Our Summer Religious Exploration Program for Children and Families
Science and Nature are two strands in the interdependent web that holds our Universe together and helps us explain how and why things exist and happen. Both are part of our “wonder world.” Summer is a time to get outside and to explore our environment. And we can still do that, even with the restrictions imposed by COVID-19. Each week, we’ll offer an activity that gets you outside and gets your hands dirty, and one that explores science from a UUKids perspective.
Week of July 12th
Part I: Nature: Creativity in Nature and “The Most Beautiful Bower”
Let the rain kiss you. Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops. Let the rain sing you a lullaby. — Langston Hughes, 20th-century African American poet
This session looks at creativity in the web of life, exploring the idea that humans are not the only creatures that exhibit an urge to create. The central story, “The Most Beautiful Bower in the World,” introduces the elaborate structures that male bower birds make to impress females. Female bower birds select mates based on the creativity shown in the bowers the males make. Children’s creativity is fostered in a recycled art activity that encourages self-expression and imagination. For a hands-on experience of nature, take a Birding Expedition.
Goals – This session will:
- Present creativity as a positive attribute that benefits the web of life
- Provide opportunities for participants to experience and honor creativity
- Reinforce the seventh Unitarian Universalist Principle, “respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.”
- Discuss creativity in the non-human world through a story about bower birds
- Use imagination and creativity to make their own “nests”
Read – The Most Beautiful Bower in the World (pdf)
Create – “Nests” and share with other family members:
- Cardboard boxes large enough for making a child-sized “nest”
- Recycled items and art supplies for decorating nests, such as glitter glue, ribbons, markers, wallpaper scraps, construction paper, beads and string, pipe cleaners, stick-on gems, and scissors (including left-handed scissors), glue, tape, and glue sticks. Natural items for decoration, such as stones, shells, colorful leaves, and small sticks
Part II: Science
Watch the UU Science Kids, Episode 2 ~ Interconnected Ecosystems: Climate Change and the 7th Principle
Episode 2: Interconnected Ecosystems (17:57)