Submitted by Pam Varga, Sahli Park Manager
Looking for something to pull your kids away from their electronic screens and get them out of the house? Bring
the kids to Sahli Nature Park on McKinley Road. A visit to the park with your children can be a fun family activity and an enjoyable learning experience. Studies have shown there are many benefits to children playing outside and interacting with nature. A day at Sahli Park can help your child strengthen muscles and bones, improve motor skills and co-ordination, increase stamina, improve language and communication skills, develop a sense of curiosity, improve sensory skills, increase attention span and memory, increase imagination and creativity, and decrease stress and anxiety. As children observe, explore, and discover, they learn about their place in the natural world and come to love and respect nature. Above all, exploring nature at Sahli Park is fun! Your kids will be healthier and happier.
Here are some easy activities to help you and your children interact with nature.
1. The best “toy” you can give a young child is a magnifying lens or a “bug box,” which is a small plastic box with a magnifier in the lid. Examine a leaf or a flower, moss or a feather, an insect or an acorn. What else can you find? Have your child describe what they see “up close.”
2. Go on a scavenger hunt. As you walk through the park, check off the things you see. Check out the next page for a scavenger hunt list for you to try.
3. Collect leaves of different shapes and make leaf rubbings. Lay the leaf flat on a table or hard surface and place a sheet of paper over it. Use one hand to hold the paper in place and rub a brightly colored crayon back and forth over the paper. Watch the shape of the leaf appear. You can also cut out the leaf shapes, use a marker to add details and create leaf people and animals. Be careful when you collect leaves that they don’t have any insects or webs on them. You don’t want to bring home any unexpected visitors.
4. Keep a journal. On your walk through the park use your cell phone or camera to take pictures of interesting things you see. Let your child take some of the pictures, too. Print the pictures and paste them into a notebook. Ask your child to write a sentence or two, perhaps with your help, about the photos. Young children love to draw. You can also ask your child to draw something seen on your park visit and write or dictate a sentence about their artwork.
5. Play the “Take Five” game. As you walk along the trails through the woods, around the pond and through the meadow, see if you can observe five things in a certain category such as five birds, flowers, animals, pinecones, differently shaped leaves, things that are red, things that feel soft, things that smell good, and so on. Each time you visit the park, try to find five of something new.
6. Try the Story Hike. The Chippewa Branch Library posts the pages of a children’s book on signs around the meadow. As you and your child walk along the meadow path, you can read the book together. At the arbor near the top of the meadow, your child can draw something seen in the meadow or in the book, and we will post the drawing in our cottage nature center.
Put away the computer games, pack the family into the car, and bring your children to Sahli Nature Park. Have a picnic lunch, ride the swings, try some catch-and-release fishing, walk the trails, visit the butterfly nursery (which will be opening at the end of June), and enjoy our beautiful pollinator flower gardens. Exploring nature together with your children will make you all healthier and happier.
KEEP SAHLI NATURE PARK CLEAN & GREEN
Sahli Nature Park is a wonderful place to enjoy nature, and we’d like to keep it that way. As park visitors, there are some things you can do to help us stay clean and green.
- Please don’t use balloons, glitter, confetti, or colored smoke bombs in the park
- Our wild flowers and the flowers in our gardens are beautiful, but please don’t pick them
- It’s fun to see turtles and frogs in the pond, but please don’t catch them and take them home
- We welcome small family picnics to use the pavilion, but large parties are prohibited. Organizations can use the pavilion for educational purposes.
- At the park, we have catch- and-release fishing. You enjoy catching the fish, and the fish likes being gently placed back in the water. Everyone goes home happy, but please remember to clean up your hooks, lures, and tangled line
- Just a reminder that smoking is not permitted anywhere in the park
We thank all our park visitors who help keep the park beautiful and protect our plants and wildlife. Our thanks to you for helping us to stay clean and green!
