The Jeffers Foundation-An excellent resource for Minnesota Educators

If you are a Teacher in Minnesota please check out the website for the Jeffers Foundation.  They have a lot of wonderful resources that connect teachers and students with outdoor learning and nature. 

I was able to attend one of the three day Team Teaching with Mother Nature and it was engaging, fun and helpful.  I have more ideas and resources now for teaching outdoors.  Jeffers was also very generous.  The workshop was free, they provided lunch each day and they loaded me up with resources!  Please check out this hidden gem!  If you don't teach in Minnesota there are many resources on the Jeffers website that you can use for free!  Enjoy!

Using my new cloud and sky viewers that I made at the Jeffers workshop.  Made from upcycled cardboard, paint chip samples and cloud cut outs from and old calendar!

Theme Days: Get Outside and Play Day!

 Theme days are a fun way to break up the regular routine or celebrate the last week of school.  My goal was to create thematic outdoor stations that had novel activities and kept student engaged.  Here is the breakdown of my Get Outside and Play Day!   This was a replacement for field day.  I tried to keep it very simple and sustainable.  I borrowed most of the equipment from our Phy. Ed. teacher.  I had a few volunteers and used a rotation system.  I try to plan activities that include all students the entire time so no one has to wait.  This kept engagement high and behavior issues low.

Hmmm, there is a big red egg hidden here somewhere.

One of the most simple games was The Great Egg Hunt! One child hides the "egg" in the forest while the rest of the kids hang out somewhere and don't peek.  When given the signal, the kids search for the egg (or whatever object you have laying around).  The hider may not search but may give hints or do the "hot and cold" cues.  The finder of the egg is the next hider. We did this in our little forest area but it could be easily adapted to a playground.  The egg itself was a completely random gift from one of the playground supervisors.  I had no idea what I would use it for until I made up this game.

Don't Spill The Beans! (Notice our strategic use of shade).  All you need is a cup or other container and a few bags of dried beans.  I marked a starting and ending spot and made up ways for kids to move from one end of our space to the other. (Run, skip, hold the cup on your head, gallop, etc.) If you spill your beans you have to try to pick them up.  Sustainability bonus, lost beans either compost on their own in the grass, serve as food for squirrels or sprout and provide some intrigue to the grounds crew.  

Next time I do this I will try different sized and shaped containers and kids can try a turn with each.  You decide on the amount of beans.

Bean Bag Golf (sorry, this isn't the greatest picture).  A golf course is created using cones to mark the "tee" or throwing spots and hula hoops to act as the holes.   Bean bags are tossed from the cone to the hula hoop. The idea is to make the course more challenging at subsequent holes. Each child gets one bean bag to use throughout the course and could go around the course as many times as time allowed.

Cone Tee Ball!  You need a taller cone for each group member, bats and whiffle type balls.  Kids bat at their tee and chase down the ball to put back on their cone for their next turn.  They love this game! (Notice another strategic use of shade)

In order to provide enough stations to keep the number of participants to 4 per station I added a sidewalk chalk station and a swing on the swing station (all in the same area for supervision purposes).  This gave the kids a break from running and added some extra artistic beauty to the play area.  We carried water bottles with us the entire day.  I was even able to set this up with enough simplicity and volunteers that our Kindergarten classes, 2nd grade classes and distance learning classes were able to participate in their own 45 minute time slot.

Theme Days: Wacky Painting Day!

 Theme days are a fun way to break up the regular routine or celebrate the last week of school.  My goal was to create thematic outdoor stations that had novel activities and kept student engaged.  Here is the breakdown of my wacky painting day! (We had to do this one inside because it was raining). This is an exploration of color mixing and texture.  It can get pretty messy (which means you're doing it right!). Be sure you have kids write their names on their papers before giving them painting tools and play for lots of space to put their creating to dry!  I try to keep my stations to a 4 student max so I included a reading station, snack station and hand washing station.

In this picture kids are painting clay rocks they made.  I love using egg cartons and cotton swabs to hold paint because they are compostable and I save water by not having as many things to wash.

I used Crayola brand air dry clay, which I purchased through Amazon.  It has a really nice clay texture but doesn't require a kiln.

Here, kids are exploring textures and stamping techniques by using mashers and other cooking utensils.  I find these at garage sales and thrift stores.

Again, I use compostable paper plates to hold the paint.

This is another favorite!  Car wheel painting!  Kids love creating lines and wheels with different textured car wheels.  

One of these kids is trying to paint his name with car wheels.

Kids were encouraged to dress wacky to celebrate the day!

Here is their wacky teacher!

Theme Day: Beach or Water Day

Theme days are a fun way to break up the regular routine or celebrate the last week of school.  My goal was to create thematic outdoor stations that had novel activities and kept student engaged.  Here is the breakdown of my beach/water theme day.  Kids love water.  I wanted to offer the sensory experience of water without a lot of water waste, or complicated hose hook ups or water balloons (time consuming and leave a bunch of garbage) and wet clothes.  For our beach day, kids were encouraged to dress in beachy or tropical clothes but knew that we wouldn't be swimming or running through sprinklers (not an option at my site).  Here are the simple activities we did have.

I used 2 big plastic tubs and loaded them with bath toys, containers, basters and droppers.  I expected the kids to spread out but they mostly stuck together and created their own stories with the sea creatures as the characters.  This confirmed my belief that kids benefit from dramatic play.

This was the easiest station to set up!  Each child was given a cup of water and an old paint brush and were given the entire building or sidewalk to paint with water.  No refills though.

The kids were able to observe evaporation up close and stayed engaged.  Some worked on collective painting and others chose to work on their own.  The shadows in the picture add an extra element of "cool".

Each child was given a frozen ice pop as a snack (shown on the back of the picture).  In the future, I will try to have the kids make them the day before and get a first hand experience with reversible change through freezing and melting.  This year, freezer space was not available.  I put out National Geographic Kids magazines for the reading stations.  Kids who had never chosen one of these for their book box were completely engaged in the informational text style!

I am learning more about cooperative games as a way of teaching SEL and taking the edge off winning and loosing every time games are played.  Pictured here is a game called The Sneaky Snacky Squirrel. I changed the rules a bit so that the sneaky squirrel give someone else a nut rather than stealing a nut.

Another favorite cooperative game is Hoot Owl, Hoot.  The players have to work together to get all the owlets to their nest before the sun rises.  Both games are available at Target.

 

Not A Box Day!

A fun STEAM activity that uses upcycled materials is having a "Not a Box" day.  If you are unfamiliar with this book, here is a link to my favorite animated read aloud.

 Not a Box Animated Read Aloud

I created some very simple planning pages.

Not a Box Stem planning page

I added an element of measuring to include measure math standards.  Here is a picture of measuring our boxes heights and widths with cubes.

Completed Creations!

Camp/Camping Day

 Theme days are a fun way to break up the regular routine or celebrate the last week of school.  My goal was to create thematic outdoor stations that had novel activities and kept student engaged.  Here is the breakdown of my camp/camping theme day.

We made solar s'mores by wrapping graham crackers, gelatin free marshmallows and chocolate in aluminum foil.  The kids wrote their names on the flattest part of the foil with Sharpie markers (note, next time I do this I would double check these.  There was some confusion over names when it was time to pass out the s'mores)

Then we used my car windshield as a solar oven!  I have a windshield heat deflector that helped create the oven.  I put the s'mores on cookie sheets to help heat them and prevent any dripping onto my dashboard.  We let them "cook" for about 3 hours.  I did need a hot pad to get them out!  

Solar s'more cooker close up!  The kids loved that my car was our oven! As a bonus, my car smelled like chocolate for a day!

Everyone got  to practice their patterning and fine motor skills by creating their own noodle necklaces!  (See my post on dying noodles to get instructions on how to make your own).

Several kids were so proud of their work, they wore their necklaces all week!

As part of the theme, kids could wear pajamas or comfy clothes for the day.  I had 2 high school volunteer counselors play cooperative board games with the kids.  

No camping experience would be complete without reading camp related books in a tent!