News From the Outdoors:

After a week of snow days, the Nature Detectives made a happy return to a snow-covered Woodend. The kids were beyond thrilled to discover that the snow plows had created some very colossal snow banks in the outdoor classroom! The kids quickly set to work creating slides and tunnels on the hillside and building mini snowmen. The massive snow hill was so exciting that on Monday we skipped our hikes in favor of non-stop snow fun!

On Tuesday we ventured out to the Meadow to check on the fox den and the Nature Detectives noticed lots of animal tracks in the snow. Confirmed sightings of raccoon, deer, and fox tracks were made by the sharp-eyed detectives. At the fox den, we saw many signs of foxy activity! From there we ventured deeper into the woods to dig in the snow and muddy earth to look for worms.

On Wednesday, with Alex for our Naturalist Hike, we braved some soaking wet weather and hiked out to the back meadow to learn about the bat listening stations which have been set up by scientists around Woodend to study bat activity. We also learned a fun bat echolocation game to play with the kids!.

News From the Classroom:

This week the Nature Detectives put the finishing touches on our Nocturnal Animals Unit. We learned about Moths, Worms and Possums, then wrapped up the week with a Nocturnal Animal PJ party!

 

The busy detectives created stained glass luna moth art, painted with wormy spaghetti paint brushes, and even created new possum sign-in tags! The kids also built sledding hills out of the blocks, dug for worms in the play dough, and used their super-sense of hearing in the classroom fox den to discern the sounds of various musical instruments.

 

This week we also began to send home nocturnal animal stuffed animals to have night time adventures with the Person of the Day. The adventures of Chester the Raccoon and Owlbert the Horned Owl have been super exciting to read about every day at circle time!

We capped off the week with a PJ Party and the nature detectives partied it up by bringing in stuffies, making glow in the dark paintings, creating a class book about their favorite nocturnal animals, and even had a fun party day surprise when they spied glow in the dark stars and animals in the class bathroom!

Books We Read:

The Very Quiet Cricket by Eric Carle

Wonderful Worms by Linda Glaser

Don’t Laugh Joe by Keiko Kasza

Moon Glowing by Elizabeth Partridge

Weekly Top Hits:

I Love the Night Time: Raccoon Verse (Tune: You are my Sunshine)

 

Flying Squirrel Song (Tune: I’m a little Teapot)

 

I’m a Little Bat (Tune: I’m a little Teapot)

 

Foxy Fox (Tune: London Bridge)

 

Everything is Possum (Tune: Everything is Awesome)

Everything is Possum

Everything is cool when at night you can see

Everything is Possum

When you live in a tree

Everything is better when we dangle together

Side by side 

You and I 

Gonna play possum together

Let’s stay safe forever

Everything is Possum

Everything is cool when at night you can see

Everything is Possum

When you live in a tree

Upcoming Events:

FEB. 11th: Sugar Mapling Field Trip

Spoiler Alert:

Next week we’ll learn about sugar mapling and do some fun science experiements!