School News

Last Updated on Sunday, 01 June 2014 01:39

By Paul Chasko

On May 8, over a dozen homeschooled and cyberschooled kids (5 to 11 years of age) spent an afternoon as part of Washington County's Mingo Creek Park Outdoor Classroom program.

Instructor Lisa Taylor conducts a nature walk.

Usually, the programs offer insight into some of the animals, insects and plant life that can be encountered in the park. In this class, given by program instructor Lisa Taylor, the students learned about some plants, insects and other critters that visitors to the outdoors should avoid.

The kids saw samples of poison ivy and stinging nettle, which are common throughout the park. They learned about poison oak and poison sumac, which are less common in this area. Lisa soon had the kids actively participating in the discussion and most every insect and critter that can cause problems in the outdoors was covered – from mosquitoes and ticks to poisonous snakes and animals that can carry rabies. Emphasis was on what can be done to avoid problems. Lisa also had a stack of books containing illustrations of most of the critters under discussion.

Lisa had a microscope set up so the students could look at some slides of mosquito larvae, and she had several bottles of pond water with live mosquito larvae to be examined close up. Later on, the class took a walk through the picnic area, the surrounding woods and a nearby pond to find some examples of the things they'd been discussing. It was a fun time mixed in with some valuable outdoor learning.