Christmas cacti, native to Brazil, are popular because they bloom during the holiday season and come in an array of colors.
Use Christmas cactus to teach children about propagation. Follow these simple directions and watch the video below for additional information.
Break off segments where two leaves meet and be sure that each cutting has three or more segments. You can place the segments into soil immediately, but you may have more success if you allow the segments to dry for two days out of direct sunlight, so they will callous. Try both methods and compare the results.
Fill a medium sized pot with soil. Water the soil. Christmas cacti are succulents, so be sure there is a hole in the bottom of your pot for water to drain easily.
Add several cuttings. Insert the cuttings, so the node is about 1/2 inch below the soil.
Place the pot where it will receive indirect light. Do not overwater. Be patient!
The weather in Atlanta has been unusually warm and rainy this December. Consequently, mushrooms are appearing which is certainly not a usual sight for this time of year! Why do mushrooms grow when it rains?
I recently discovered this beautifully illustrated and informative book. Watch a preview below.
Read Mushroom in the Rain on a rainy day and then hunt for mushrooms. Observe a mushroom over a week and journal about the changes. Click here to view full screen.
Retell the story to practice sequencing. It’s also an easy tale to dramatize. Click here for full screen viewing.
When my daughter was young, she would help me search for snails for my second-grade students to investigate. It began our appreciation for these gastropods, and it’s always fun when we find a snail gift for one another.
I discovered this snail when I was raking leaves and I took him inside for a photo shoot.
I recently added this book to my library. Click here to view full screen. Compare people and snails. How are they alike and different?
Learn more about snails on Scishow Kids. Click here for full screen. Compare snails and slugs.
What is wrong with this snail? I see this mistake too often!
Click here and here for previous snail labs. The first lab includes a snail craft.
What a beautiful way to integrate art into a unit about snails! Click here to view full screen.
Love the illustrations in this informative book about snails. An ideal book to teach descriptive words, as well as positional concepts, such as through, into, over, and up. Click here for full screen.
Another fun book with snail characters to introduce prediction and the concept of perseverance. Click here for full screen.
No video for this fun story that blends math concepts with facts about snails but add it to your library if you are a fan of snails, like me.
Snails have spiral shells. Click here for a previous post about spirals.
As I walked through my neighborhood, my eyes were suddenly drawn to this long mound in the grass. Moles had been at work!
Moles are small burrowingmammals that live mostly solitary lives underground. They have tiny eyes and front claws that are perfectly designed for digging tunnels and underground chambers. Their diet consists of invertebrates, especially worms and insect larvae. Although they aerate the ground and don’t eat plants, homeowners usually regard them as pests.
Moles are classified as mammals because they are warm-blooded, their body covering is fur, babies are born alive and young nurse on mother’s milk. They are sometimes mistakenly thought to be rodents.
When I taught about invertebrates, observing roly polies, (aka pill bugs or potato bugs) was always a favorite lab. They actually aren’t bugs at all! Why? Scientists refer to them as isopods and they are most closely related to shrimp and lobsters (crustaceans). They breathe through gills and require a moist environment. Click here to go to a pill bug lab.
When I retired, I left all the lab animals at school, except for a handful of pill bugs. They have multiplied (through laying eggs) over the last 18 months, and their habitat is full of many generations!
I just added this book to my collection:
Click here to watch the author read her book full screen.
Examine the following photos closely. Notice the diversity of colors and the different sizes of these decomposers.
Constructing a pill bug habitat for a classroom is simple. I placed decomposing leaves and wood on organic soil. Then I added slices of potatoes and sprinkled Deer Park mineral water as needed to keep the habitat moist. They can’t crawl up the plastic sides, so a top isn’t necessary.
Engineers study nature for solutions to problems. I recommend this book for young entrepreneurs who want to learn about the study of biomimicry. What have engineers learned from pill bugs? Think about their defense mechanism (seven overlapping plates that can slide back and forth) and then read the book to learn more.
Click here to watch the preview of Nature Did It First full screen.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING! I am very grateful for each of my readers! See you next week.
In this season of gratitude, let’s also show our appreciation for trees. Before reading further, think of all the ways that trees provide for people, animals, and the earth. It’s a long list!
Did you think of food (fruit, maple syrup, chocolate, olives, spices, and nuts), shade, shelter and food for animals, Christmas trees, lumber, paper and paper products, rubber, as well as oxygen? Trees also prevent erosion, enrich the soil, and provide beauty. Just imagine a cherry tree blooming in the spring or a maple tree with its crimson fall color.
The following video is one chapter of Be Thankful for Trees. Click here to watch full screen.
Our Tree Named Steve is a humorous story about a family who loved a tree. Click here to watch full screen. Do you have a special tree? My first graders traditionally adopted a tree on our school campus each year. Go here to learn more.
Use this book to teach metaphors and similes to students of all ages. The figurative language describes trees beautifully! Click here to watch full screen. Before watching, discuss with your children or students what images they see in their minds when someone says, “Picture a tree”.
Click here to watch Have You Seen Trees? and follow trees through seasonal changes.
What a fun way to integrate history and create a multidisciplinary approach to the study of trees. The story is told from a tree’s perspective. In the video below, the author previews her book, What Did the Tree See?
Like the character in the story below, plant a tree to demonstrate your gratitude.
Thank you, God, for trees! I can’t imagine a world without them.
The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food.
(Genesis 2:9)
What a treat to discover a litter of young squirrels! I watched three enchanting kittens darting in and out of their nest in the tree hollow before scampering up and down the branches of the old tree.
Eastern gray squirrels build their nests in nut-bearing trees. They have a litter of two to four kittens (on average) once or twice a year. At three months, the babies will leave the nest and at nine months, they are considered full grown.
Add this beautifully illustrated book to your collection:
Click here for a previous post about tree cavities.
Fall food is my favorite – apples, pumpkins, and butternut squash! North Georgia mountains are well known for their apple orchards and my family visits an orchard annually. Click here for an apple orchard field trip with my first-grade botanists.
There are numerous ways to integrate the study of apples with other subject areas. Click here for an oxidation experiment with apples.
Integrate math with science and weigh apples and other objects with a balance scale. Click here for directions.
Then explore the concept of balance using the story, Ten Apples up on Top. Place an apple on a child’s head and direct him or her to balance it as he or she walks across the room. How many apples can you balance on top of one another like the characters in the story? Ask your students to work in small groups or create a balancing apples center. Use this rhyming story to introduce or practice the concepts of more, less, and equal, as well as addends that equal 10.
Love this musical version! Click here for full screen.
Taste a variety of apples or a red, yellow, and green apple and create a tally, pictograph or bar graph of your students’ favorite apples.
Celebrate apples with an apple tasting party (apple butter, apple pie, apple sauce, apple cider, apple turnovers, and apple muffins). Make apple sauce or apple crisp.
Estimate how many seeds are in an apple, and then cut the apple to reveal the star inside. Cut several more and count the seeds. Do all apples have the same number of seeds? Does one variety of apples have more seeds than another? Be sure to use the correct terms to describe the parts of an apple – skin, core, seeds, stem, and flesh. Of course, apples can be used to introduce fractions.
There are many engaging apple stories! Use The Seasons of Arnold’s Apple Tree to learn about the life cycle of an apple tree. Sequence the life cycle. Click here to watch full screen.
Click here for the Safeshare link for Bad Apple, A Tale of Friendship.
Use the following song/fingerplay with your youngest scientists to introduce subtraction and the concept of less. Write a subtraction sentence each time an apple is taken away. Click here to watch full screen.
Apple Trouble is an ideal story to identify story structure – characters, setting, problem (conflict), and resolution. Identify the steps the main character attempts to resolve the problem. Click here to watch full screen.
Leaves aren’t the only things falling from the trees around my house. The oak trees are also dropping acorns. Not only are acorns the seeds of the oak tree, but they are also food for animals, such as deer, mice, wild boar, squirrels and opossums.
The hundreds of species of oak trees result in a variety of acorns. Just look at the diversity-color, shape, and size!
If you see small round holes in acorns, acorn weevils are present. In the fall, the fully grown acorn weevil larva chews a hole in the side of the nut and emerges.
This story illustrates the interdependence of living and nonliving things in creation. Also, a great lesson for cause and effect and sequencing. Click here to watch full screen.
Sing The Acorn Song with your students. Instead of clapping, make a clicking sound with your tongue. Click here for the tune.
I’m a little acorn brown,
Lying on the cold, cold, ground.
People always step on me,
That is why I’m cracked you see!
I’m a nut (clap, clap),
I’m a nut (clap, clap),
I’m a nut (clap), nut (clap), nut, (clap, clap).
I’ve been watching the acorns grow on oak trees around my home since spring. Just think, everything the tree needs to grow is inside the acorn! Acorns don’t appear on an oak tree until it is mature, usually around twenty years old.
Acorns change from green to brown and their caps (cupules) fall off.
Collect acorns and try to germinate them. Do a little research before you begin. Some acorns should be stored in the refrigerator first, while some species of acorns can be planted right away. Place the acorns in water. Floating acorns will not sprout and should be discarded and composted. Why?
The Golden Acorn is a humorous tale with lessons about teamwork and friendship. Click here for full screen viewing.
Use this entertaining story to introduce character traits. Click here for full-screen viewing.
Another beautifully illustrated book:
Click here to view full screen. Use this story to introduce journal writing.
Play “Where is the Acorn?” as you teach positional words. After giving each student an acorn, give them commands. Suggestions:
Put the acorn in your left hand.
Hold the acorn behind your back.
Place the acorn between your fingers.
Lay the acorn under the table.
Hold the acorn in front of your face.
Progress to multi-step directions.
Turn around, jump two times, and balance the acorn on your head.
Play the following game to develop self-control and observational skills:
Choose one student to be the squirrel. Other students (squirrels) sit around the selected student in a circle. The teacher places an acorn behind the squirrel while the squirrel’s eyes are closed and then points to a child to quietly take the acorn and hide it in the student’s lap. All students also pretend to be hiding the acorn in their laps. Children repeat, “Squirrel, squirrel, look and see. Someone took your acorn. Who could it be?” The squirrel is given three chances to guess who removed the acorn without leaving the center of the circle.
Everywhere I walk, I see grasses showcasing their seeds. The diversity of seeds is an interesting study. Most elementary science classes study and plant seeds in springtime, but autumn is the ideal time to observe, collect, and dry seeds to plant later. Click here to go to the Forks in the Dirt blog to learn how to dry seeds. (It’s a fun to site to explore.)
Most grass seeds are dispersed by wind. Can you list other ways that seeds travel?
