Animals in Spring

Some are hatching! Some are growing! Some are changing! And it's been an adventure at Harmony's House this month to watch, study, and play with animals. We worked with critters indoors and out.

We looked at bird nests, seeds, and local bird figurines in our play.

We got brave and found many earthworms, slugs, beetles, ants, a lizard, and even a salamander in the damp earth under our playground mats, not to mention the Daddy Long Leg we caught in the playhouse.

We studied pictures of a variety of caterpillars, talked about their defense mechanisms, and made our own models with play-doh, beads, and toothpicks.

We watched for birds.

We pretended to BE birds in an extra large nest!

We visited birds on the farm! We saw real ducks sitting on their nests, with an abundance of eggs. We pet chickens and got their breakfast ready for them.

We visited the growing piggies who are always hungry! Good thing there is a variety of available food in the springtime for animals to eat.

We adopted classroom caterpillars and have watched them grow faster than seems possible! All of our caterpillars have successfully formed cocoons.  

We've floated our duck toys in the pond and learned a new song:

"Ducks in the pond, QUACK a happy song!

Mother hens cackle the whole day long.

Birds in their nests, and wind in the treetops,

All join in singing, a happy song!"

We have hopped Little Bunny Foo Foo through the forest many many times.  <3

We made our own nests for the birds with baskets and clothespins and pretended that corks were the eggs!

Our butterfly habitat is prepped.  Now we are just waiting for our butterflies to emerge! It is so hard to wait!

Just today we were very creative using tree slabs, bricks, and logs to build a big duck home. It was unseasonably chilly today and it seemed fitting that they should have somewhere warm to go to huddle inside together. What was most beautiful though about this plan was how collaborative the children were. Almost every child helped in someway to build this, by carrying bricks, coloring them with chalk, finding the ducks, and placing them carefully inside. 

Spring is here, animals are busy, and so are we. <3

Farms to Feast

Farms feed the world.  They are, quite simply, fundamental to our existence.  For some of the children at Harmony's House, farms are also the place that they live.  We have been exploring farming for several weeks this fall in a variety of ways.  This post will explain how the ideas about farming and food culminate in celebrating the harvest at Thanksgiving.

In September, we visited a small farm of one of our families to meet, care for, and understand where food like milk, meat, and eggs come from.

Some farms have only animals, only food, or both.  In October, we "worked" in a Farmer's Market in our House Area.  

The children would come to the market to buy produce that they could "take home" and make supper with.

When they ran out of food, they would go shopping again.  Eventually the food at the store ran out.  The children solved this problem by "calling the farmer" to make a delivery to the store.  

Whoever was pretending to be the farmer would have to check if the hens were laying, if the pumpkins were ripe, and when they'd be able to make a delivery.  We learned that farmers were important people because the stores would run out of food without them!

Now, in November we are preparing for Thanksgiving.  Most people in the U.S. celebrate Thanksgiving by sharing a feast with family and/or friends, just as pilgrims did centuries ago to express gratitude for a plentiful harvest.

The children are demonstrating their knowledge of farming that they have developed during September and October by working with farm animals and barns.  Farmers must take good care of the animals to have enough milk, butter, and eggs for all of the baking that happens during November and December.

They know that turkeys live on farms, and try to "catch a turkey" with these clever scissors in the Explore Table.  Turkey farmers are very busy this time of year getting ready for Thanksgiving!

They create their own miniature farms, deliver hay and water to the animals, and use the tractors to work in the fields with the plants.  It's time to harvest all the corn, apples, pumpkins, potatoes, and squash.

Finally, they use the grain, eggs, and butter from farms to run the Cookie Bakery.

Some friends work the mixers to make cookie dough.  Some bake the cookie dough on sheets.

Some friends work to frost the cookies, and box them up for sale.

This year, for the children at Harmony's House, Thanksgiving will mean being thankful to farmers who bring the meat, produce, and grains to our table for a feast!

Welcoming Fall at Harmony's House

We are so excited about the cooling temperatures!  We are anticipating the leaves changing colors and beginning to fall.  Our older students remember this season from last year.

One of our outdoor table choices has been to paint glue on these twigs.  Then we applied tissue paper leaves.  The finished "trees" turned out beautiful!

We will be learning more about how animals on the farm and in the forest will be preparing for winter.  In the House Area, it has been so fun to dress up like different animals!

Friend "Elephant" dressed up like the "big, bad wolf!"

Friends "Kite" and "Alarm Clock" dressed up like pig and cow.

Finally, we've been exploring a new way to paint at the art easel.  We have used paint rollers with different textures to mix red and yellow paint.  What I loved about this picture was seeing the oldest and the youngest painting side by side.  The mixed-age environment provides the children so many opportunities to learn from friends in different ways.