Green Grubs Garden Club

Fresh air, bare feet ad grubby hands = active learning! Fun, down-to-earth nature based ideas & educational resources for Grubby kids!

Magnifying Glass Silliness! {+ Free printable activity sheet}

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You can’t get a more enthusiastic response to a science lesson than producing some magnifying glasses!  A tub full of magnifying glasses is an essential part of any well stocked nature table, and is a great way to get your students involved in observing, comparing, describing and asking questions.  

A 10 minute magnifying glass lesson can morph into just about any curriculum area….. science (obviously!) language skills, art, research, writing and more.  Even your most reluctant learner should get their interest sparked by viewing something new and unusual.  You could also take a nature walk to collect some special treasures to study before embarking on your magnifying mission.

~TOP 10 CLASSROOM FRIENDLY THINGS TO STUDY:~


1) Your hand (finger prints, pores, fingernails)
2) A friends eyes (or your eyes if you also add a mirror)
3) A piece of hair, pet fur or feathers
4) Fabric, Velcro, zippers and stitching
5) Insects (dried shells, spider webs and slow moving creepy crawlies!)
6) Plants, leaves, wood, bark & flowers
7) Rocks, pebbles or crystals (salt and sugar are also interesting)
8) Soil, dirt and seeds
9) Your lunch!  Sandwiches, crackers, fruit, cheese etc.
10) Beach finds – seashells, sand and seaweed


USING MAGNIFYING GLASSES IN CLASS ~TOP TIPS~
  • Hand-lenses are much more powerful than the ‘lollypop’ shaped magnifying glasses, but are trickier to use (you have to hold the lens quite close to your eye and move very close to the object you’re viewing, which is a little scary if you’re trying to view a big hairy spider!)  I’d suggest collecting a mixture of magnifying glasses if possible.
  • At the first introduction of magnifying glasses to your class, I’d suggest letting the kids be ‘off-task’ and free to explore and have fun (and by that I mean laugh hysterically at each other’s giant eyeballs, check to see who has the most boogers up their nose etc!)
  • Encourage them to experiment with how far away to hold their magnifying glasses from their faces and from the object they’re studying (most children hold them far too close to their face).  SLOOWWLLYY moving the magnifying glass also works much better than jerking it around
  • If you’re worried about your class using glass magnifiers, you can purchase plastic ones at most dollar stores (but plastic lenses scratch far more easily and have varying quality)
  • Make some connections between wearing glasses and using a magnifying glasses.  Magnifying glasses have a curved ‘convex’ lens that makes things appear bigger – what do glasses have?
  • Think outside the box when it comes to magnification – do you have access to digital cameras with a strong zoom lens? (This has the added bonus of being able to save what you observe) Are your students old enough to gently handle a microscope? (These are also an amazing thing to include on your nature table if possible)  Even better – does your school have access to a digital microscope?  These are awe inspiring when hooked up to your overhead projector…
  • Don’t forget to take a photo of your children with their magnifying glasses so they can share their learning with others later
  • If you need a little more structure, organise a variety of different stations around the classroom that the children can rotate through (sketching or making notes as they go)
  • If you have a special topic that you’re learning about or studying, you might want to use the following sheet to scaffold their observations.  The children start by draw a picture in the box about what they can see (before using the magnifying glass) then complete the sheet with their magnifying glass observations – “What can you now see that you couldn’t see before?”  You can find your free copy of this sheet below!
~Download your FREE PRINTABLE here!~

DISCLAIMER: The author takes no responsibility for cries of “Ohh my gosh Mrs__________ your wrinkles are ginormous” or “Whoa, that’s a lot of grey hairs” etc….

Above all – have some fun!  Science is all about observation and asking questions… no need to get too serious!

Happy magnifying, 
Grubbily yours,

How to squeeze a daily dose of nature into your busy classroom routine {+36 free ‘Nature Snack’ prompt cards!}

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Respect your class’s need for a few minutes here and there to just burn off some energy, run bare feet and feel the wind in their hair… in fact, why not take your shoes off and join them?

Ekk!  I’m uber excited to be guest blogging over at Rachel Lynette’s fabulous blog ‘Minds in Bloom!’  Whip on over there for a peek at my blog post: “Nature Snacks: How to Squeeze a Daily Dose of Nature into Your Classroom.”  It’s full of lots of practical tips and a free set of 36 ‘nature snack’ cards with prompts that encourage engagement with the natural world…some of the cards can be used inside the classroom by looking out the window, others can be used while moving as a class from one part of the school to the other, and some are best used outside in the playground!

Check out the blog post above or click here for your free set of cards!
Grubbily yours,

Happy Equinox! (FREE Vernal & Autumnal wall display posters)

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Grab your free copy of these printables here.

Here in NZ, we often think that autumn has arrived the moment we hit the month of March, even though technically autumn doesn’t arrive until the AUTUMNAL EQUINOX (which is normally around the 20th of March every year).  Of course this also means that our friends in the northern hemisphere are heading into their VERNAL EQUINOX at the same time (otherwise known as spring!)

Did you know…..equinoxes occur when the axis of the earth (the line between the north to south poles) is exactly perpendicular to the suns rays?  This only happens on two days of the year – the spring and autumn equinoxes.  This means that on these days, the day and night lengths are nearly exactly the same (12 hours).  The word EQUINOX comes from the Latin ‘aequus’ (equal) and ‘nox’ (night), because on the equinox the night and day are nearly the same.


Click here to see a ‘Brain Pop’ video clip that better models how the earth tilts, and explains how these equinoxes work.


The posters (above) are perfect for displaying on your nature table to mark the transition from: winter to spring (if you’re in the northern hemisphere), or summer to autumn/fall (if you’re in the southern hemisphere like me!)  They pair really well with our seasonal nature walk recording sheets (as seen below).  Going on a nature walk to mark the changing of the seasons is an activity that most kids will love, and once back in the classroom they can reflect on their experiences by recording the seasonal ‘clues’ they spotted on the nature walk sheets. 



Which ever hemisphere you’re located on, I hope you’ve had a happy equinox and enjoy the up and coming season!

Grubbily yours,

Bringing active learning to your Nature Table {PART 1}

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Adding a few prompts to your nature table is a great way to get your children engaging closely with their nature finds! 
You can find our Nature Table Sorting Arrows here.
One of the simplest ideas is to get your children to arrange their finds on to a continuum (biggest to smallest, roughest to smoothest, heaviest to lightest etc).  I like to use arrows to support their arrangements, but you could just talk about different ways to group your objects and choose one to experiment with.  These types of activities are a great way to incorporate the skills of organising, comparing, ranking and ordering!
 

My little Grub attempting to match up and ‘nest’ his shells together.

Simple structure around how they’re required to group their materials often encourages very careful observation and healthy debate among kids – which one is the smoothest/plainest?  Which is the heaviest?  This is also a great time to remind them that there is often no correct answer and we all do things differently!

 

Don’t forget to take a photo of your child with their arrangement when they’ve finished (especially if the materials they’re using are somewhat ephemeral…)

You can find our Nature Table Task Card pack here.
Have fun!
Grubbily yours,

Toddler Nature Walk DO’s & DON’Ts!

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Fresh air (maybe bare feet) and grubby hands – that’s what a nature walk is all about!  My ideas about exactly how a nature walk should work have changed a huge amount since having my son…. So here are 2 groups of ideas, one for rambling along with a toddler (below) and the other for nature walking with a school aged class.
 
TODDLER RAMBLING DO’S:
 
  •          DO give up any ideas of having a destination to reach….. Just bumble along at their speed and try to be patient. If you feel yourself getting the urge to hurry them along, practice doing some deep breathing, take some photos of your little explorer, or do some gentle stretches!
  •          DO be guided by what interests THEM.  You may be very excited by a stunning blossom, but they might be enjoying picking up tiny bits of gravel or poking a twig into the dirt – and that’s totally fine!
  •          DO use lots of words to describe what they’re doing/touching/smelling/seeing etc.  Talking about their 5 senses is a good place to start.
  •          DO take lots of photos of their special treasures so you can look at them later and talk about your adventures (Have a peek at our Upcycled Toddler Board book post for more ideas!)
  •          DO discuss showing respect and being gentle with living things – talk with them beforehand if there are specific things that they can’t touch or collect such as mushrooms or insects.  Talking about where little creatures live is a great way to nurture empathy (e.g. let’s roll that log back over – it’s where the beetle’s home is!)
  •          DO remember safety first.  Always watch carefully to make sure nothing icky ends up in their mouths, and that they’re wearing appropriate clothing and footwear.
  •          DO choose a nature walk location that’s not too stressful for you (e.g. the beach at low tide is a more relaxing ramble than trying to wrestle them out of the high tide every 3 seconds!)
  •          DO take along a camera, a little bucket (to save your pockets from getting filled with gooey things!) and if your toddler is older, a plastic magnifying glass.
  •          DO have a special place at home where they can keep their natural treasures.  My little man stores his nature finds at the base of a sturdy outdoor pot plant (perfect for things I’d rather weren’t brought inside!) and in the base of a dried Nikau palm frond inside (but any container made of natural materials would be perfect).  He periodically pulls things out, puts them into different containers, takes them out to his water tray and enjoys banging them together.  ‘Nature tables’ for this age don’t need to be anything fancy, just make sure they can reach their treasures!
 
TODDLER RAMBLING DON’TS:
  •          DON’T make a big deal about dirt, mess or mud.  You might want to set aside some special ‘exploring clothes’ that you wear on your adventures so you can just let them enjoy nature!  Pack a spare change of clothes and if they do get really dirty make sure you get some good photos!
  •         DON’T stop them poking and whacking things with sticks (just make sure they know what they can and can’t poke (e.g. it’s ok to poke the dirt and whack the rocks; it’s NOT OK to poke people or bugs etc.)
  •          DON’T make going on a nature walk a ‘big thing’ – depending on the age and attention span of your toddler, A daily 10 minute potter around your garden or local park/beach is perfect, and much more preferable than an occasional long walk.  Have fun!
Thanks for popping by!

Grubbily yours,