March Cloverbud Activities

National Nutrition Month

 

Concentrate on eating right during March, National Nutrition Month. Introduce your club members to the food pyramid and Cloverbud program “ Making Healthy Food Choices .” Your club members will enjoy the story Gregory, The Terrible Eater by Mitchell Sharmat. After reading the book, have cloverbuds compare good foods for Gregory (a goat) and good nutrition for humans.

March 1st

Today is a day to celebrate the pig as one of man's most
intelligent and useful domesticated animals. Read Perfect The Pig by Susan Jeschke, and then discuss the popularity of pigs as characters in literature. Have students list famous pigs from stories, movies, or TV, and then illustrate their favorite pig character.

March 5th

Super Frosty, the largest snowman ever built, was completed in Anchorage , Alaska , on this date in 1988. It stood 63 ½ feet tall! Lay out a line of masking tape 63 ½ feet long on a sidewalk and let members lie beside it for comparison.

March 6th

Shaquille O'Neal was born in 1972. He stands 7'1” tall and wears size 22EEE shoes! Besides playing basketball, Shaq has acted in movies and recorded rap songs. Ask members to imagine what it must be like to be Shaq's size. Have them write about what they would do for a living and for fun if they were as big as Shaq.

March 24th

In 1989 the tanker Exxon Valdez spilled ten million gallons of oil into Prince William Sound , Alaska . Have students locate this area on a map or globe. Simulate an oil spill by putting 15-20 drops of oil into a small container of water. Have youth brainstorm ways to remove the oil.

A Wild and Woolly Month

Spring into the season with thematic activities and lessons about lions and lambs.

As The Saying Goes…..

Introduce your club members to the old saying, “March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb.” As youth if they know the meaning of this saying, and then discuss March's position as a transitional month between blustery winter weather and mild springtime. Make copies of a March calendar. Each day during March, ask a student to classify the day's weather as a “lion day' (cold and windy) or a “lamb day” (warm and mild). At the end of the month, count to see whether there were more lion or lamb days.

Simile Similarities

Do your members think they are more like lions, or lambs, or other animals? Read the book Quick, As A Cricket by Audrey Wood and discuss the animal comparisons and illustrations. Introduce the concept of simile if your members are not familiar with it. (A simile is a descriptive comparison using words like or as. An example would be “hungry as a bear”.) Then let youths write their own similes. Have each child illustrate herself with the animal of her choice and write a sentence or two explaining why they are like that animal.

Animal Investigations

Divide your group into two groups. Ask one group to research lions, the other lambs. Provide both groups with nonfiction books about each type of animal. When their research is complete, pair up lion and lamb researchers to share their information with one another. Then gather the students into the two original groups and have each group work together to create a poster about its animal, including pictures, interesting facts, diet and habitat.

Lion and Lamb Literature

Dandelion by Don Freeman
Young Lions by Toshi Yoshida
A Lion For Lewis by Rosemary Lewis
Warm as Wool by Scott R. Sauders
Sheep In a Jeep by Nancy Shaw

  St. Patrick's Day Shenanigans

Ideas for a club celebration!

Festive Fare

Let members assist you in preparing a snack of Leprechaun Pies and Pot O'Green Punch. You might also provide shamrock shaped gelatin snacks or sugar cookies with green icing.

Leprechaun Pie

Vanilla wafer cookie
Pistachio pudding
Whipped topping, tinted with green food coloring
Gold foiled wrapped candy coins

Have each member place the vanilla wafer in the bottom of a paper cupcake liner. Add a dollop of pistachio pudding and a dollop of green whipped topping. Stick the candy coin into the whipped cream to finish the pie.

Pot O'Green Punch

Clear Soda
Green food coloring
Lime Sherbet

Pour one or two, two-liter bottles of clear soda into a large bowl and add just a few drip of green food coloring. Spoon in one quart of lime sherbet. Serve in individual cups.

Leprechaun Games

Try this relay race to add new meaning to the phrase, “the wearin' o' the green”! Gather a collection of green clothing; green hat, socks, shoes, scarf, mittens, etc. Divide the group into two teams. Have each team line up in front of a pile of clothing. At the starting signal, the first team member puts on all the green clothes and turns to face the second team member, who must remove all of the green clothing and put it on herself. Play continues until the last team member has removed all the green clothing and placed it back in a pile at the front of the line.

How about a Shamrock Hunt? To prepare, cut out a large number of shamrock shapes from green construction paper and hide them. Distribute paper cups to the members and let them hunt for shamrocks as you play a recording of Irish music. Set a time limit and award a prize to the member who finds the largest number of shamrocks. You might also hide a four-leaf 4-H clover cutout redeemable for a special prize.

Super Spuds

Let your budding scientists grow potatoes for St. Patrick's Day. Supply each member with a small potato, four toothpicks, and a plastic cup large enough to hold the potato. Begin by having members observe their potatoes, calling attention to the buds (eyes) that may turn into sprouts. Have members count the number of eyes on their potatoes, then estimate how many they think might sprout. Place the four toothpicks around the middle of the potato, and place the potato in the cup (the end with the most eyes facing upward). Place the cups near a sunny window and fill with water to cover the bottom halves of the potatoes. Check the water levels in the cups each day and add water if necessary. Remind members to take a few minutes every day to observe the potatoes and have them record any growth.

Stories for St. Patrick's Day
Literature links for lucky readers

St. Patrick's Day
By Gail Gibbons

This non-fiction book about this popular holiday will provide your members with background on St. Patrick and how the observance of this day began. Inform members that this is an important religious holiday in Ireland , including church services, parades, singing, and dancing.

Patrick: Patron Saint of Ireland
By Tomie dePaola

Your members may particularly enjoy the legends about St. Patrick at the end of this book and making snakes or shamrocks from clay. Prepare the recipe for clay below or use commercial air-dry clay. After hardening, let members paint their shamrocks or snakes with tempra or watercolor paint.

Clay
(enough for 4-6 children)

1 cup cornstarch
1 pound baking soda
1 ½ cups water

Mix and heat over low heat until the mixture gets bubbly and begins to thicken. Remove from heat and let cool. The mixture will thicken more as it cools and will be ready to work with in a few minutes. (This clay will harden in about 24 hours, so freeze unused portions in plastic wrap).

Leprechauns Never Lie
By Lorna Balian

This story features a treasure seeking young lady named Ninny Nanny and her Gram, who captures a leprechaun and try to get him to tell where his pot of gold is hidden. Although the captors don't get the gold, they do profit from his visit.

Nuts about Peanuts

Get'em while they're hot! Fresh and practical peanut ideas, and activities sure to give your youngsters a bunch of nutty fun!

From Plant To Peanut

George Washington Carver, a famous African-American botanist, grew up fascinated with plants, especially the peanut plant. He spent his lifetime learning as much as he could about how peanut plants grew and how they could be used. Your members will enjoy following in this inquisitive scientist's footsteps by growing peanut plants of their own. Give each student a clear plastic container (with drainage holes) and two raw peanuts with the red skins intact. Provide soil and water. Each member can personalize his container and fill it with soil. He then places each peanut about two inches deep in the container. Trays should be placed in a warm location (65-70 degrees). Members should check their plants daily and water as needed. Sprouts should appear within seven days.

Nutty Necklaces

Your members will wear smiles when they create nutty necklaces! Use the clay recipe from the St. Patrick's Day article. Have members use the clay to create “peanutty” sculptures ranging from simple peanuts to peanut pigs or people. Use toothpicks to create dimples in the clay peanuts and to poke holes in the sculptures for threading. Air dry or bake the clay creation at 300 degrees for 1 hour (longer for thicker objects). Members can paint and string their novelties to create nutty necklaces.

Peanut Pick-Up

Develop critical thinking skills with this nutty activity! Place drinking straws and two small containers, one that is filled with ten peanuts and one that is empty on a table. Challenge the members to move the shells from one container to the other using only the straws. The containers may not be moved and the straws may only touch the peanuts. Peanuts can be moved by placing one end of the straw against the shell while sucking in air through the other end of the straw. The suction will keep the peanut attached to the straw as it is gently moved to the empty container. A member could also use the straws like chopsticks in one or both hands. The possibilities are endless, as is the opportunity for fun.

Peanut Literature Picks

Peanut Butter by Arlene Erlbach
A Weed is a Flower: The Life of George Washington Carver by Aliki
From Peanuts to Peanut Butter by Melvin Berger
Make Me a Peanut Butter Sandwich and a Glass of Milk by Ken Robbins

Bloomin' Good Books!

  How Do Apples Grow?
By Betsy Maestro

Introduce students to the colorful stages of a flowering tree. With this simple text and lovely pictures, the books explain how apples grow from bud, to flower, to fruit. After sharing the story, let members make flipbooks depicting the bud to fruit process. Give each member 8 sheets of 4” X 5” white paper and have them draw and color one stage in the development of an apple on each sheet. Then staple the sheets in order behind a construction paper cover. As a special treat, supply fresh apples for members to enjoy after the book making session.

Miss Rumphius
By Barbara Cooney

Share the delightful story with your members. Miss Rumphius, who was told as a youngster to do something to make the world more beautiful, decides to plant lupines. By the end of the story, the Lupine lady's efforts are quite noticeable! After sharing the story, brainstorm and list ways that members can help make the world a more beautiful place. After providing members with sheets of construction paper, have them illustrate one of the ideas.

The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush
By Tomie dePaola

When it's time to study plants, it's only natural to talk about flowers. In this Native American story, a young boy dreams that he will one day be able to paint the vivid colors of the sunset on his buckskin canvas. One night as the boy lies awake, a voice called to him, telling him to go to the top of a hill. There, the boy is told, he will find the beautiful colors that he is in search of. The next evening as the sun is setting, the boy goes to a hill where he finds brushes on the ground. He sees that they are filled with paint, and he uses the brushes to paint his buckskin canvas. When finished with the painting, the boy leaves the brushes on the ground. The next morning the hill is ablaze with color, for the paintbrushes had taken root and multiplied.