Thinking Thursdays: Rainforest roaming (Activities & videos!)

We've been finding it a little tough squeezing in time for activities since baby J has been rather undecided about his morning nap (some days he wants them, some day he refuses to sleep at all!). However, we did manage to squeeze in some activities to learn about the rainforest for the past 2 weeks:

:: Videos: We watched a couple of videos on the rainforest. Junior J kept talking about cocoa trees and beans (he's a huge fan of chocolate!) after watching "The Magic Schoolbus: In the Rainforest"! And we also watched this video, plus the front bit of the "Jungles - People of the Trees" from the Human Planet series. The latter made him a little scared when he saw the huge goliath birdeaters, but seeing the Piaroa children catching them with apparent ease had him relaxing after a while.

The part which made the deepest impression on him was probably the blowpipes of the Matis tribe, because he found this long paper roll from our pile of cardboard boxes, and proceeded to shoot darts at imaginary monkeys:

And even the baby got to try his hand (or rather his mouth) at the blowpipe!

 :: Zoo trip: We also went to the zoo. It was raining though, but we managed to see some of the rainforest animals, like some rather creepy-looking stick insects from Peru. Most of our time was spent, however, trying to spot all the colourful poison dart frogs they had in the two frog tank displays!

:: Make a boa constrictor: We did a couple of crafts (more to come in the next few posts!)... and this one was quite a hit with both the boys...

Junior J got to paint a couple of toilet paper rolls, and I cut them into half. We punched holes in them, and tied the rolls together using yarn. Then we just added goggly eyes and a tongue cut from craft foam. And there you have it, our very own boa constrictor, which has been christened "Crunchy bite" after a Veggietales song.

Crunchy Bite had loads of attention, and got fed food (the boy actually pushed food through the entire length of his body!)...

... and also got some attention from baby J, who shook him until his eyes dropped out! But there's nothing that a little glue cannot solve. ;)

Will be back tomorrow to share the books we've been reading, plus more activities, so stay tuned! Do you have any favourite rainforest activities to share?

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