Why Are They Marching Daddy?

It's ANZAC Day here today, we've been reading some of our picture books that we have on hand, all of us shedding a tear or two at hearing the stories of bravery and loss.

Many of the books available, even the picture books, are just a little too heavy on war and death for young ones and they aren't always ideal.

I wanted to share this book with you, especially if you have young children, as I thought it was a fabulous introduction to ANZAC Day and what it's all about.

This is the story of Maddy, a young girl that goes to the ANZAC march with her father. As all young children do, she asks questions, lots of them. Questions such as, Why are they marching? What is war?

Is war bad? What does it mean to live freely? And many other questions are asked and answered throughout the book.

In fact this one story pretty much answered all of the questions my younger children had, without the emotional baggage that many of the other picture books bring with them.

I'd recommend you add this to your list. It can be purchased, along with a teacher supplement at this link. or from the Australian War Memorial online store

We are off to the march............. Lest We Forget.............

Exploring The Arts In The Park

We took a short drive down the coast this weekend to attend the inaugural Art in the Park Festival. Like most new community events it wasn't massive, but then it didn't attract a million and one visitors either, which made for a very lovely day all round. Loads of free fun for the kids!

Tattoo's for everyone.

They all tried their hand a spot of aerial hoops, circus here we come!

We spent most of our day with Spiderman and a little Flower Girl.

Both boys loved the African Drumming workshop. They got to spend a good 15 minutes with this, was absolutely fabulous for a free workshop.

Under the art tent, the children had the choice of a canvas, wood plaque or a boomerang to paint as they wished.

They loved the aerial silks too. There we other hands on activities that we either didn't get to or the kids chose not to, Hebel Carving, Clay Sculpting, Sand Sculpting. Plus live entertainment, demonstrations from some of the display holders and of course food.

If you are local be sure to catch this one next year!

Outdoor Hour: Fungi & Printable Note Book Pages

The Outdoor Hour challenge this month was Lichen, Moss & Fungi. With all of the rain we've had here this year we didn't even need to leave our yard to hunt down and discover an array of fungi.

Once we started looking I couldn't believe my eyes with all of the different varieties right here in our own back yard. The kids were pretty excited running here, there and everywhere looking for fungi. I could here shouts, "I've found a different one over here!"

I wanted a record of our time spent looking more closely at the fungi but didn't want to turn this into a chore, so I put together a very simple notebooking page for the kids to illustrate the fungi of their choice.

Everyone agreed on water colours for this exercise. Lego Lover (11) chose a single stand alone specimen.

From the Fairy Princess, 8.

Little Surfer Dude, 4.

We also completed a second page with the all of the photographs taken during the backyard fungi hunt.

After Fungi we were on a bit of a roll and notebooked some of our backyard flowers and birds. I'm sharing these simple notebook pages over at my box storage.

Download the note book pages by clicking here.

I'm linking this post up to the Outdoor hour Challenge over at Handbook of Nature Study.