Schoolyard Safari

We grabbed clipboards, pencils, paper and hats and went on a schoolyard safari today! Our task was to find minibeasts to observe.

First, we decided on some rules to keep ourselves safe and to care for the little creatures we found. Our rules were:

• Don't touch any animals we find, just in case they can bite or sting us, and so that we don't do them any harm.
• Put things back exactly how you found them (eg. if we move a rock to look underneath, put it back carefully, because it's a habitat and it was just the way the insects liked it before we took a look.)
• Wash our hands after we're finished because our hands might be dirty from touching sand, bark and rocks.

A few days ago, we predicted what sort of minibeasts we might find at school and made a big list of them. Today, we put a tick beside the ones we actually found. Some of them were interesting because even though we didn't find them today, we're pretty sure they're somewhere at our school, but they might be hard to spot because they're so good at camouflaging themselves.

• mosquito  ✔
• stinkbug ✔
• ladybird ✔
• butterfly
• praying mantis
• grasshopper ✔
• fly ✔
• spider ✔
• bee ✔
• snail
• centipede
• dragonfly ✔
• hornet
• caterpillar
• ant ✔
• worm ✔
• moth
• wasp ✔
• slug
• beetle ✔
• stick insect ✔
• scorpion
• slater ✔
• cicada

Mrs N appreciated having Renee's mum to help us on our safari this morning!

Love from The Smarties and Mrs N