents did help or worked together to create their art.

Here are a few of our turkeys.
   
     
                      Gobble, gobble!  Have a happy Thanksgiving.