Saturday, March 23, 2013

Nurturing Acorns: Fairies

In Nurturing Acorns at Woodlawn Nature Center this week, our topic centered on FAIRIES! We started out with some letter exploration! We've really loved these Melissa & Doug word puzzles . . . we found them for about half off during the holiday season. They are sturdy and easy for my 3-year-old to use.


It was great having extra helpers there. Thanks! After letter work, we made fairies. We had different types of clothespins, fabrics, pipe cleaners, ribbons, sequins, gems, etc. available to fashion a fairy with the children.




I worried a little about the boys getting into this, but they seemed to do okay!




We had story time. Thanks, Lauren, for all the book suggestions and even checking a few out! She has all girls and has done fairy topics with her daughters more. During story time, we also talked about mushrooms. It's the topic of study of the Outdoor Hour Challenge by Handbook of Nature Study this month. Also, the circles of mushrooms that magically pop up are called fairy rings. I thought this was a great combination for nature study with fairies. 


Vicci Moore, a volunteer at Woodlawn Nature Center, helped the children make fairy houses. 



She had supplies ready for the children to glue Spanish moss on upcycled water bottles.


The fairy houses turned out very cute. I look forward to exploring a few different kinds of fairy houses out in the woods as it warms up.




We played Dance Freeze with the puppets and talked about fairies. 



During exploration time, the children chose from many activities or made their own. They could make cairns with the stones or sort them by size.


They enjoyed the glittery play dough and the Melissa & Doug Shape, Model and Mold along with some smaller cutters.

We had mushrooms to explore, along with mushroom guide books. Notice the free printable from Handbook of Nature Study.


New items were in the sensory bin, including cute painted wooden mushrooms!


One of the boys found sticks with moss and lichen on them--we added these to the mushroom exploration area.


Another great exploration day!