Outdoor March 12&13

Thursday

We began with snacks today as everyone was hungry this morning! Once we arrived to circle Gordie volunteered to lead our morning routine. This wasn't something we talked about, however, since he turned 5 over the weekend he felt particularly proud of what he could do 🔥 and we rolled with it! He did a fantastic job leading the group.

After circle we had more snack while we read from Animal Riddles. Everyone loved the sneaky riddles that got us all thinking! Free play followed and was full of games and wonder this morning!

Before we ventured outside we got familiar with our thermometer and the temperature for boiling our sap. The sap gets to boil at 206°F until our hydrometer tells us it is thick enough. We checked the thermometer through the day to ensure it was hot enough....and REALLY enjoyed the smell of boiling sap that filled the entire school today! It boiled down by a third!!

Our outdoor time was nearly 3 hours long today!! Despite the chilly wind, everyone had a blast outdoors exploring puddles, fishing with sticks, playing on the swings and climbers and searching for signs of Spring and animal babies - our theme of the week. When we checked our sap buckets in the backyard, we noticed a Mother Squirrel bringing more branches to her nest....AND we noticed there were barely any squirrels around! We could see the belly of the Mother Squirrel and it looked like she might already have babies in her nest high in the trees in the school yard!!

We discovered our first potato sprout emerging very small and still present. We also noticed plantain, stellaria, many crocuses AND the flowers budding on the maples trees!! The pussy willows were especially full today as well. The ducks and geese were tucked in for a chilly day so we gave them space and played lots instead. We even found a dandelion flower and the big marshmallow plant in the park was sprouting new leaves too

Friday

Today began with our morning circle and a beautiful card layout completed by Gordie! Our animal cards had great messages for us and our sit spot time was just what we both needed.

After circle we enjoyed our snack and story. Today we read The Sweetest Season and reminded ourselves about the steps to make maple syrup. We wrote down our steps and keeps the sap boiling all day long to see if we could turn the sap into syrup before the end of the day.

While we waited for the sap to boil, we played the dice game and we both won!!!

After our game we noticed there was a snow storm happening outside! Naturally, we decided that outdoor time was going to be super fun!! We ventured out and built a snowman in the backyard, then took a trip to our favourite hill and tobogganed until we were very wet. We also built a smiley face on the wall of the school...the snow was very sticky! We took the opportunity to remove the sap buckets and spiles marking the end of our sap collection for 2026.

After lunch we washed all the buckets and pots used to boil our sap, explored our hospital, and then played basketball with many balls in the gymnasium so we could be close to our future maple syrup.

We got the syrup boiled down to nearly 2 litres!! We have jarred it up to self seal in the fridge over the holiday and will resume boiling when we return ❤

Happy March Break!!