Another StoryWalk at a Picnic

Today was our annual Picnic at the Gardens.  It was a beautiful day to be out meeting friends and enjoying many activities that were spread throughout the gardens.

One activity was a StoryWalk with the book The Little Mouse, The Red Ripe Strawberry and The Big Hungry Bear by Don and Audrey Wood.
              
I set it up all around the outside of the garden so they could see what is in every
                                         part of the garden.
  
             
         Colleen, another facilitator, suggested we add props to this walk.

   
  I made scratch and sniff strawberries to add to the page that read,
   “The big hungry bear can smell a red, ripe strawberry a mile away.”

 
          Tin cans and sticks were placed with the page that read,
“BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The bear will tromp through the forest on big, hungry feet.”

     
Colleen brought locks and keys to be with the page that read, “or who is guarding it.”

            
       
A basket of silly glasses were put with the page that read, “or how it is disguised.”

 
Beside the page that reads, “share half with me.” I placed strawberry cards that
                            I had cut in half and they had to match.

And finally they looked for the Big Hungry Bear at the end of the story.
                
 Adding props to the story brought it further to life and the children more involved.
                       I’ll do more like this next school year.

Butterfly Release 2015

Today is one of my favourite days of the whole year, the day we release our
                                                butterflies.
 
The butterflies finished emerging over the weekend and were fluttering in the container when we arrived at school this morning.  It’s true that it is wonderful to watch the caterpillars grow and change but the fun part is letting them free.
                     
We share this experience with our grand friends.  We visit them at their seniors home once a month. They have a beautiful flower garden that is a great home for
                                        our butterflies.

               
We had a small group of children so they had lots of opportunity to care for the butterflies.  We removed each butterfly, from their container, using a stick.
   
      
    
Once they were holding their butterfly on the stick they walked around to show the grand friends. I love watching the interactions between the seniors and the juniors. They are both excited by what is happening.  The relationships grow stronger and
                                   their differences grow smaller.
     
If the butterfly stays on the stick long enough the children take a good look before
                                 taking it to the flower garden.
  
           
Many of the butterflies flew up in the air but some of them did stay in the garden.
  
                           

We also found them in other places.
On the chairs.
On the ground.
And on our shirts.
                               
                                        Bye bye butterflies.

Potato Candy

With our first tub of spuds harvest we made Potato Candy.
                 
It’s a simple recipe that has a small amount of potato and a lot of sugar. 
     This is a recipe that should be eaten in small amounts.
 
I had mashed potatoes the night before and we measured them into the bowl
      with the coconut and vanilla.  Almond flavouring is delicious too.
  
After mixing it in we added the icing sugar.  The spoon was working fine but I thought
                  it would be a lot more fun to use our hands.
 
It was such a wonderful sensory experience and I was impressed that these two
           children got right in there and did a great job mixing it altogether.
               
After we each had a little spoonful we pressed it into the pan.  I’ll take it home,
cut them in squares and dip them in chocolate.  It will be a special treat when we harvest tub #2.

Harvesting Spuds–Comparing Size

        
As we pulled the plants out of the dirt most of them broke off but one gave us
                           promise that there were potatoes below.
 
     I loosened the soil then the children started to dig and find more potatoes.
                    
It was obvious that it would take a lot of work to dig to the bottom of the tub
                             so we dumped it on the ground.
                     
    
Eureka we found lots of potatoes, roots and the seed potatoes that began it all.

       
                        
I brought out a comparison chart with three different sized circles; small, medium and large.  The children sorted, compared and asked about the sizes.  There were a lot of medium sized potatoes.  Do we count the little bitty ones?  Of course which brought our total from this tub to 58.

  
We took them into the school and washed them.  Which gave us a chance to take a closer look at each.  We saw bits of dirt stuck in little holes (the eyes).  Some wanted to taste the potatoes fresh (raw) from the garden.
              
      Now the are all ready to be cooked.  Next post I’ll share our first recipe.