Dino Dig

About three years ago I had a the 'brilliant' idea of putting a bunch of plastic dinosaurs in plaster. Little did I know that over three years it became part of my mission to release them. I could easily do it myself, but I thought i'd give the children a chance. There were some brief successes over the years where the children managed to free one of the little guys, but for the most part there they sat, encased in plaster. 

Much of the lack of success has been due to the lack of me of thinking like a child, and involving the children in the problem solving process. It was this time, that I asked the children what we needed to release these dinosaurs. The children recalled what they had seen in one of our books.... shovels, hammers, brushes, water, etc. Of course, why not use the real thing?!?!?

We've been completely engrossed in the wonders that are dinosaurs, and it was a great opportunity to practice our paleontology skills. So when the children arrived this week, the sensory table was set up like this.  

The children recovered the tools mentioned above. And rather that digging in head first into the project, they carefully used their paleontology knowledge to recover the 'plastered dinos' I'm not kidding, they drove ME crazy with their patience to detail in retrieving the dinosaurs, brushing each little granule of sand until the dinosaur was nearly lifting itself out of the sand!

This is what the children carefully brushed the sand away from. Then immediately set to work on extracting the dinos from their plaster prison!

Our tinkering tools were carefully laid out (by the children) and ready for extracting. You can also see that some plastic blueberries were also set out on the table as a tool that could be used. Not sure what for, perhaps in case the paleontologist became hungry during the dig. A picture further down the page you can also see the a tiny toaster was deemed a useful tool. Of course, it was! 

Of course some children just enjoyed moving the sand around. The softness of the recovery as opposed to the loudness of the extracting was a bit more soothing.

Then came the giant spike nails. Again, these items we are retrieved by the children when I gave them full reign of my 'actual' tool shelf. I'm pretty sure the enormity of the nails was appeal in itself, but they were very practical too!

I got very excited when I saw that the dinos had left and imprint on the plaster. The children were impressed, but I did get the impression that they were trying to humour me, as the thrill of hammering was more satisfying

Back at work, it took a lot of skill to keep the plaster still, as well as hold the nail and hammer all at the same time. These children made it seem like it was the easiest thing in the world!

I would say it was a successful dino dig, would you?

Of course, who could forget, that after being encased in plaster for three years, the dinos were in dire need of a bath, so that's right where they headed!

Natural Paintbrushes

We collected these pine needles from our backyard, so we could paint with them. The pictures that they made were quite neat, the smell was an extra bonus too!

The dinosaurs got in on the painting action too. 

Plus the plastic trees from our really fun grass table.

Then the paintings evolved into car painting. 

We're pretty excited to share our latest addition to our room. Our grass table has become a favourite miniature playscape. We planted the grass a few weeks ago, and the children looked forward to checking in on the progress each day. It's finally ready to set up little scenes, and reenact some fantastic stories!

Tubes are for what???

Last week I scored the mother load! A parent drove past these out front of an industrial building and immediately called me! They have now been transferred to our outdoor space. The best part of it all, is a few days later my mum and I drove past the building again, and BOOM! there they were again, so we picked them up, and now we have 11! I think we are going to have to send the industrial company a thank you note, and perhaps a note to let them know to keep 'em coming.

The children have noticed them over the last few days, but I think that some of the children were a bit overwhelmed by the enormous size of them. So last week I layed them out like this:

The children were still not too interested in them, yes, there were a couple takers, and the odd child went through one or two tubes, but quickly went onto something else. It takes patience and creativity to draw attention to things. I was beginning to think that the children were not as interested in them as I was... and that's ok.

BUT, today, with it being rainy and wet and the tubes being cardboard, I wasn't as eager to set them out, so I left them on the pallets, in a stack, under some poly plastic. 

Often not doing anything purposeful leads to something more inventive. That's what happened today!

The children immediately started climbing into the tubes.

They discovered they made great hiding spots. The thing that surprised me most of all, and you can just see it in the top right hand corner of the picture, was that this hiding spot evolved into a giant game of  'whack-a-mole'! It was with our plastic bat, and the children on the receiving end of the bat found that it hurt, but still wanted to play the game. I remembered I had some pool noodles in our storage room, so I rushed to bring them out, and the game continued and developed into a full attendance game. The pool noodles were great replacements and ensured no trips to the ice packs!

I tried to capture what I saw when it was my turn to be the whacker.

After a while the children got really into climbing in and out of the tubes and started to test how many children could fit in a tube together.

2 children....

3 children... then I was invited in, and that was not a good experience for both myself and the children... so no pictures!

We then brought them down on to the grass and rolled them around a bit.

And even rolled inside them....

The children made comparisons in the size to our biggest ball...

And climbed in and out of them again and again!

Then came the time that I got in the tube and the children rolled me down the hill. I tried to get a 'rolling photo series' of what I saw when I went down the hill! 

Rolling others down the hill is part of the fun! 

The tubes are making their way into our outdoor play... what other shenanigans will we get up to with these? You'll have to check in and see! 

I also wanted to share these two photos, because now that spring is here, we are able to spend a little more TLC on our outdoor space, and here's step one. 

This corner area was overgrown with weeds and random bits of garbage. So we fenced it off with the intent of getting to it at a later date. Well, the later date has arrived! It was rototilled and ready for grass seed and wood chips, so stay tuned for the progress to this little area and the rest of our yard. There's some exciting plans a foot!

Nature's Playground

*Just a disclaimer... my batteries in my camera were dying, so some photos are a little blurry.*

Earlier in the week we took a trek out to our local forest. This is a new experience for some of the children, and of course part of walking in the forest is exploring and discovering hidden gems, and that's just what we did.

The younger children worked very hard to keep up with the big guys, and they made a valiant effort, because the big guys found something awesome!

Of course sticks picked up along the way are always part of the trip!

Also part of the exploration is discovering new things and being curious about these new things.

This tree was COVERED with fungus. I don't know who was more interested, me or the children.

At the end of the path that we explored was a little wooden bridge, underneath we found a little stream.

Climbing over those fallen logs proved a challenge for the smaller children. Of course part of the reason I love exploring the forest with the children, is that it helps them to be aware of the uneven ground, and develops their gross motor muscles without them even knowing it! This is a weekly trip for us, so I foresee the younger children leaping over the fallen logs before too long.

A little further down the stream was a lush green area, also accompanied by a bridge, and some natural 'waterfalls'. 

This forest is home to so much potential, and experiences!