This week your young explorer hopped and slithered into the fascinating world of reptiles and amphibians! We explored how reptiles and amphibians live, what they eat, how they move and so much more! 

Monday being the first day we needed to practice our critter finding skills. First we practice coloring in our own snakes to learn what they may look like. Then we went to forest camp where we did a pretend critter search, our CITs hit plastic animals and talked about if they were a reptile or an amphibian. Then we enjoyed a puppet show all about the differences between a reptile and an amphibian.  

Tuesday we made paper plate snakes and colored then in different patterns and then we cut them a spiral (like a curled-up snake) and added a paper tongue and googly eyes. We then journeyed to Pepper Pond to survey the area for insects that these cold-blooded friends may want to eat. We also got to practice moving like these critters such as hopping like frogs, crawling like a turtle, and slithering like snakes. 

Wednesday we got our day started right away and hiked all the way to the Sherman Hollow Brook! There we searched for salamanders and other cold-blooded friends.  Back up at the barn we create a group snake, we each got a section of the snake and colored it in however we wanted too. We then tapped all the section together to make one giant snake! We also played red light green light but when we moved, we only could move like a herp! 

Thursday we explored the herps of the forest. We hiked to mossy rocks and flipped over rocks and logs looking for salamanders. We also made snake hotels, frog/toad homes, at forest camp too. In the afternoon we enjoyed a puppet show on camouflage and bring colors and how that keeps reptiles and amphibians safe.  

Friday was finally a cool day, i know our cold-blooded friends were enjoying the heat, but us warm-blooded folks needed this cooler weather. We hiked down the Beaver Pond and enjoyed some pond scooping time. We also hiked around Audubon taking different temperature readings to find the hottest and coldest areas and what these spaces would be used for and by who. Our final craft was making paper plate frogs with our adults at closing circle.