Mother Nature gave us some fun weather today for the first day of our winter session: Quest for Winter Survival. We had a mix of snow and rain all day, making for some fun splashy slush and snow for finding tracks! We started with a game of colored eggs with the older homeschool group. Then we came inside and began morning circle with “find your match” greeting, where kids had to find the person with the same cone as them.
We sang a repeat-after-me song about a moose named Fred. As requested, here are the lyrics:
There
was a great big moose
He
liked to drink a lot of juice
There
was a great big moose
He
liked to drink a lot of juice
Chorus:
I
said Whoa ooh Whoa
Way
o way o way o way
Way
o way o
Way
o way o way o way
The
moose’s name was Fred
He
liked to drink his juice in bed
The
moose’s name was Fred
He
liked to drink his juice in bed
Chorus
He
drank his juice with care
But
he spilt some on his hair
He
drank his juice with care
But
he spilt some on his hair
Chorus
Now
there’s a sticky moose
Full
of juice
On
the looooose
Chorus
The theme of the day was “Why do evergreens stay green in the winter?” Upon reading the morning message, homeschoolers discovered that today’s password was a mystery to solve!
We discussed what makes an evergreen an evergreen and how they are different from deciduous trees. Evergreens have several adaptations to help them survive the cold, and we made a chart about it.
The morning activity was an Evergreen lab. There were different evergreen boughs all throughout the room in stations, and kids traveled from station to station studying and drawing each one. I was so impressed with their keen eyes and attention to detail. Each homeschooler became an instant botanist-artist!
The lab prepared us for our outdoor adventure, which we embarked upon after snack. Each child held a different evergreen bough, and we set out to find the trees that matched them. Furthermore, they had to find the next clue to the daily password. The letters that spelled out the password were pinned to evergreen trees, and after they collected them all we had to unscramble them.
After we collected all the letters we continued walking through the forest towards the white pines. We learned how to tell how old a white pine is, by counting the whorls of branches along its trunk. Kids went looking for a tree as old as them. Some kids “shook hands” with evergreens and deciduous trees. Turns out evergreen branches are much more flexible, in order to allow snow to fall off!
We walked through the farm, finding a slushy pond, farm animals and some tracks! We ate lunch and then got to work on our journals. Children rearranged the letter clues we had found on our walk and deciphered the password: conifer! We decorated the covers of our journals then we recorded our daily observations. Then I put on a short play about how pine cones carry the seeds of the pine tree.
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