Be sure to hang your feeders near a window so you can watch all the birds!

Keep an eye out for our Spring Event!

Who’s that looking in my eye?

Sky of darkness with bats in flight

Who’s out here tonight?

We are happy to announce the return of our “Whose Eyes” event.  Come with your child, and remember your flashlight! Explore the gardens – can you find all the eyes peeking out from the shadows? Who will we find?

The event is being held Friday, October 23 from 7:30 – 8:30 in the Growing Minds Garden. Cider and snacks will be served!

By JANET ROMAKER
BLADE STAFF WRITER

Shark, jellyfish, and gigantic spider crabs lurk just outside the door where small fry attend preschool classes at the Toledo Zoo. “Look! Look at those huge fish!” exclaimed 3-year-old Brayden Mefferd as students scampered about the zoo’s aquarium. Fake orange fish point the way to the preschool, in a former conference room in the aquarium building, where fake blue fish swim near the ceiling. But this preschool experience, both indoors and out, is the real thing with real animals and real zookeepers. Real jumbles of flowers spill like jewels from a treasure chest along zoo paths where children explore and learn.

With its focus on getting children outside as often as possible to see, smell, and touch their world, the preschool’s theme easily could be “no child left inside,” tying in neatly with the zoo’s goal to reconnect children with nature.

Go-outside-and-play initiatives are being cultivated across the country as teachers, community leaders, parents, park directors, and others coax kids off couches and away from computer screens to help address what author Richard Louv in Last Child in the Woods identified as nature-deficit disorder.

Mr. Louv’s message about the disconnect of kids and nature touched hearts and common sense and gave voice to the No Child Left Inside movement, said Cheryl Charles, president and CEO of the Children & Nature Network. The nonprofit agency, of which Mr. Louv is chairman, was created to encourage and support people and organizations working to reconnect children with nature. Efforts focus on the health and well-being of children, and the by-product is a better understanding of the natural world, she said. Locally, that is happening at such places as the state-licensed preschool operated by the Toledo Zoo and at Growing Minds Learning Center in Berkey where children connect with things that creep and crawl, peep and peck. On a recent day, preschool students at the zoo wiggled, wiggled as they acted out the four life stages of butterflies. Later, they transformed with paint and imagination egg-carton sections into caterpillars. “We are building a strong science base for these children early in life,” said Mitch Magdich, the zoo’s curator of education. He agrees with others that children suffer from nature-deficit disorder, and said the zoo’s programs and activities are geared to get children outdoors. “We let kids discover,” he said, noting the discovery process is critical to the development of critical-thinking skills. It’s important to raise children who have a concern for nature and who take an active role in conservation, he said. Preschool homework is designed to get families outdoors, said Lori Wittler, preschool administrator. Students search their yards for interesting stuff, and their finds – dead bugs, acorns, cattails, leaves – are placed on the preschool’s touch table along side a magnifying glass and tweezers (pulling things apart is part of the learning experience). Julia McArthur Kelley of Monroe said the zoo’s preschool enhances her children’s interests in nature and science. Her 3-year-old triplets JoAnna, Michael, and Colleen Kelley attend now, and 5-year-old daughter Jillian went there before she started school. Mrs. Kelley, who said the zoo’s atmosphere is a natural way to help children learn, limits computer and TV time for her daughters. “They need time to get outside and play.” Unstructured play, she said, is important to a child’s development as well as to a child’s involvement with the environment. Her 5-year-old daughter already “talks about not wanting people to litter. I can see her interest in the environment sprout,” she said. Based on the evidence as well as common sense, “kids are healthier, happier, and smarter when they have direct contact with nature,” Children & Nature Network’s Ms. Charles said.

A foreign concept

The No Child Left Inside movement isn’t an anti-technology campaign, Ms. Charles said, but she and others said children’s lives are out of balance when they spend 40 to 60 hours in screen time and very few hours outdoors. Many health-related problems such as childhood obesity are related to the fact that for many children going outside to play is a foreign concept. Because parental worries about safety keep some children indoors, communities could invent new ways to make outdoor play safe, such as neighborhood programs where parents take turns watching over the activities, Ms. Charles said. Activities to reconnect children and nature are being considered in northwest Ohio where a No Child Left Inside initiative has begun, said Olander Park naturalist Sandy Gratop. Goals include developing a Web site, identifying partners interested in participating, and defining local needs, said Mrs. Gratop who recently conducted a No Child Left Inside meeting at Camp Miakonda. “We have a variety of people interested in this initiative from 20 counties and 12 park systems,” she said. “Getting outside is good for children. Uncontrolled play is an opportunity to let a child outside and roam and observe. Give them a pile of sand and they will build a mountain.”

A widespread effort

Sarah Bodor, coordinator for the No Child Left Inside Coalition in Annapolis, Md., said nearly 1,500 organizations representing 47 million people are involved with efforts to strengthen environmental education in classrooms across the country and to reconnect children with nature. Unveiled in May and still in committee, the No Child Left Inside Act of 2009 would authorize $500 million over five years for school systems to build environmental literacy, strengthen teacher training, and provide competitive grants to help schools and nonprofits pay for outdoor education. The federal No Child Left Behind education overhaul resulted in environmental education being edged out in favor of shifting funds to areas such as math and reading, she said.

Nature deficit

At Lourdes College, where programs promote outdoor education, Sister Rosine Sobczak, director of the college’s Life Lab, said definitely yes, children are experiencing a nature-attention deficit. If we don’t get on the stick and do something, we’ll possibly wind up with a generation of Americans clueless about nature-related topics, she said. Consider some children wonder where macaroni and cheese is grown or that some college students think prunes are plucked from prune trees. There is good news, however. “We are addressing this. We’re getting connected. That’s the important thing,” said Sister Rosine. During a summer camp at the college, 84 kids got dirty digging for fossils and searching for crayfish in a nearby creek. “The kids just loved it. They had soggy shoes and I did not hear one complaint,” said Sister Rosine, adding “Nature is a teacher.” Active in the No Child Left Inside movement, she learned a few days ago that the college’s request for a $48,000 state grant was rejected. The grant would have funded a project for the college to work with five area schools to introduce teachers to the “whole idea of getting children outside,” she said. The college will reapply for the grant in January. Meantime, Lourdes continues to conduct programs that provide natural bridges for learning. Batches of budding naturalists learn about monarchs; participate in composting activities, and explore insects.

Something drastic

Outdoor exploration was introduced at Growing Minds in Berkey after administrator Nancy Salerno grew weary of bad behavior on the playground. “It hit me like a ton of bricks. These kids are not playing, I thought, and we have got to do something.”

Something drastic, it turned out.

On a weekend three years ago, she yanked everything out. The swings, the climber, all the toys. Her husband John who works at the learning center brought in logs. Just logs. Five of them.

Come Monday, “the children were all upset and were saying there was nothing to do. I thought let’s see what they do with the logs.

For the first time, there was no bickering. The children started to work together. They couldn’t move a log alone. They were cooperating and figuring out what they could do.”

Soon piles of pebbles were added. Then a stream. And flowers and bird feeders. In the summer kids grew cherry tomatoes, broccoli, and zucchini. In one area, vegetable plants covered a curved fence, providing a hideaway place where children sat in the shade, snapping off fava beans for impromptu picnics.

On a recent afternoon,Dallis Myers, 4, pulled off shoes and socks and settled into a sandy area with an old kitchen kettle and some bottle caps. She was making lady bug houses because it’s good, she said, to have happy lady bugs.

Children are responsible for rinsing out mud-caked socks and hanging them to dry on a clothesline. Loads of learning crowd the area, too.

“There’s math as we add up how many buckets of water it takes to make mud. How long is the worm. How big is the pumpkin,” said Mrs. Salerno.

In the winter the children check out animal footprints in the snow. They feed the birds. “We have mourning doves and woodpeckers and robins,” 5-year-old Dylan Ball said.

Thomas Pollard, 9, who collects bugs, looks for insects in the play area, and 6-year-old Hannah Gleckler watches for skippers.

“Skippers is one of the most fastest butterflies. We catch them and put them in the bug box for a minute and then let them go,” she said.

Michael Ernst of Reynolds Corners, father of 5-year-old Noah who attends classes at Growing Minds, said the back-to-nature habitat is “a good idea. The kids are more active out there. They are more involved in their environment.”

Mrs. Salerno hopes others will follow the learning center’s giant positive step toward reconnecting kids with nature.

“We have seen such a phenomenal difference in the children. It is unbelievable. The creativity is unbelievable. There is not a single toy out there and the kids can stay outside there for a couple of hours and never be bored.”

Contact Janet Romaker at:
jromaker@theblade.com
or 419-724-6006.

it has some nice quick and easy ideas for on the go…

The children will go hunting through the gardens looking for signs of spring. We will make a special magic wand to help encourage the flowers to bloom. Our outside rabbit, Carma has left a surprise for all the children….can they find it?

We also have a special visitor bringing in a sheep to trim. . . will the birds use the trimmings in their nests?

Don’t miss out on all the fun! We’ll see you there!

An award ceremony is scheduled in May where we will receive our certificate. We are all very proud of this recognition but more importantly of the astounding achievements we have witnessed in our students because of our Green Program.

This week’s Featured Team, NaturalKids, makes sweet, wholesome products for your little ones!  We love the way these toys inspire creativity while staying true to their natural materials.  You’ll find these items are crafted with a lot of love, and it seems this affection pours into their Team as well!  The NaturalKids Team has a great website and blog to promote their work and also holds weekly promotions in the Forums.  We love how they’ve created their own co-operative advertising program within the Team and have ads running on parenting websites!

Check them out here: Natural Kids

take a look!

http://gobabylife.com/products/weegobottle.html

Slice bananasinto  1/4 inch thick rounds, spread the peanut butter on the tortilla and place the bananas on top. Dot with raisins, roll it up and cut it in half!