State Nature Symbols

Did you know that every state has an official state bird and flower? Most states also have several other state animals and plants: insects, trees, reptiles, mammals, etc. These symbols often represent a beautiful and common example of the state's wildlife, and it's fun to find out what your state symbols are. Here is a photograph of me feeding my state bird, the Black-capped Chickadee.

There are many online sources for information about state plants and animals. Wikipedia has photographs of all state birds and flowers. For a complete list of all state animals and plants, go to http://www.statesymbolsusa.org/ Have you seen your state bird in the school yard? Is the state tree or flower growing anywhere nearby? I live in Massachusetts. Here are my state animals and plants:

Bird: Black-capped Chickadee

Flower: Mayflower

Tree: American Elm

Insect: Ladybug

Fish: Cod

Marine Mammal: Atlantic Right Whale

Mammal: White-Tailed Deer

Reptile: Garter Snake

Lady Bug, Lady Bug!

Here I am outside with the children letting our Lady Bugs go. Get them at your local garden center.

Lady Bugs are another fascinating insect to study. Here are some Lady Bug facts:

• Lady Bugs are actually beetles, and, like all insects, have six legs
• There are almost 5,000 different kinds of Lady Bugs around the world; 400 species live in North America
• Lady Bugs taste so terrible that birds will not eat them
• Lady Bugs favorite food is aphids
• You can tell Lady Bugs apart by their color and number of spots
• Lady Bugs are the state insect in Delaware, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Ohio, and Tennessee (my next blog will be about state animals: birds, insects, etc)

Lady Bug Resources:

1. http://www.insectlore.com/ Insect Lore sells a variety of Lady Bug materials.
2. http://www.google.com/ Search on Lady Bugs, then click Images.
3. www.geocities.com/sseagraves/ladybugteachersguide.htm For Lady Bug information and activity ideas.

Beautiful Stuff

This book, Beautiful Stuff, Learning with found Materials, by Cathy Weisman Topol and Lella Gandini (Davis, 1999), is an excellent resource for implementing a recycling materials project in an early childhood classroom. Colorful, inviting photographs document the collecting, sorting, and using of a variety of intriguing and readily available recycled materials. More than just toilet tissue rolls, recycled materials add a wealth of variety and creativity as materials for children's art. Each face, each fish, each representation is unique, because the materials are unique, and an so they are an important language for children. I have implemented a similar project in my preschool, and I do a 'Beautiful Stuff' workshop in my curriculum planning course in my community college early childhood education program. I was recently delighted to meet Cathy when we both presented at a materials conference for teachers, then again at another conference where we both were in attendance. At each conference I heard teacher after teacher express their appreciation for to her for this book.
What a great way for us to model recycling and help save the planet!

More Resources for Nature Education- Web Sites

Just in time to prepare for Earth Day next month!

1. This link, from Beyond the Journal (NAEYC) connects you to several helpful articles and resource lists, including a book list. The articles are in pdf format, and are available at no cost.

January 2008: Teaching and Learning about the Natural World. This issue offers research-based ideas and practical strategies to give children many opportunities to explore, appreciate, and value the natural world. For more ideas about children and nature, see the two articles published exclusively online. You’ll also find four articles from the January 2008 issue of Young Children as well as additional resources and columns.

2. This link connects you to a page on the National Wildlife Federation web site, Outside in Nature. This page includes several free articles, including Connecting Today's Kids to Nature Action Guide, as well as several activity guides for teachers.

http://www.nwf.org/outside/
National Wildlife Federation

3. This link is a nature resource bibliography.
http://ectc.nde.ne.gov/media/bibs/nature.pdf
Nature Resource Bibliography

4. This article describes what is called the Schoolyard Habitat Movement; how to create natural schoolyard habitats in your outdoor space.
http://eelink.net/eetap/info23.pdf
Schoolyard Habitat Article

Teachers all over the country are creating intentional and engaging nature education exeriences for young children. Take advantage of the multitude of resources for teachers.

Nature Materials and Forms: Inspirations from the work of Andy Goldsworthy-Spirals in Nature

I first encountered the work of Andy Goldsworthy in a film clip during a leadership seminar led by Margaret Wheatley. It immediately struck me as something that teachers should know about. Soon after, I found a photograph of a child's stone spiral constructed next to the cover of Goldsworthy's amazing book, A Collaboration with Nature (1990), and I soon started introducing the images and materials to students in my curriculum courses.
Recently, in the process of developing a photo-presentation for a workshop for teachers, I became enamored by all of the spirals in nature: from snail shells to galaxies, seed patterns in a sunflower head to fiddle head ferns, a ram's horn to the petal patterns of a rose.
The spiral is one of the most ancient human symbols and was described mathematically by the ancient Greeks, including Archimedes. I like them because they are simple and elegant, and children are naturally drawn to them- they love snails and curly snakes and anything that loops around. It's a form they can make using a variety of media and materials.
Check out spirals in google images, then go on a spiral hunt in your school yard. Introduce photographs and natural spirals to the children and see what happens. It's a lovely way to help children connect to the natural world.

Go to flickr.com and search on dgmurphy2002 to see some photographs of Goldsworthy-inspired art by student teachers.

Resources and Inspirations- A great book

Picture Science, Using Digital Photography to Teach Young Children, by Carla Neuman-Hinds. Redleaf Press. 2007

This is a wonderful book to help you get started introducing children to nature science. It includes dozens of photographs and sample lesson plans, many with a focus on plants. It is divided into four sections: photography for collecting and analyzing data, photography for demonstrating conclusions, photography for making the process of inquiry visible, and photography for creating documentation. One great idea is a photo-scavenger hunt. Take close-up photographs of nature around the school and mount them on cardboard. Have the children match one card at a time to the actual objects out in the yard. There are ideas for creating charts, sequencing, sorting and matching activities, puzzles and making books. It is very concrete and will inspire you to invent your own activities. You do not have to be a scientist or a photographer to implement the great ideas in your classroom.

Butterflies: A Great Place to Start

Almost everyone is attracted to butterflies, so they are a great window into the world of nature. I actually wanted to a Lepidpterist (a person who studies butterflies and moths) when I was 12 years old, until I found out that you had to kill them to study them! No thank you!
Many early childhood teachers include a cursory treatment of butterflies as a unit, but there is so much more. Here are some tips and resources for enhancing and enriching your butterfly studies:
1. Find out what kind of butterflies live in your area. For instance, on Cape Cod, Massachusetts where I live, there are over 70 species of butterflies! Contact your local nature museum, county extension, of get a butterfly field guide and look at the range maps to see if they might be in your area. You can also go out on your own before you talk with the children and look for them, too. Butterflies are often seen in wild meadows and fields, along the borders of woodlands and forests, as well as in gardens, especially butterfly gardens.

2. Borrow or buy a copy of The Family Butterfly Book, by Rick Mikula. There are literally hundreds of books about butterflies, but this one is itened to be used with children and is very comprehensive and includes detailed information on butterfly gardens, raising butterflies, and lists the most common butterflies as well.

3. Find out more about the butterflies in your area. Did you know that each species of butterfly has it's own caterpillar food plant (No, they do NOT eat grass!) and favorite nectaring plants as adults? You can attract specific butterflies from your area to your school yard by planting both types of plants. Did you know that butterflies sip nectar through a long "straw" that they keep curled up until they need it? Patient, careful observation can reveal this and more, which is why studying butterflies have all of the benefits of engaging children in nature.

You can google butterflies for web sites and images. They are there by the thousands, testiment to the human facination with butterflies.