Year 1 Squirrel Project

During our visit to Sad Janka Kráľa the children spotted a squirrel jumping between the trees. The kids were very excited to share stories about other squirrels they had encountered. This led to our second emergent topic of the school year.

Our study of squirrels led us to learn many facts about squirrels and also led us to a further inquiry about where squirrels live and what they eat.

We learned that squirrels live in nests called dreys. The children then made dreys (using many of the same materials squirrels use to make their real dreys) and placed them in tree branches.

We also learned that squirrels hide their extra nuts in underground “pantries” and can later locate about 80% of these caches through their memory and excellent sense of smell. The children then made squirrels and nuts from salt dough. They added the squirrels to their nests and “buried” the nuts in the forest.