Beauty in Nature
Natural beauty can be seen everywhere. White fluffy clouds float above the playground, a spiders web flutters in a gentle wind and flowers shoot up in a nearby garden. Today the natural beauty we found came in the form of caterpillars.
They seem to be everywhere. The children made the game finding the caterpillars small and large.
I reminded the children about last year when we had caterpillars and grew them in an indoor habitat. I found the butterfly netting and we placed the caterpillars inside with some leaves and a piece of stick and now we wait and we watch.
I don’t know enough about caterpillars to know whether these will transform into a butterfly but we will have fun watching them.
Short nature walks give children a chance to observe the wonders of our natural world. At school, we take nature walks to listen for environmental sounds or to look for insects. We also take advantage of every day opportunities such as exploring puddles after rain shower.
Noticing nature’s wonders helps children become more observant and respectful of the world around them, helps build their vocabulary as their adults describe what they see and encourages drawing and painting to document their observations.
We have a science area in our room that has a many objects the children can explore. Sometimes I will remove them from the shelf and place them on the table so they are more easily found or the child’s attention is drawn to them. We also have nonfiction books that have real pictures in them of insects, other animals, and plants.
One discovery leads to another.
We adults have much to learn from the natural curiosity of children