What’s so special about it? Visitors can explore a bog, marsh, pond, stream, large ravine with suspension bridge, and a harbor — all among a beautiful second-growth forest with lots of plant and animal life.

The buildings at the six-acre, 18-building campus are designed to be extremely earth-friendly and to blend with the environment as much as possible. Features include composting toilets (they don’t stink!) and photovoltaic roof panels (a solar technology).

IslandWood provides comfortable indoor areas for kids to explore when they aren’t outside.

IslandWood is too wondrous to describe in a single blog post. To see some great photos of the structures, including a true tree house, visit this Metropolis article.

During the school year, the learning center focuses on their four-day overnight programs for 4-6 grade students in the Puget Sound area, but in the spring and summer various programs are available for kids of all ages.

Three-hour IslandWood tours are also offered. If you are going to be in the area, IslandWood is a 35-minute ferry ride from Seattle, WA.

Post from: Tree Hugging Family

I won’t use the word “puke” here often. I do promise. However, this product intrigues me so much I had to post about it for kid’s day.

Available from kidsgardening.org, Owl Puke is a book that comes with a real, vomited, but heat-sterilized owl pellet. This sanitary pellet contains the skeleton of one owl meal, such as a small bird or mouse. The book, intended to help teach kids about the food web, also includes a bone-sorting tray and chart to aid in identifying the contents of the owl pellet. Additional pellets may also be purchased.

The Gardening with Kids Store, from the National Gardening Association, describes Owl Puke as an “irresistible combination of hands-on science and yuck.”

Please note: Owls regurgitate indigestible portions of their meals twice a day, so the makers of this book aren’t going around forcing owls to vomit!

Also, Owl Puke covers many other facets of owl life besides vomiting. Kids can learn about owl habitats, hearing and vision, and many other owl tidbits. With the threatened status of some owls, teaching kids to better appreciate this mysterious creature can be a good environmental lesson.

Post from: Tree Hugging Family