Aquatic Life Sharing

Aquatic Life Provides a Wonderful Unit Study With Projects

SEASHELLS - I realize this is not an individual badge but I thought maybe you could post it under AQUATIC LIFE.

Each club member was given a folder that contained lots of interesting seashell info.  On the first page was the “She sells seashells” tongue twister.  This was just to be silly and to appeal to all age groups.  We said it a few times together for fun.  We  then learned about mollusks and gastropods.

Since different shells are found in different regions, we focused the rest of the meeting on shells found on Sanibel Island in Florida.  The next few pages contained a shell’s name and a description of that shell.  The club members were seated around a long table that was covered in various seashells.  As the description was read everyone was encouraged to search for the appropriate shell.  Inside of everyone’s folder was a small ziploc bag with pictures of shells.  After the actual shell was found, they searched for the coordinating picture in their ziploc bag and attached it to their worksheets with double stick tape.

Then we began craft projects.  Everyone was given a large lunch bag that they wrote their names on.  This was for them to place their completed projects in.

We had learned about sand dollars and their “teeth,” which actually look like doves.  Everyone was given a copy of the “Footprints in the Sand” poem and two sea biscuits.  Sea biscuits are sturdier than sand dollars so they are better to work with.  One was kept whole, and they smashed the other to get the teeth/doves out.  Then they decorated their poem with the doves and whole sand dollar, and placed it in a small plastic box, and chose a ribbon to adorn it.

The next craft was a photo holder.  Everyone was given a small cardboard circle the circumference of a drinking cup.  Then they chose whatever shells they wished from the table, mounded them on the cardboard circle, and then hot glued into place.  Then they broke a wooden skewer into the length they desired, and hot glued the broken end down into the shell mound.  On the end sticking up they hot glued a small clothespin face up and added a final shell at the top and a little raffia for decoration.

All the shells they used were from Sanibel Island.  Since they had completed their folders, they could identify the shells by name that they had chosen for their craft.

Lastly there was another table set up with a sand dollar rubber stamp and the supplies and ideas for everyone to stamp three cards.  (Honeybrook, PA)