Moose

This week we chose Moose. We learned they're ruminants like American Bison, we made green pancakes with homemade whipped cream to represent the waterlilies moose enjoy and a fun finger paint craft. Come learn about moose with us!

All activities at Glass Half Something require parent supervision! Safety first, friends!

Books! Books! Books!

This week we learned about Moose. These massive deer live largely in the northern part of North America and can dive for water plants up to 18 feet deep! Come learn about this ruminant with us!

Top 3 moose books:

Moose: Animals of the Forest by Al Albertson
- This book taught us lots about antlers and moose habitat. It is also a level 2 early read!
Moose: Animals that Live in the Forest by JoAnn Early Macken
- This book taught us our favorite fact: moose will dive underwater to grab plants from the bottom. These animals are massive. It's hard to imagine them diving underwater. We learned in our third book that diving depth can be up to 18 feet. Fascinating!
Moose: Wild Animal Kingdom by Gail Terp
- This book has a neat growth chart to show how fast and large moose grow. They're born at around 25 pounds, are 400 pounds by 6 months and can grow up to 800-1,600 pounds in adulthood.

Create!

This week, we made finger paint moose! My youngest loves that it's "my hands" and her brother's hands on their page. They were quick and easy and had a great sensory component.

Parent Prep

First, I cut out the brown construction paper that they glued to their white background. EZPZ!

Each kid chose a finger paint color, painted their own hand with a paint brush and stamped it on as the moose antlers. The sensation of painting your hand is different! We also talked about which hand was easier to use for painting, the topic of right and left handedness. Such a quick, fun craft for moose this week!

Get Moving!

We learned that moose have split hooves which help them travel across many different uneven terrains. To get moving, we went for a hike outside at a local park with hills, grass, sticks to (carefully) walk over. We talked about which materials were easier to walk on and why we though that might be. We were moose in our own right!

Eats!

By Thursday, we'd learned moose are herbivores that eat plants, including water plants, like waterlilies. Check out how we eat like a moose!

We chose waterlilies for dinner Friday. It was a great opportunity for all four of us to be involved. My husband and our youngest collected all of the ingredients from the pantry and refrigerator while my oldest sifted through the recipe to grab his measuring tools. We used Kids Eat in Color's (who you should definitely check out!) Green Pancake recipe and made homemade whipped cream to represent the waterlily.

We blended our mix thoroughly. It was SO green because my son chose, accidentally, a lot of spinach. But it worked out okay!

We let the mix sit for a bit to thicken up. While waiting, we made homemade whipped cream. I usually toss half a pint into our KitchenAid, whip it up and add vanilla and a small amount of sweetener. This time, because the pancakes have honey, we left the sweetener out. That can be an acquired taste but my kids still love unsweetened cream.

Set aside the whipped cream, after snatching a spoonful to snack, of course. We made the pancakes on a griddle. My oldest (under close supervision!) flipped the pancakes. We learned about how heat can change the color of things, seeing the pancakes turn darker as they cooked, and reviewed cooking safety. The griddle is hot! We need to use a tool to touch food that's cooking on the griddle; here is a spatula. He did great and "waterlilies" were a hit!

Have you tried green pancakes?

Summary

Top 5 Moose Facts

Moose will dive underwater to find and eat plants.
Male moose can be up to 7 feet tall and 10 feet long
Male moose grow antlers up to 6 feet across. Each winter they shed their antlers to help conserve energy. They grow back in the spring and summer.
Moose don't have upper front teeth. They grab food with their lower front teeth and upper lip.
Adult moose live alone.