aenvironment

MINI-ENVIRONMENTAL ED:
Earth Day/Recycling/Mr. Garbage Man Beautiful Wildflowers

Earth Day/Recycling/Mr. Garbage Man
From Stormie:
Although I'm posting ideas below as often as I can, I have reserved my very favorite "Garbage Helpers and Recycling" activities for my "COMMUNITY HELPERS" booklet (see the "Stormie's Stuff for Teachers" section of my website).

Hugs: Take a globe with you to group time. Discuss the location of land, water, your state, etc. Talk enthusiastically about how much we love the earth and why/how we need to take care of it. Then pass "Our Earth" around the circle so that everyone can give it a big hug. You can also hug trees, plants, leaves, sticks, etc.

Wordless Walk: Take a "wordless" walk after a rainstorm, on a foggy morning, after the grass has been mowed, (or anytime). Listen for sounds of nature. Sniff the air. Look for all kinds of outdoor life (from insects to birds and squirrels). Instruct the children before the walk that when they smell something, point to their noses. When they see something, point to their eyes. And when they hear something, point to their ears.
Consider taking walks along the same pathway each time to compare differences between dry and wet grounds and to make new discoveries, or go at various times of the day to compare nature in sun and shadow. Go barefoot when possible.

Stop, Look, and Listen: When your classroom windows are open in Spring, stop what you're doing and listen to the birds. What do you think they're saying? Or, listen to the rain as it falls outside your classroom. Listen to the wind blowing. Dress warmly and go outside to enjoy the first snowstorm of the year. Can you hear the snow falling?

Grass: Sit in it, run through it, roll in it, smell it, run your fingers through it, all the while talking excitedly about it.

Wild Things: If at all possible, how about a snack consisting of only things that grow in the wild (tree nuts, berries, sassafras, for example)

Oh Look!: Get into the habit of expressing joy upon seeing natural things ("Oh look, there's a blossom on that tree. Let's go smell it"). By the same token, express sadness upon seeing an abuse of our earth ("Oh look, someone threw plastic on the

ground. I hope the birds in that tree don't try to eat it.")

Rock Play: Collect rocks of all sizes and shapes for children to investigate and compare.

Cloud Watching: Lie down on your backs on the playground and simply watch the clouds.

Nature Mural (two-day project): Provide paints in the colors of nature (blues, greens, browns, yellows, etc). Have the children draw an abstract painting on a long strip of butcher paper. Once it has dried, have them return and glue items from nature on it (bird feathers, leaves, twigs, pinecones, etc).

Magnification: Allow the children to take magnifying glasses outdoors to look at things in nature.

Where Are All the Animals in the Forest? This activity will take some work in advance on your part, but once it's done, you'll have something you can use over and over again. Glue several small boxes of varying heights together, then using collage materials, create a very simple forest scene. (Create caves by cutting arches into boxes, round pieces of Styrofoam (painted green) can become hills, trees can be created from craft sticks glued onto a paper green treetop then simply pushed into a box, logs can be made from cardboard tubings, etc.) During Free Choice Play, sit down with a child and ask him/her to place forest animal toys in various positions throughout the forest: "Can you make the bear go INSIDE a cave?" "Can you make the deer stand IN FRONT OF a tree?" "Can you make the rabbit run THROUGH the log?" "Can you make the squirrel run UP the hill, DOWN the hill?" And so on.
Variation: Have the children themselves create the forest scene then use the toy animals to tell their own story as you print their words on paper. This activity is also perfect for use with the theme of "Animals."

Bug Sounds: Go outdoors and "listen" for bugs.

Pictures: Show pictures and short videos of natural places, pointing out exciting landscape features and/or animals

Also in celebration of the earth, do a unit on the very valuable community helper of "Garbage Man," and include recycling.

From Stormie:

Crushing: During your "Recycling" unit, provide plastic milk cartons and liter bottles for children to crush with their "bare hands." Little boys especially love this as they can be SO STRONG, but it'll be your secret that it also works those large arm muscles at the same time.

Mr. Garbage Man: In advance of school starting for the day, gently scatter some "light litter" (like gum wrappers, small paper strips, styrofoam pieces, etc). During your Greetings Group Time, announce that the special play for the Blocks Center is to use all the toy dump trucks to go around the classroom and gather trash like our wonderful community helper, the "Garbage Man." Discuss why this job is so important to us and the earth. Where do they take the trash?

From Donna King, Roxboro, North Carolina:
Recycling Focus: I think "recycling" is such an important topic--I do it every year. I start off the week by putting out boxes labeled for each kind of recyclable item that our town takes, and I invite each child to bring one item per day. Each day we count the items in the boxes, see which is more, less, bigger, smaller, etc, and sometimes we take the items out and sort them back into their boxes. And of course, I read books on the importance of recycling. At the end of the week we go to the Recycling Center and recycle our items. Sometimes I get the recycling truck to visit our school and we put some of our stuff in it. Believe it or not, my children think this is one of the best field trips we go on.

From LisaRae Benincasa:
Sign Language: Dear Stormie, As it relates to your "Wordless Walk" activity (see near top this page), I've been teaching the children some basic American Sign Language, which is helpful on this particular outing. This encourages the children to communicate in another way. Additionally, a good video to help with this is "Blue's Clues All Kinds of Signs." In fact, after learning some ASL, I've discovered that there are many uses of sign language on Blue's Clues.

From Linda Goad, Covenant Nursery School, Evanston, Illinois:
The Can Man: Hi Stormie, I too think it is of upmost importance to teach our children about nature and our place in it. At our school, we talk about recycling and respect for all things living on earth. In fact, it's an ongoing theme throughout the school year. We take neighborhood/nature walks periodically, and purposely, to witness the changing seasons, and for an all school assembly, we have "The Can Man" come to tell us what items can be recycled.
Note from Stormie: Call me crazy, but when I read Linda's great idea above, I immediately began humming the tune once sang by Sammy Davis, Jr. called "The Candy Man." Maybe we could come up with some words and create a song about the "Can Man," huh? If any of you come up with one before I get a chance to do so, please send it to me for posting here. :-)

From Stormie:
*Deer At the Brook, by Jim Arnosky: Children get to go through the woods with a deer.
*Listen To the Rain, by Bill Martin Jr. and John Archambault; Illustrated by James Endicott: This is a wonderful book about rain.
*Dinosaurs To the Rescue: A Guide To Protecting Our Planet, by Laurie Krasny Brown and Marc Brown: A delightful book about "Slobosaurus" who learns about respecting the earth and how to recycle.
*Being Wasteful, Written by Joe Berry; Illustrated by John Costanza: This little book briefly teaches children about not wasting things like food, water, electricity, etc.

Pam Bruns Works, from Topeka, Kansas suggests this book:
Home Sweet Home, by Jean Marzollo; Ashley Wolff, Illustrator: This is a wonderful picture book for preschoolers (and emergent readers) that celebrates what the earth has to offer us. The illustrations bring the animals and spring season to life using vibrant colors, and the message this book brings is a delight to both children and adults alike.

Making a Multi-Cultural Connection Through Books:
To provide a frame of reference, show children where countries are located on your classroom globe or map, and if possible, provide related pictures and books:

*Book sugggestion from Stormie:
Where Are You Going Manyoni? by Catherine Stock: This story takes us through the jungle with an African child on his way to school

*Bonnie T from Colorado Springs, Colorado suggests this book that sounds like a wonderful multi-cultural connection between people and the earth:
All the Colors of the Earth, by Sheila Hamanaka. Bonnie says that it shows paintings of children in the colors of "roaring bears and soaring eagles" to the "tinkling pinks of tiny seashells by the rumbling sea" in the environments mentioned. The summary inside the book reads, "With sunlight like butterflies happy and free, children come in all the colors of the earth and sky and sea. A joyous rhyme that celebrates the special qualities of every child."

Beautiful Wildflowers:

Note from Stormie: Environmental Education activities will be included in my "Stormie's Activity Cards." If you would like to begin collecting all my classroom ideas (each on a 4 x 6" index card), click here to check them out.

This ends "APRIL" themes and activities for now but many more are coming. Please understand that maintaining my webpages has now become a part-time career for me, and the cost of site maintenance has steadily risen over time. So, if you benefit from this website and would like to see it continue, please purchase "Stormie's Stuff for Teachers," and/or make occasional financial donations where possible to help defer the costs of keeping my site on the internet.

CONTINUE ON

OR

REVIEW APR CURRICULUM CURRICULUMS INDEX WEBSITE INDEX HOME

My website address: http://www.preschoolbystormie.com