Gilsland Farm Nature Explorers Class

For the past couple of months, I've been taking the boys to a Nature Explorers class through the Maine Audubon at Gilsland Farm. This was essentially a preschool ecology class where we participated in one hour of playful activities designed to encourage self-discovery, a sense of place and a budding awareness of the natural world.

Each class began with some independent play time where there were multiple nature related activity areas for the kids to explore and play. I thought this was a smart way to begin class because it allowed the kids to adjust to all the people and surroundings, get a little energy out, and start playing and feeling comfortable with new playmates. Link was always a social butterfly during this period.

The next part of class, all the kids gathered close to the teacher to listen to a story or two related to the theme of the days class.

Then the teacher, Kim, would have a mystery bag filled with objects related to the them of the class. The kids would put their hand in the bag and try to guess what they could feel.

After that there was always a mystery animal to be unveiled. Kim would prompt the children with clues to see if they could guess what stuffed animal was under the blanket.

The indoor portion of class always ended with an arts and craft project. Over the course of the session they made lots of fun things including frogs that could stick their tongues way out, fox puppets, raccoon masks, and owls that could flap their wings.

The remainder of class was spent outside, no matter what the weather was like. I really appreciated that because in our family we try to go outside no matter if it is sunny, raining, snowing or whatever. Nature is worth exploring and experiencing in all sorts of weather. Outside we did things related to what we learned about inside. So one day we visited the pond and caught tadpoles with nets. Another day we went on a search for places animals might live and found salamanders under logs. Another day we played in the orchard pretending to be owls and mice. On yet another day the children ran around collecting seeds on pieces of felt. Outside time was always fun for everyone and a great way to end the class.

I really loved taking the boys to this class. Obviously, I love nature, and it has been one of my priorities to foster that love of nature in the boys. While both boys seemed to really enjoy many aspects of the class, there were also times I felt like I needed to spend the entire class trying to get them to pay attention and participate. There were times when all Meo wanted to do was crawl away and laugh because he knew he was being difficult. So some days we all went home feeling frustrated and exhausted. I know all the things we did in class were things that Meo would normally love to do so it was frustrating when he insisted on trying to sneak away and be silly rather than check out what was going on. I came to the conclusion that we were simply doing too many things during the week and that we had to cut back...so ecology class ended up being one of the things we stopped doing. My hope is to start going back to class eventually over the winter, but to do a drop in class so we only go every other week or so that way the boys aren't doing too many things during the week and they won't feel overwhelmed and start acting up again. I am really grateful that Gilsland Farm offers such a great way for little guys to learn about nature!