Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Earth Day - Hooray!

Usually I do not post plans because I am sure to change them. Just compare my Kindergarten Curriculum posting in relation to my Monthly Reports. However, Samuel is taking an interest in my blog and wants me to post everything. While we have started our Earth Day fun/lessons, there is still time before Earth Day (April 22) and maybe it would be of interest/use to you for this year.

These are the books and videos I have gotten from the library so far:

Every Day Is Earth Day, by Kathy Ross (A Craft Book)
Earth Day -- Hooray! by Stuart J. Murphy (a living math book and the inspiration for my post title)
The Lorax, by Dr. Seuss (in DVD and book format)
The Magic School Bus Holiday Special DVD (three programs about recycling, saving desert animals, and the rainforest)
I also plan on reading the creation story from the Bible to relate how we should use what God provides, but still take care of His creation.

The first book I got was the craft book. Samuel loves crafts and was desperate to find one we could do RIGHT NOW, without having to go to the store or wait until we had collected whatever trash we needed to make the craft (like toilet paper rolls, etc). The one we decided on was the TRASH MONSTER!:

Trash Monster
Side View

'Trash
Top View (Face)

Here are the directions:

  1. Cut a large oval hole out of the bottom of a grocery bag (Samuel drew the oval and I cut it out). Open a second grocery bag and slide the first bag inside so that the bottom with the hole is at the top. The hole is the monster's mouth.
  2. Crumple newspaper into balls (we used half a page for each ball) and glue them above the mouth for eyes. Cut sharp teeth (triangles) from an old magazine cover and glue them around the inside of the mouth (we used scotch tape instead of glue).
  3. Cut large letters from the magazine to spell out "trash monster" and glue them to the front of the bag (our bags had writing already on them so we first glued our letters to the back of a piece of paper that we had previously drawn something on the front - more re-using!)
  4. The directions in the book made a nose out of a pipe cleaner that you could also use as a handle, but our bags had handles on them and Samuel wanted to draw on his nose so that's what we did.
  5. Take your trash monster for a walk and feed it trash you find along the way. Since we made this, we have had wet weather and I didn't think it would be a good idea to put wet trash in a paper bag, so we have been "feeding" it with bits of trash that cannot be recycled like the plastic from clothing tags and Easter candy wrappers.

I'll post pictures if we do any other crafts from this book. It's out of print as far as I can tell, but it's pretty good and I recommend trying to find it at your library or you can find it used through Amazon.

2 comments:

  1. i love the "trash monster"...what a good idea...

    i also love your header comments. life is never what we expect i guess!

    thanks for stopping by my blog!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for posting the Trash Monster idea! I think my boys will love the project!

    It'll keep us busy, as we try to keep our computer and tv off for Turnoff Week!

    Have a Happy Earth Day! :)

    ReplyDelete