OH-SO-COOL CAVE DAY!
Welcome to our “Adventures in Nature Week” – an at home camp filled with days of relaxed learning and fun themed activities all themed to exploring nature – rainforests, mountains, caves, volcanos and more! For this day, we focused on oh-so-cool caves: what they are, different types of caves, and how they form! Read on to check out the fun!
A TYPICAL DAY
All kids are different and you can definitely vary your day with whatever works for you 🙂 But the gist of our day is having our kiddos focus on some work books or online learning tools in the early morning, an intro to the day’s theme after they were done, some videos around lunch time, and themed activities (reading time, writing time, crafts, food crafts/snacks, and games or experiments) in the afternoon. Feel free to pick and choose whatever works for you 🙂
INTRO
With their dark and mysterious interior, caves are definitely natural formations that can capture the imaginations! Whether or not your little one wants to race into a cave to explore or take a more cautious approach and study it from the outside, they are definitely worth learning more about! For this day, we learned about how caves form as well as became acquainted with the different types of caves that exist. So, while we didn’t actually explore a real cave, our “Oh-so-cool Cave Day” was definitely a hit with our little ones.
If you need a few references, these are the ones that helped us explain to our little ones:
- Caves by kids.britannica.com
- Caves – Mysterious and Intriguing by easyscienceforkids.com
- Kids Spotlight: Caves by kidsdiscover.com
AND just for fun, if you’ve got some extra time, these games from pbs.org are a fun little, educational diversion 🙂
- Caves and Karst Interactive (reading interactive). Reading about caves and their formation
- Echo Explorers (game interactive). Exploring bats in caves using echolocation.
WHAT TO WATCH
We find that mixing in a short video themed to our day is a great way to add some learning fun! We try to pick informative videos OR mix in a cartoon favorite (where they don’t even realize they’re learning). Below are some of the videos we picked from for the day:
- Types of Caves for Kids – How Caves are Formed for Children – FreeSchool by Free School (4m)
- Explore an Ice Cave! | Geology for Kids by SciShow Kids (4m)
FOOD CRAFTS / SNACKS
What’s more fun than taking a break and having a simple snack??? Including the snack in your theme of the day! We find that our kiddos are more than happy to eat the snacks they create especially when they can arrange them into fun shapes and scenes!
For our snack of the day, we made a mini cave by cutting out a piece of a waffle bowl. Then we decorated with a few teddy bear graham crackers!
READING
It’s no secret that reading helps prevent that summer slide. Some even say this is the most important. For our older ones, we have them fill out some worksheets (or let them create some of their own comics) to describe what they read and/or learned!
- Step Into Reading: Discovery of Caves
- Exploring Caves: Journey into the Earth by Nancy Holler Aulenbach
- Caves & Caverns by Gail Gibbons
WRITING & WRITING PROMPTS
Just like reading, writing helps prevent that summer slide by both encouraging their creativity but also their motor skills and penmanship.
If you’ve got a little one, have them trace words related to the theme: NATURE, EXPLORATION, CAVE, FORMATION
If you’ve got older children, have them write a sentence or two up to a page or two (depending on their age). Encourage them to be creative AND give reasons for why they made certain choices. This was our writing prompt of the day (and we offered up some examples as well) but definitely pick something your kiddo might be interested in writing about!
- Imagine you were a woodland creature living in a cave and some human cave explorers came up to observe you. What would you say to them if you could speak their language?
- If you were on an adventure and needed to find some shelter for the night would you go down into a dark cave or keep going?
- Imagine you were exploring a new cave. Deep within you find new critters and creatures. What do they look like?
CREATE & CRAFT
If you’ve got a crafty little one, a simple craft is a great way to keep them interested in the topic. While their creative juices are flowing, you can also chat about what they’ve learned so far or ask them what else they’re excited about learning!
- Cave Drawings. We decided on a simple & upcycled craft for the day – We opened up some paper grocery bags and let the kids decorate ‘cave drawings’. We also snuck in some creative storytelling as we asked them to explain their drawings and why they were important to draw on the cave walls!
- Paper Lunch Bag Caves. We also created a few caves out of some paper lunch bags. After cutting the bag down a bit, we used a bit of brown paint and crumpled them up a bit to look more like caves. If you have any mini figurines, this would be a great decoration or imaginative play prop!
STEM & STEAM ACTIVITIES
While crafting and writing get their creativity and imagination flowing, we also like to add in an activity that gets them thinking along the lines of science, technology, engineering, or math! These engaging activities or experiments are a great way to keep them learning!
For our science activity, we simulated the formation of a cave using some modeling clay, sugar cubes, toothpicks, and water. We found the activity: Making a Cave by US National Park Services on their site: www.nps.gov. This is a great experiment AND the site also has some pdf handouts for students and teachers 😉 Our little ones were definitely impressed and awed by how the cave formed so quickly!
THANK YOU!!!
Thank you for checking out our at home camp article! If you enjoyed this post, please let us know what you think in the comments below and/or follow us on Pinterest
Also, if you haven’t already, check out some of our other Nature-Themed Day, as well as our DIY At Home Camps!
Happy Learning!
