Pinecone bird feeders were hung for small animals on our hike.
We woke with a goal: The Summit. Being the third time our class has visited Caves Crater this school year, we all felt that it was time to reach the top.
Each of our trips to the trail were designed with different goals in mind. The first time we ventured on the trail, we explored vegetation and tried to spot animals and had a picnic. We almost made it to the top, but tuckered out before the peak. The second time we went we explored the same vegetation and looked for how it had changed now that fall was upon us. In our exploration we found a good amount of trash and it became an impromptu, student initiated, class litter clean up as I lugged trash up and down the hill. We were (un)fortunate enough to find a plastic bag that we used to haul our findings out of the forest.
As we prepared for our upcoming adventure, we were in the dead of winter and the students had expressed concern over the lack of food the rabbits, squirrels, and birds might have during these cold, dry months. Remembering my family used to make pine cone bird feeders when I was a kids, I pulled out some pine cones I had stored away, so we could use them as a base and not add any trash to the forest.
All morning, we slathered the pine cones in vegetable shortening and rolled them in birdseed. When we arrived we spent the first hour of our hike sloshing through the forest hanging feeders with cotton string, some high, some low (for the rabbits, of course).
Each of our trips to the trail were designed with different goals in mind. The first time we ventured on the trail, we explored vegetation and tried to spot animals and had a picnic. We almost made it to the top, but tuckered out before the peak. The second time we went we explored the same vegetation and looked for how it had changed now that fall was upon us. In our exploration we found a good amount of trash and it became an impromptu, student initiated, class litter clean up as I lugged trash up and down the hill. We were (un)fortunate enough to find a plastic bag that we used to haul our findings out of the forest.
As we prepared for our upcoming adventure, we were in the dead of winter and the students had expressed concern over the lack of food the rabbits, squirrels, and birds might have during these cold, dry months. Remembering my family used to make pine cone bird feeders when I was a kids, I pulled out some pine cones I had stored away, so we could use them as a base and not add any trash to the forest.
All morning, we slathered the pine cones in vegetable shortening and rolled them in birdseed. When we arrived we spent the first hour of our hike sloshing through the forest hanging feeders with cotton string, some high, some low (for the rabbits, of course).
All that feeding made us hungry, so we stopped by a tree stump to nibble on our own snack , watching to see if any animals partook in our offerings.
On our way back up the trail we came across some sticks that turned out to be perfect for making our own snake tracks and for practicing our writing skills.
Sticks make great writing implements for little hands!
We continued making tracks as we headed up the trail until, we found the spaceship we always ride when we visit and proceeded to blast off!
We landed on mars in time to find a spaceship race had just started. We'd been preparing all week, so we were ready to win. As you can see, the race was a serious one.
Our creative juices start flowing as we engage in a spaceship race on two fallen logs.
After our victory, we continued on the path until we came to a crossroads. Our beginning reader helped us learn which direction we needed to go to reach the summit by reading a sign on the trail. After some sounding the words and learning what vehicles weren't allowed up the trail we took off in the right direction.
Kindergarten student reads the sign to give us our bearing on the hike.
At least until we were distracted by "THE BIGGEST SPACESHIP WE'VE EVER SEEN!!!"
Students use this fallen Ponderosa to take them on a trip to the moon.
It took us to the moon where we practiced zer0-gravity walking and did a little zero-gravity yoga.
We took some time and practiced our zero gravity hop and executed some excellent yoga moves on the moon.
Our ship landed back on Earth, we were finally on our way up the crater. The trees started to change from Ponderosa Pines to smaller conifers. We cautiously approached some Alligator Junipers that were in our path. Luckily, this one didn't bite.
W's close encounter with an Alligator Juniper
So we decided to have lunch with it.
As we proceeded up the 500 foot elevation increase of the trail we spotted some sticky pine sap coming out of the trees. We proceeded to smell, taste, and roll the sticky sap around in our fingers while singing the "Icky Sticky Bubblegum" song, substituting "sap sap sap" for "bubblegum" in the lyrics.
T points out some pine sap he found to us.
Our uphill assent led us around to the North side of the cinder hill. This side of the hill doesn't get much sun during the winter so we were able to track some animals in the snow. The general consensus was that these tracks came from one of the leashed dogs we'd seen hike up the trail ahead of us. Though, it could have been a baby dragon.
Dog or Dragon tracks. Who knows?
As we drew closer to the top we were able to get a beautiful view of the San Francisco Peaks. We stopped to rest and stare at it, all the while practicing saying the words "San Francisco" over and over again between bursts of giggles.
Our view of the San Francisco Peaks on our hike up Caves Crater
After a little over a mile of uphill climbing we finally reached the crater's top! Everyone had a sudden burst of excited energy as we tried to find our school amongst the little community below.
We finally reach the top!
We scoured the top and explored a few of the 70-80 rooms/caves of the ancient Sinagua Pueblo. It was interesting to imagine the lives of the people who had lived there so long ago. We talked about how the caves had provided temperature control and how water was more abundant when the Sinagua tribe lived there. The students decided the caves were comfortable home and we explored 8 or 10 of them as well as their connecting rooms.
Outside the caves we found hundreds, if not thousands of pottery shards that were left when the ancient dwellers moved on. We left them for other visitors to see, but had fun trying to fit some of the pieces together.
Our descent led us back down to complete the 2.4 hike. It took us a bit longer because of the diversions we had along the way but I think we learned more because of them.
What did you learn at school today?
What did you learn at school today?
