Touch Scavenger Hunt – Part 2

After we finished the Scavenger Hunt we sorted items by how they felt. 
         
We reviewed all the different words they used to describe the items they found and then I handed them new items to touch.  Their clipboards were laid out with one descriptive word on each.
 
 
As they examined their item I asked them to think of a word to describe it.  The little girl in the last picture is telling me that the bark is ‘crunchy’.  English is her second language and she comes out with this delicious word – I was in awe.
          
We made up a word card that said ‘crunchy’ and she added her bark.
          
The rest of the children got up and placed their nature object with the word that they chose to describe it.
 
Then together, with their grown up, they looked and talked about all the rest.
 
As they talked about the items they noticed that some could be described in more than one way.  They solved this by overlapping the boards.
        
When done we collected it all, took it back to school and set it up for children who didn’t come to the park.
 
What could we do as a next step?

Touch Scavenger Hunt - Part 1

It turned out to be a fantastic day to be outside.  The sun was warm
and welcoming.
            
We went to Filberg Park for a scavenger hunt.  A touch scavenger hunt.  Encouraging the children to use descriptive words when touching items found in nature.
          
I also wanted to encourage the use of the word “wonder”.   Hopefully leading the children to voice many other wonders. 
             
In each nature bag was their clip board with the “I wonder” question on it with three photos of things to find around the park.  As well as crayons for recording.
                    
Once they found an item they were encouraged to touch it and think of a word to describe it.
 
They then recorded what they felt by drawing a picture or the grown up wrote the words.

		Scavenger Hunt VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

My favourite observation was this little boy.  His picture was of a wooden face.  He found the sculpture and took his time looking at the photo and the sculpture. 
  
We asked him to find the nose, eyes and mouth on the wooden face and on his own face.  Even though he does not yet have much language this was a full and meaningful experience for him.

Some families mentioned that they come to visit this park quite often but had never noticed some of the things I had taken photos of.  By cropping the pictures to show only a portion of an item helped the families look more closely at the environment around them.

Our Flower Paintings Garden

        
Last week we painted flowers using everyday utensils.  I showed our daffodil paintings last week so to follow are; orchids, roses and tulips.
    
First we painted purple flowers, with the orchid as the main flower, using
drinking straws.
 
One end of the large straw was slit and folded back so when it was dipped in paint then stamped on paper it left a 4, 5, or 6 point mark depending how many slits I cut.
         
To add stems and leaves we used an eye dropper to drip green paint on to their pictures,
              
then used a smaller straw to blow the paint around.


Next we explored roses and used scouring pads to paint them with pink paint.
 
And egg cartons cut into single cups dipped into white paint.
 
We used the eye droppers to draw the stems.
         
I found the little brown bottles and eye droppers at a recycling store in Vancouver.  They are the perfect size for the little one’s hands.
 

Lastly we painted tulips.  I found this idea at Blog Me Mom.
  
Forks are dipped into paint then pressed on to paper to make the flower.
 
I made stem shapes from foam meat trays and glued a clothespin to the back for easy dipping in the paint.
 

I guess we could of called all these paintings ‘kitchen’ art since all the implements
could be found in that room of the house.
       
            How does your art garden grow?