Autumn Leaf Craft

 

What a FUN activity to do with little ones this autumn. Go on a nature walk and find fallen leaves together. Please do not pick leaves off of trees. When you get back home, take out your paints and your imaginations and see what you can create! 

We'd love to see what you come up with. Be sure to share it with us! 

Bird Study and Nature Notebook Journaling

Supplies Needed:

Bird Binoculars

Nature Notebooks from September Monthly Curriculum

Crayons/Watercolor Pencils/Pencils or Pens

Bird Field Book from Public Library (optional)

After your morning circle, take the children Bird Watching. Take along binoculars, a field book from your local library, your nature notebooks and something to color and write with for your journaling. As you walk, share this week’s nature verse and help the children look for birds.   

Suggestions for Small Children:

Print out photos or draw the types of birds you saw on your walk and have the children glue them to their Nature Notebooks. If a bird holds a certain color, have the child color along side of the photo with that crayon. Count how many birds you saw on your nature hike today and make a note of it. Have children draw a picture of the weather outside during your hike. Have children draw a picture of the birds they saw or other interesting things they came across.

Suggestions for Older Children:

You can take this experience a step further depending on the age of your child. If you brought a field book along, have children journal about the types of birds they saw and their specific names and attributes. Have them make note of the weather, the behavior of the birds and the color and size of each. They can make a quick sketch, write poetry or just write about their day.  

Bird Study

Everything in relation to the teaching of birds must be done with spirit. Little children will never get education from a robin by following an outline. They must follow the robin himself and each year deepen their love of him, their need of him, and their knowledge of his interesting life and ways.

Little Classes in My Home and Our Backyard Farm

Last week began a series of little classes I am offering in my old daycare space to children in town and in my neighborhood.  Nature Detectives is VERY full and each week we focus on a new subject of learning about nature.  Last week was The Sun and Sundials to celebrate the Summer Solstice. It was so nice to have neighborhood children walking to my house and friends of mine dropping off their children to spend the morning learning with us.

 We made pretty woven suns in miniature format from the tutorial in our Midsummer Festival E-Book (by the way, there is a SALE right now for only two more days!)

We also played fun nature games and made pocket sundials.

 The class is so big I employed my teenager to help as well as my friend who does the outdoor programs with me through Park and Rec.  It is so nice to have such a big response so soon... but it was also a lot of prepping and difficult to find enough activities to keep the children engaged for the full two hours.

 We also made simple paper plate sundials and tested them outdoors.  

My little Nature Detectives!  It's so funny how big my own daughters are compared to these children now. They are still willing participants in all of my classes but it's pretty obvious they are growing up and away from our Little Acorn days. 

 I also held my first Learn to Crochet class with a small group of girls last week.

Crochet is NOT easy to teach but once they mastered how to hold the yarn and hook, they were able to learn the chain stitch and made a VERY long chain that we turned into necklaces and belts. 

Tomorrow is week two of both classes.  I worked hard tonight preparing in advance and hope it goes ok.  

I also have a Mommy and Me Learn to Crochet Class starting on Thursday night. That should be really fun.  

In between, I've been working in the garden a lot.  

The chicks are getting SO big and they LOVE it when I take them into the garden to free range.  I let the bunny out too and it's so cute to see them all in there together. 

I think I may have two roosters though. They are still too young to know for sure but their combs are huge compared to their same breed sister and it's pretty obvious there is a distinct difference in the way they look, their size and also the noise they make. We will have to see how it all works out but I won't be keeping roosters... so we may be down to only 6 chickens. I knew I should have gotten more! 

Learning Together in Nature

This little video says it all.. this is exactly why I love doing what I do so much.  It was taken the very last day of the Forest Preschool session and is such a beautiful memory for me to capture. 

 I love that the weather is warm and we can be outside so much again.  School is still in session until Thursday but the girls have been enjoying playing in the back woods, in the garden area and in our pool after school each day.  It makes striving for media-free more realistic in our home when the weather is nice like this.  Those very cold nasty winters are hard to handle sometimes.

  

One of the wonderful parts about running outdoor programs in town is that my own children get to come to work with me.  I take Maia and Bree to Nature Club on Saturdays with me and I love being able to share these outdoor learning moments together and still help provide for my family financially. 

 We did so many fun things together in both the forest preschool and nature club programs.  We learned about life cycles, went on fun scavenger hunts.. leaf hunts...

Played outside with new friends in the fresh air for hours...

Collected some bugs, climbed some trees... 

 Found some cool discoveries... 

Identified trees

  

by sorting and analyzing their leaves and looking up which species they came from.

It's been busy... and fun... and soon I will be starting new classes in my home such as Nature Detectives where we will make sundials, dissect owl pellets, learn about metamorphosis and create a weather watcher.  I also will be teaching a learning to crochet class and a waldorf friends class for smaller children.  

I'm excited about the great response to these programs in town and I'm also trying to keep my online writing active as well as the photo contests and newsletters for Little Acorn Learning and my e-book sales.  I've been working on my new website for over a year now but have not been able to put the hours into it that I need to launch.  It's busy but I've missed focusing on my work this way and as long as I can keep a good routine in place, I think I will be able to create some balance.

Preschool in the Woods...

I love our little nature school in the woods. I really would love to grow this program and have it be something that runs a few days per week. If you live near Brookfield, CT, please be sure to call our town's Park and Recreation to find out what programs I am running or contact me directly at info (at) littleacornlearning.com 

This time I promised the children we would spend some time at the pond. We read a sweet story about pond life and Mr. Tom braved the waters for us and took some samples that we could examine. 

We learned that algae is a very small plant that lives on the surface of the water and it is low on the food chain and very important for the environment. 

This particular algae is called "duckweed algae". I found that out after our class through a friend so I will teach that to the children the next time we meet. 

I will miss these little children. This class was not a long session. I hope they will consider enrolling in another one of my classes or programs this summer. You get pretty attached when you spend so much time with one another learning and talking.

On our way back we found a little friend... 

It always seems that right toward the end of school we find a little surprise... a nest, a lizard a toad..

I hope you are able to spend some time in nature with your children this weekend.

xoxo