We've been obsessed with ants here lately! From ants in our house because of the substantial rain, observing ants on our peony flowers, watching them carry things, finding them attacking a piece of food, finding anthills in the cracks over the pavement, and building nests in our sandbox! This book Two Bad Ants by Chris Van Allsburg has been a great accompaniment to our studies of ants! This book is by the same author that has brought many wonderful books such as The Polar Express and many more. This book takes the perspective of the adventures ants might have while they are in a home! We really enjoyed this book! In this post I will share some of our adventures with ants!
Observing ants on peony flower blooms! Every day Cassie has wanted to check to see if they are there!
The reason why ants go on peony buds can be found here. (great article!)
Close up view!
Ants building hills on the pavement in our garage. We've been checking these too!
Finding ants in our sandbox along with ant eggs! What a SURPRISE! They have been taking shelter from our swampy backyard!
Ants on all the toys in the sandbox! SO many Ants! Yikes!
Close up view of ants in the sandbox! We don't need an ant farm! We have one in our sand box!
*Can't get enough ants? Create an Ant Motel here from Your Big Backyard Magazine! (One of our favorite magazines!)
*Check out 10 Fast Facts About Ants here.
*More Ant Facts can be found here.
*Check out some Ant Science Projects here.
***We are working on some artsy projects to go along with our Ant Explorations! Stay tuned...
What nature studies have you been doing with children???
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Thanks for linking to Read.Explore.Learn. We have been viewing ants too. I would love for ours to move on.
ReplyDeleteStopping by from Link & Learn. My children have developed a recent obession with ants too. I need to find that book at our library. :)
ReplyDeleteAnother cute ant book is The Ant Bully by John Nickle.(It was made into a movie but we haven't seen it.) Cute pics of your daughter investigating all those ants. :)
ReplyDeleteYou have convinced me we should take a closer look at ants, thanks!
ReplyDeleteoh we are deep into an insect/bug theme too - so fun!
ReplyDeleteWe started w/caterpillars which we watched turn into butterflies and now we are going through some other bugs.
Would love for you to link up your ideas to The Sunday Showcase Linky Party
Bernadette Mom to 2 Posh Lil Dias
http://momto2poshlildivas.blogspot.com/search/label/Sunday%20Showcase
Um, I know this doesn't really gel with your learning-about-nature storyline here, but I don't suppose in your ant research you happened to learn how to get RID of them, did you? We are overrun with tens of thousands of them in our house every spring.
ReplyDeleteOn another note, do you know of the children's musician John Farrell? He has a cute song called 'I love ants' that would go very well with your theme!
Thanks for linking this up to Outdoor Play! Hope we'll see you again this Friday!
Bugs of all kinds are just endlessly fascinating to kids aren't they? I love the way you are extending this interest for ants - and I love the title of that book! I'll have to have a hunt around for it.
ReplyDeleteI love your blog, thank you for sharing your fantastic ideas. Greetings from my creative activities blog. http://tocreatemoments.blogspot.com/
ReplyDelete