Week of April 22nd

Happy Earth Day - Every Day!

Every year I've taught, I have wanted to spend the entire Earth Day doing outdoor learning activities with the children, and this year the weather finally cooperated!  We started with a story and discussion about the importance of taking care of our Earth and sharing it with all living things.  Next we did a math activity where we learned to weave on the playground fence using recycled fabric to represent the water, land, and sky.  After the weaving was complete, we did a nature hunt to collect fallen pieces of nature to weave into the fabric.  Meanwhile, many of us drew a welcome mural with chalk on the sidewalk and included plants, animals, birds, and insects who share the Earth.  We painted Earth rocks and played a game to get things out of the landfill by finding ways to reduce, reuse, and recycle.  During snack we talked about buying foods that have less packaging to help reduce waste.  It was a wonderful day of learning together and enjoying the outdoor sunshine!

Cans, Cans, Cans
Our JK can collection was a huge success with the help of the entire USM community - thank you!  The truck came from Miller Compressing on Thursday, and we made a huge line to take turns loading the bags of cans onto the truck.  It took lots of helping hands to load over 2,000 pounds of cans!

Hard Hats & Safety Goggles

At Miller Compressing, we were all decked out in hard hats and safety goggles to view the huge cranes and conveyor belts that lifted the scrap metal to the shredder.  It was like looking at a huge, moving "I Spy" and hunting for metal cars, refrigerators, bicycles, and more!

Our JK Cans Revisited

Around the bend came the Miller Truck that had our cans from the day before.  It dumped all the cans in a huge pile in front of us.  It sounded like it was raining cans!  Then we saw a building that was filled with enormous piles of cans, and we watched the baler compress our cans into a large bale.  It was so neat to see all the different pieces of equipment that were used to recycle our cans!

Thank you to Miller Compressing and the dads who helped chaperone - it was an awesome trip!