Nature

05/24/2013: This workshop was canceled! Come to a fun filled workshop hosted by the Beverly Recreation Department! Building a fairy house is a great way for kids to be creative and learn about preserving our planet. Use twigs, rocks, shells, mulch, sand, pinecones, moss, clay and more. Children encouraged to dress like fairies! Materials included. A photographer may take pictures for parents (extra fee for pictures). Instructor: Gigi Sisman-Thomson.

Join watercolorist Brenda Sloane in a monthly program that combines nature and art. We will start with a walk on the sanctuary to observe the topic of the month. We will then return to the Nature Center to create a follow-up work of art.

Joppa Flats Education Center offers April vacation programs offer a wide variety of indoor and outdoor activities - keeping minds active and hands busy during school break! Come all day or as your schedule allows! This Vacation Week Flyby will focus on the salt marshes, the important role they play in the ecosystem and the creatures that use them to feed, live and breed.

The Cape Ann Community Cinemawill be hosting a showing of the film 'Birders: the Central Park Effect' to benefit Kestrel Educational Aventures! 'Birders is a film that celebrates the diversity of birds that live in and migrate through New York's Central Park and the New Yorkers who make birding in Central Park part of their lives. Come see this fascinating film and help raise funds for a unique local organization at the same time!

Joppa Flats Education Center offers April vacation programs offering a wide variety of indoor and outdoor activities - keeping minds active and hands busy during school break! Come all day or as your schedule allows! This Vacation Week Flyby will focus on the birds and Spring buds.

Each year on the first warm rainy night of spring, wood frogs and mole salamanders begin a mass migration to vernal pools where they breed. If you happen to be out on one of these evenings, the experience can be spectacular. Tonight, a part of the sanctuary will be transformed into a Big Night scene. Participants will take a one-hour guided walk along the Vernal Pool Trail, where they will meet some interesting characters who will share some facts and stories about themselves, vernal pools, and this special time of year.

Any season is a great time to notice nature's beauty and to make it come to life with amazing works of art! In the Spring series, we'll use collage and various materials to make wonderful 3-D landscapes of places we like to play in and faraway worlds we've always wondered about.

Join watercolorist Brenda Sloane in a monthly program that combines nature and art. We will start with a walk on the sanctuary to observe the topic of the month. We will then return to the Nature Center to create a follow-up work of art.

We'll read The Mitten by Jan Brett and then take a hike to look for animal homes in the sanctuary. Using a very large mitten, we will recreate the story. As a group, we'll build a people shelter and see how warm we can make it.

This parent/child program is designed for the creative, curious, and active preschooler. Each 90-minute session offers a structured series of activities including original songs, movement, dramatic play, outdoor exploration, and a thematic snack. When it's time to go home, you'll receive coloring pages, song lyrics, vocabulary, a fun fact sheet, and a suggested reading list via e-mail. At this ISL, we'll learn to identify tracks in the snow and about the creatures that leave them behind!