What is that in the tunnel?

Time to make a move forward. Listen to your inner voice and you will know exactly what you have to do.

-Grasshopper

The preschoolers raced out onto the playground, and up onto the playscape,
and the next thing I heard was screams from within the climbing tunnel.
I ran to the tunnel to see what was the matter,
to see who was climbing over whom.

Surprise!
No one was hurting; there was a grasshopper* in the playscape tunnel!
A big beautiful green grasshopper!
An amazing find!!

Thankfully (?), someone had left a trash cup on the playground,
so I was able to catch the grasshopper.
I moved the grasshopper down to the mulch, along the brick wall,
where it delighted the children for some twenty minutes or so.
I encouraged the children to work like scientists,
to stand back a little bit and observe;
we sang “What do you see as you look closely?”
The children were in both awe and fear -
especially when the grasshopper would unexpectedly fly.
Truly, the children swarmed the grasshopper, trying to get a very close look.
As the grasshopper climbed the wall,
I lifted children individually to see it up close.
We wondered why it kept licking its front legs.

Later, after lots of observation
(and so many students playing very close to the grasshopper),
I moved the grasshopper into a bush/undergrowth by the side of the school.
Time for it to have a little privacy!

Back in the classroom, quickly trying to think of a way to extend this learning,
I placed some simple coloring pages of grasshoppers in the writing center,
to discover during our centers play. While the children colored, they shared their thoughts.
Their thoughts form almost a story:

(Me, prompting) A grasshopper came to the playground. We found him in the tunnel.
What did you notice?

(T) He wanted to have a ride.

(W) He wanted to go down the slide.

(E) I saw it. He was walking. See that wall over there. He walked under it, on it.

(C) I was running away from the grasshopper because it was about to climb on me,
all the way to my head.

(J) Why was he licking his hand? Because he ate something - our lunches!

(B) That’s just what he wants.

(L) That it flew...I saw it walking on the tunnel and I went down.

(S) He flied and I run away and then I came back and then I saw him licking his hand.

(T) He so creepy.

(W) He want to climb up the wall.

(Sh) When I saw the grasshopper, it was trying to get in my eyes, and I run and run and run.

An unexpected inquiry about grasshoppers!! Totally exciting for all.

*Full disclosure - I found out the next day from one of my parents,
who is also an entomologist, this grasshopper was actually a katydid! Ah, well,
still great learning, all around!