November Urban Nature Play and Learn

At last Friday's Play and Learn we focused on animals getting ready for winter and also did a little bit of leaf art.   Since there was a new family joining us, and a child who seemed a bit shy, we started a little bit differently than just jumping into activities.  I handed out stuffed animals and read a story by Denise Fleming called Time to Sleep.   Then as we discussed signs of winter we moved into doing loom art.  This was an activity that took a bit of preparation (cutting cardboard, hole punching it and then threading it with yarn) but led to nice looking autumn art.  The leaves that the children thread through it dry up quite quickly, but it is beautiful nonetheless.  One of the children decided to thread paper instead of leaves, that was nice too.

After art we did a counting game where I put out plates with numbers on it and then had children go to the number and place that number of things on each plate.  Next time I will put the items on the plates and have the children just go to the items.  If I wanted an extension I would give each child a piece of paper and have them make their own number art board to share with one another.  Placing items like: leaves, seeds, sticks and other natural finds on them.

Finally we had quite a long parachute session.  Singing songs.  Popping balls up and down.  Doing Ring around the Rosie.  We were going to go for a hike but the time had mostly passed so we decided not to try to head to the woods (as it takes 15 minutes just to get to them).    As the play and learn continues we may alternate one week doing a hike and woods exploration, the next month just outside play.

Here is an example of the loom art-- this child enjoyed threading paper, leaves and string through the loom.