Hello one and all, welcome back to the best nature program of all! Put your sunscreen on, grab your favorite sunglasses and join us for a day in the lives of your Knee High Naturalists.
We started off the day with fun nature play, on a search for any crawly critter we could find. Roly poly’s were hiding under every rock we flipped, worms slowly waking up on the chilly morning and spiders running through the fallen leaves. We noticed that there were a lot more leaves on the ground this week, plenty of good hiding spots for bugs! We sang our favorite Good Morning song, talked about our plans for the day and were on our way. We jumped to action, using our words to figure out who would be pulling our cart for the morning and who could help.
We decided to have a picnic style snack today, we all washed our hands, grabbed our snacks and headed to a sunny spot! We noticed that everyone brought some type of fruit again today and talked about our favorite foods—pancakes with butter, apple chips, tortillas and graham crackers all made the list. Some of us picked apples this weekend while others picked pumpkins, we all enjoyed the beautiful fall weather. After snack, some of climbed rocks and some of us colored while we anxiously waited to meet the special birds who were the focus of our lesson. It’s Happy Goose Day, so we learned about a Canadian Snow Goose and a Mallard duck! We noticed that they had feathers instead of fur, which helps them fly and stay warm in the winter. Humans also use their feathers for things like pillows or our snow gear to keep us warm, too! We observed their beaks and how the mallard duck had little lines in his beak that help him filter his food from the water, they looked like the teeth on a comb. We even learned a new word, migration—this means that different birds and butterflies who live in Michigan will move to warmer areas for the winter where they’ll be able to find food and rest before heading north in the summer.
As we set off on our hike, we stopped at a few different overlooks to observe the big tractors and cranes preparing for the arrival of our new bridge across the river. We could sit and watch them all day, they’re so cool! Every day, we get to check in on the progress, watching as the land begins to change and make new observations. We continued on our way down a big, winding set of steps, past giant, white mushrooms as we headed to the boardwalk. We touched the smooth bark of Beech trees, stopped to pick up our favorite leaves and watched a small, clear stream trickling below our feet—how peaceful! We finally arrived at the Discovery Boardwalk and talked about the best way to see frogs and turtles by walking slowly and quietly.
We were instantly rewarded with three turtles, soaking up the warm sun on logs! Though we weren’t able to catch them, it was so fun to look at them and watch how quickly they swam away and disappeared into the weeds. Their shells looked so shiny and so smooth, easily blending to the water and helping camouflage them. Tiny tadpoles swam lazily along the bottom of the pond, mudminnows quickly swimming by them. It took some time, but we eventually began scooping tadpoles out with our knee high naturalists sized nets, everyone yelling with joy as a new critter was put into our observation tank. We all eagerly held tadpoles, observing how squishy and shiny they are, almost like they have glitter in their skin! We noticed that they don’t have arms or legs like adult frogs and that they have tails to help them swim away from things who might want to eat them. Eventually, we were able to catch to frogs and learn about their ears and check out their big, webbed feet that help them swim so well! After we all got to pet the frog, we put in our observation tank so we could safely watch him without fear of an escape.
All too soon, as always, it was time for us to go home! We said good bye to our new frog friends and released them before making our way back up the big, winding steps to the pavilion. We got drinks of water, grabbed our wagon and excitedly made our way to our families, so excited to talk about our watery, wonderful day.
Thank you all for another amazing day in the lives of your Knee High Naturalists! We hope you can get outside and enjoy the beautiful weather, we look forward to seeing you all next week when we learn about fantastic flora and their unique winter survival skills!
