I did sneak into a 2nd grade classroom and take a picture of the ecosystems last week before they went home. I was a little worried about them going on the bus, but I didn’t hear any horror stories… The tadpoles on the other hand - I don’t know what went wrong, we had so many in the beginning and they just keep dwindling. Last week we were down to 4, and now 1...
My sister was in town and we stopped by school after a soccer game to show her the worms and we were surprised! At one point, I scooped up a solid handful of worms! I feed them once a week a mixture of vegetable scraps mainly consisting of carrot and cucumber peelings, egg shells and banana peels. Lately my contributors have been sending sweet potato scraps, broccoli and cauliflower scraps too. We have 2 bins and I try to divide the scraps equally so they get a mix of everything and the 1 bin is so full of worms that I barely find any food the following week. I thought the brocoli would take awhile to soften up but that ate most of it already! I have had to sit the worms outside once or twice this week because it is a little too wet in the bins, but they are doing great! We started looking for eggs and found at least 8! They are the little yellow things in the picture below. Oh and Brooke, my photographer had to take a picture of the escaping worm! A few people have asked what I am going to do with the worms over the summer and since they are really self sufficient, I will leave them at school and just stop in once a week (I’m almost there that often anyways) to give them some fresh food. Then we will have a worm sort again when schools starts to introduce the new 2nd graders to the worms.
I did sneak into a 2nd grade classroom and take a picture of the ecosystems last week before they went home. I was a little worried about them going on the bus, but I didn’t hear any horror stories… The tadpoles on the other hand - I don’t know what went wrong, we had so many in the beginning and they just keep dwindling. Last week we were down to 4, and now 1...
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The tadpoles are getting big! We did lose quite a few in the beginning and I have ideas to fix it for next year but we are loving watching them grow! I keep checking every day for legs but don’t see any yet. We had a worm sort last week, it was so nice out, I took the worm bins outside and dumped them out on big pieces of cardboard and the kids sorted through it all pulling out worms. They had a blast and found tons of worm eggs, so we must be doing a good job with our composting! I’m already thinking about getting nightcrawlers to add to the mix for next year! Speaking of nightcrawlers, in the school parking lot the other morning we found a huge nightcrawler! I couldn’t believe how long it was - probably about 9 inches long - I picked it up and brought it in to show the kids. Our red wigglers only 4 inches long so it’s quite a difference! Oh and remember the girl who was totally grossed out by worms on our first day? She was digging right in - without a glove! I gave the student the option of wearing a glove because they were really going to be digging in it and some was a little too wet. The finished compost all dewormed. We probably should have waited a little bit longer, but we needed some good dirt for a school flower bed!
I came in on Sunday and was amazed that the eggs had hatched! I was a little worried because none of the tadpoles were moving, they were all at the top of the water hanging tail down, but a tap on the tank made them all start swimming around! I'm not sure if some eggs are a little behind and still haven't hatched yet, or if we have some duds. I scooped some of the egg leftovers out today to clear up the water and am keeping everything just in case we do have some late bloomers. I'm looking forward to teaching the kids about the metamorphosis they will go through and seeing their amazement as we watch!
Guess what was brought in today for me?? Frog eggs! I am so excited! I can't wait to watch the transformation with the kids! I think they will be so excited to see the little tadpoles swimming and changing! I remember bringing home tadpoles from my uncles pond when I was maybe 6! A kindergartener found some in a ditch near his house and was bringing them in for show and tell and his mom posted this on Facebook saying she hoped the teacher knew what she was getting into when she said to bring them in! I posted that would be a great science phenomena, and here we are! I set up another aquarium (which i'm worried won't be big enough once they really get swimming) and will begin taking pictures and video's to show their growth. In the mean time I did find a really cool video on Youtube. Not much happening yet, if I had to guess, i'd say they are only a few days old. I see a few eggs with the "fold" they mentioned in the video.
Wow, have we been busy! Students brought in tons of 2 liter pop bottles and I washed and cut them all and then students assembled them into ecosystems! Aside from the ecosystems, other grades have been busy too! We have been doing a little woodworking with a community volunteer who was kind enough to bring in all the machines and materials for students to create a mother's day gift. We also had our tech guy come and bring a few computers for students to take apart and identify the different components. Top that all off with normal day to day stuff, and throw in the STEAM Showcase my Lego League Team participated in, and a dance recital... But back to the worms - I already had the fish scooped out of the big fish tank when they came to class and then I showed them the steps to construct the top part of their ecosystem. They put two pieces of string through the mouth of the pop bottle and then made a coffee filter into a cone that they fit into the neck of the bottle and covered it with a little gravel to help “filter” any water that would drip back down to the fish. Then they added a scoop of sandy “bad” dirt followed by a layer of food scraps and 10 worms and then another scoop of bad dirt. Cover it all with a scoop of good dirt where they planted either marigold of four o’clock seeds and then they stacked it onto the fish part of the bottle their part was done! From there I made sure the string was in the water and taped the seams of the pop bottles together and added the top piece to complete and seal our ecosystems. I shipped the fish down to their classrooms and the students were excited to see their hard work and be able to watch it work! I apologize for the lack of pictures, we were trying to squeeze the whole ecosystem assembly into 25 minutes and i had dirt hands for most of it. I will take a few pictures this week to show off our ecosystems! More pics from out last class before the ecosystem building. All the students love to watch the fish as they line up for class! The baby worm is pictured next to a sharpie for reference.
So Brooke and I went to school to check on the fish after our long ice storm weekend plus a snow day today, and I decided to check on the worms and wow, we found a lot of worms. I have to admit, I was a little concerned that we were not seeing the worms move to the food, or much movement at all, but after today… They were all over! I read somewhere that they love avocado and I bought 2 overripe avocados that were discounted at our local grocery story and tossed them in. Where do you think we found worms??? In the avocado peel! I had squished it open and buried it in the dirt/leaves a little and they were all over it! Needless to say, I was excited and relieved! Brooke was my photographer, so excuse the pictures. We even found a baby worm which in my research I learned that they are white for the first few days then they change to the red/brown color. Can’t wait for the kids to give the bins a stir! The worms are all moved into their new homes! 3 classes of 2nd graders have helped layer dirt, shredded paper and food scraps along with the half broken down leaves the worms have been calling home. I had one girl who was grossed out and wasn’t going to touch them - ironically she was the one seated next to them - little did she know- as we were learning about worms and composting. Then it was time to get dirty and move the worms and she got closer and closer and finally she was holding one! Love that they get so interested and conquer their fear! Next week we will learn about what worms like to eat and start saving their scraps from lunch. Love that they and eager and willing to bring stuff in! A few 2 liters have came in, we even had someone drop off 2 bags full! 1 of the 12 goldfish I brought survived and I reached out and received quite a few donated guppies for our ecosystems we will be starting! More pics later this weekend - my phone was having a problem so I used my iPad and I left it at school today.
Wow, what a busy day! I introduced our worms to my first class of second graders and they loved it! I don’t think there was a single kids who was grossed out - they all were ready to find the worms! We started out watching a quick YouTube video on worms followed by another on composting. I learned that worms have tiny hairs that help them move! Then I showed the kids 2 different samples of dirt, some that was really sandy and hard and another sample that was softer and darker. Then we talked about how worms could help turn the sandy dirt into nice dirt that plants would grow a lot better in. Then we got dirty! Kids layered the sandy dirt, shredded paper, a layer of yard waste that the worms came with, they some food scraps from my weekend food prepping consisting of banana peels, egg shells, cucumber peel and green pepper leftovers. Next week we will learn more about what worms like/don’t like and begin gathering our leftovers from the lunch room! My next class of second graders will fill another composting bin and transfer the last of the worms. I’m trying to get ahead of the students and made my ecosystem complete with a goldfish, plant and worms! My hope is to make smaller ecosystems (just a fish and seeds to watch grow) if we get enough pop bottles... I spent my morning getting the extra fish settled in a small aquarium - thank you science closet - and building my ecosystem. I took the worms to school where they are waiting to be transferred to our compost bins. I’m having a hard time waiting for the students - I want to make sure they get their hands dirty (haha) with this project too. As I was cutting up veggies for the week, I remembered to save my scraps for our bins. I’m hoping to get a bin in the cafeteria for students to put their salad scraps and what not into then when they come to class they can feed the worms! I found a few baby worms as I was digging for worms for my ecosystem! I hope to post pictures of the students working and getting our worms comfortable so you all can experience this adventure with us! Maybe I can even start a general blog of our other day to day activities! For now we will stick with the worm blog! And so it begins - our wormie adventure! I have been wanting to learn and teach about worms, and compost for a while now and was waiting until spring to start. I thought my kids and I would make a adventure out of going out to our farm and digging up a few worms from the field and starting there. No, no, no, I learned you can't just use any kind of worm. You see, I was visiting my sister in Grand Rapids who had just went to a composting workshop and she shared her knowledge with me. I then called our local bait shop and learned they don't carry the right kind of worms for composting - bummer! We then decided to contact the worm people from her workshop and luckily they were at the farm and we could go meet with them and get some worms! 1 freezing hour later, we had 2ish pounds of worms mixed in 2 5 gallon buckets full of yard waste to bring home. The worms made the journey back to my house in Pigeon! Thank you Wormies Vermicompost for the worms and the info! Find them on facebook or at www.thewormies.com/ |
AuthorHi, my name is Jamie Schaefer and I am the Elementary Art/STEAM/Technology teacher at Laker Elementary School in Michigan. Most of my webpage is used to gather resources for my lessons, and this is my first blog! I am excited to share our worm adventure! ArchivesCategories |