Next up was Brazil! We concentrated on one of the most fascinating parts of Brazil-the Amazon Rainforest! We started with the flag...
Next we learned about the layers of the rainforest. The kids LOVED this. Every morning we would ask what layer they wanted to live in for the day. Here's a chart of the layers:
Then we sang this song about one hundred fifty million times. :)
Next we learned about Anacondas. It was disturbing and fascinating at the same time! We found they could grow up to 30 feet. Since our room is about 30 feet long, we rolled out butcher paper the length of an anaconda.
After cutting them into snake shapes, we added eyes and a mouth.
Next, we stamped our snake's skin with black spots.
This was such a big undertaking, we moved our anaconda to another area!
The campers were so fascinated with the length of the snakes that we used different toys to make chains to show us how long they were. *shudder*
We played a snake game, too.
Ahh! A two headed snake!
We added rainforest animals to the sensory table.
After learning about poisonous tree frogs we got frog tattoos!
They were pretty popular.
One really interesting thing we learned about tree frogs in the rainforest is that they often make their homes in bromeliads. A bromeliad is a tropical plant in the pineapple family They live on the branches and trunks of rainforest trees. They have a remarkable way of getting water and food. Their long, curved leaves overlap at the base, forming a tight little bowl -- a perfect water tank! The leaves act as gutters to collect rain, and the tank holds the water. The largest bromeliads hold up to two gallons of water. Many animals make their home in the bromeliads. We examined a pineapple for ourselves, then made our own bromeliads.
We cut paper to look like spiky leaves and taped them around a cup, similar to the hole the leaves create in a real bromeliad. Then everyone got to choose a tree frog to go inside!
We even put water in our cups!
We took an expedition down the Amazon river in a small boat...
Then we learned about tropical birds. One was the toucan. We made toucans at art.
Are these super cute or what?
Ms. Courtney made us this awesome waterfall that we walked under to enter our room.
For our cultural cooking project, we made Brazilian cheese puffs, called Pão de Queijo. You can find the recipe here.
This recipe called for tapioca flour, which I couldn't find! Ms. Heather came to the rescue and picked some up at Whole Foods for us.
The batter turned out to be completely liquid, which we didn't expect.
But we poured the batter in and hoped for the best.
They puffed, then deflated, but here's the final product:
The consensus? Strange texture, but with two cups of cheese, let's be honest, anything that cheesy is delicious.
That's the end of the rainforest days. Next up, we are escaping to Egypt!
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