Field Trip: Vizcaya

One hot and sunny day this summer, we headed to Miami for Zelda's first visit to Vizcaya. We viewed every room, walked through most of the gardens, and enjoyed a picnic lunch under an impressive tree. Zelda referred to the lavish villa as a castle and was convinced that mermaids lived in the ship-shaped breakwater on the Bay. It was a magical day for all.

Visiting Vizcaya with Zelda was an extra special treat for me; I've loved the house and gardens since I first visited in the early 1990s. There's so much history packed into its rooms. I'm not sure how much Zelda soaked in from our tour, but maybe it's enough for her to simply experience something in South Florida that's older than a strip mall. 

She learned the word tapestry and was most interested in the (no longer functioning) elevator and the spiral staircases. She was also a big fan of the dozen or so young women taking picutres for their quinceañeras. Zelda thought they were all princesses who lived at the castle. We didn't correct her.

Zelda and a friend search for life in one of the garden's ponds.

Luckily, this guy wasn't in the pond. He stayed on his side of the retaining wall separating the garden from the canals.

"Look up! The clouds are like marshmallows!"

Yes, Zelda. Shoes are required when walking around historic landmarks made of coral and limestone.

Field Trip: Anne Kolb Nature Center

At the Anne Kolb Nature Center, we take long walks along the deck that winds through the mangroves. We use our eyes to observe the trees' roots dipping into the water and muck. We search for the tiny holes where crabs hide. Inside the visitors' center, we touch specimens, live and otherwise. One day, we even got to pet a sea star. 

Scientific discovery is always more fun with friends.

She's So Fine (Motor Skill Mayhem)

Fine motor skills are the actions we perform with the little muscles found in our hands and feet. It takes considerable practice for little fingers to be strong enough to fasten buttons and snaps, control a pencil and crayon, cut with scissors, or tie a knot. We do all sorts of activities and projects that employ fine motor skills and therefore independence, including picking up dirty clothes from the floor with our "talented toes" before throwing them into the hamper. 

Here we see the preschooler in her natural habitat, surrounded by the mess of newspaper scraps she ripped all by herself. Who needs a shredding machine when you've got a three year old?

(I think our facial expressions might technically be categorized as fine motor, as well, and Zelda enjoys playing imaginative games that involve dramatic facial expressions. And dramatic voices. And really dramatic plots.)

Eye droppers are excellent for strengthening the pincer grasp. In this activity, borrowed from the Montessorians, Zelda transferred water from one container (on the left) to another container (on the right). This is a fine motor skill activity as well as a pre-reading and pre-writing activity because it reinforces the left-to-right movements of our eyes and hands when practicing (English) language literacy skills. There was also a discussion about how the water looked yellow in the yellow cup, and Zelda made a prediction that the water would look pink in the pink cup. She was correct, but we double checked our experiment's results with a blue cup, too, because that's what good scientists do. (And yes, she's wearing a crown for this lesson. Princesses like science, too.)