Hello one and all, welcome back to the best nature program of all! Buckle your snowshoes, pull on your hats and get ready to dive into a winter wonderland with your Knee High Naturalists.
Fresh snow greeted us this morning, blanketing nature in a soft, white and sparkly powder that made us smile from ear to ear. The fresh snow is like an open book that we’re excited to read and figure out what types of wildlife have been out and about! A fresh canvas for our snow paint, we made quick work of creating art on every surface in sight (including trees), some of us digging with big shovels and some investigating with garden tools like rakes. While waiting for all of our friends to arrive, we used our winter activity dice to waddle like penguins, fall like snowflakes and roll like snowballs! We talked about our plan for the day and what animals we thought we might see like rabbits, deer and birds. We learned how to freeze like statues so we could observe these animals and learn more about them! We sang a beautiful rendition of our Good Morning song before making our way to the pavilion, pushing and pulling our cart through the very deep snow. We make a terrific team!
Once in the pavilion we took off our gloves, mittens and hats before pulling out our snack. To our surprise, a wooly bear caterpillar was eagerly awaiting us on top of the picnic table! This was one critter we did not expect to see today! We gathered around and set up shop near the caterpillar to observe him as we ate our snack. We noticed that he was soft, not hard and had fur instead of scales or feathers. We also noticed that he curled into a ball when we touched him, we guessed that this was probably because he was scared. We made sure to give him room until he felt comfortable enough to crawl all over the table, greeting each one of us as he walked on by. We used a magnifying glass to see his tiny, sticky feet that let him walk upside down without falling! While we really wanted to feed him, we knew it was best not to feed wild animals and talked about what he might eat in the wild. Fascinated by our new furry friend, we continued to investigate, follow and check on him for the whole class.
As we ate and observed, we talked about today’s weather and learned about snowshoes. We learned that they’ve been around way longer than our grandparents, phones or even the invention of paper! People who lived in places like Michigan and Canada used them to get around in snow way deeper than we are tall, it helped them walk on top of the snow instead of falling in! We matched up snowshoes to every naturalist for the best fit and excitedly strapped them on as we finished with snack. We walked through deep snow, climbed up big snow hills and sometimes even tipped over like penguins as we learned how to walk in them. Every single naturalist tried snowshoeing and many kept their snowshoes on for half of class, too excited to take them off! We explored new areas, found a new little tree to climb and rolled in the snow to our heart’s content, always making sure to check on our furry little friend. We started to wonder what he would look like in Spring and remembered that caterpillars go through metamorphosis, meaning that they will go through a change and look like a whole new animal! We found out that he would hatch into an Isabella tiger moth when the weather gets warmer and looked at pictures of the beautiful, orange moth with six spots down his back. We hope to see him again soon!
After having snow much fun snowshoeing and exploring the winter wonderland, we gathered around for a game of animal charades. Friends stepped up and acted out animals like frogs, rabbits, bears, eagles, snakes, etc. while everyone else tried to guess what they were. We were a little shy at first, but soon got the hang of the game and jumped at the chance to become a silly animal! We loved this game so much that we played until our families picked us up, expressing our creativity with glee. We can’t wait to come back next week for more winter fun!
Thank you all for a wonderful, wintry week in the lives of your Knee High Naturalists! Every one of your naturalists eagerly tried snowshoeing today, climbing up big hills, wading through deep snow, falling and getting back up—we’re so proud of them! We can’t wait to see you all next week to become Friendly Foresters.
