These can be done at our site or yours. Some can be done right in your classroom. Others are intended for the outdoor space at your school, overnight facility, or park.
Animal Adaptations
Examine skulls and other animal treasures to discover how predators and their prey are so well designed.
Animal Senses
Use your senses the way animals do. Try smelling like a fox, seeing like an owl, and feeling like a raccoon. You will learn about animals’ hidden talents, and you may discover some of your own!
Animal Tracking
Discover the signs and habits of the creatures who share our eastern forests.
Archaeology
Learn about our ancestors from the things they’ve left behind.
Backyard Geology
Did you ever pick up a rock or pebble and wonder how it formed, where it came from, and what story it had to tell? Learn answers to these questions while cracking rocks, making sediment jars, and discovering how to identify rocks right at your feet.
Basic Orienteering
Practice skills of map and compass as you work on a team to steer through an orienteering course.
Campfire Program
Come gather around the fire to hear stories and sing songs together. This program is adaptable to themes such as nocturnal animals, or Early American and Native American folkways.
Colonial Cooking
Build a fire and cook on it the way the early settlers did. This program includes fire, feasting, and fun!
Cornhusk Crafts
Students will use husks of corn to make their own dolls in the tradition of early American children. (seasonal)
Early American Games
Play the games your forefathers played. Try your hand with potatoes, hoops, marbles and balls. This program is good old fashioned fun!
Early American Life
Experience a day in the life of the early settlers as we do the chores, sing the songs, and learn some of the skills of the American frontier.
Edible Plant Walk
See, smell and taste the plants near you. We will gather plants from the forests and fields, then make an edible feast (seasonal).
Environmental Concert
Experience stories and songs inspired by the Earth and its people.
Environmental Games
A learning and playing extravaganza! We will experience games inspired by the animals and forest trees around us.
Fun with Fossils
Life existed on our planet as long as 500 million years ago. What kinds of animals and plants lived between then and now, how were they preserved, and what can we learn from them about ancient climates and environments? Hunt for fossils in gravel and limestone, identify fossils and learn about how they form in this exciting, hands-on class.
Insect Adventures
Investigate the insect world. Search for six-legged creatures and learn about their lives.
Minerals
Minerals are the basic building blocks of rocks. Learn about their characteristics, variety, crystal structure, beauty, and how to identify them. Students will discover the minerals hidden in rocks by using hardness scales, hand lenses, magnets, streak plates, and a few simple tools.
Native American Games
Discover some of the toys and games of our native country: play hoop and dart, hot rocks, and more!
Native Ways
Experience the lives of the Piedmont Woodland Indians through tools, traps, bow and arrow, and other aspects of daily existence.
Natural Basketry
This program may include harvesting vines, dyeing them, and weaving them into baskets.
Nature Walk
Nature’s creatures live all around us: under logs, inside leaves, in the earth, air, and water. There are many discoveries we can find together.
Night Hike
Come discover the world of bats, owls, fireflies, and other creatures at home in the night.
The Story of Corn
This program can include shelling, grinding, and cooking corn. Children will learn how traditions, stories, and songs of corn have shaped our American culture for centuries. This relates to studies of Native American life as well as studies of the Pioneers.
Stream or Pond Life
Investigate the community of creatures living in your water.
Water Science
Discover the science within water, use the tools and techniques of water scientists to measure PH, turbidity, salinity, and other factors within the stream or pond near you.
Ways of the Woods
Discover skills in walking silently, camouflage, and reading animal signs. Learn to read the language of the birds, the movements of the fox, and the visions of the owl.
Wild Plant Walk
Tour our site or yours to discover the plants that are growing around you.
Other specific natural history programs are available:
Flowers, Trees, Fruits and Seeds, etc.
We can also bring your classroom books to life in our Living History Series.
Our series includes the following books:
- Sign of the Beaver
- My Side of the Mountain
- Little House in the Big Woods