We have been seeing an abundance of artistic expression lately as our friends, neighbors and the children we care for embrace the pause necessitated by the pandemic and let their creative juices flow.

At times like these, I like to bring Andy Goldsworthy’s books back into our lives. I use Goldsworthy ‘s examples to teach my early learners and their families about ephemeral (pronounced ih-fem-er-uhl) art. Ephemeral art is short-lived. The children often refer to it as “earth art” or “land art,” but ephemeral is such a great word that I often introduce it to broaden their vocabulary.

Andy Goldsworthy is an ephemeral sculptor and creator who specializes in crafting art from natural and found materials. His books have inspired and challenged my budding artists for years. Goldsworthy’s goal is to celebrate and study nature by interacting with natural elements as intimately as he can. He generally works with whatever is available at the site of his design, including stones, twigs, thorns, muds, snow, icicles, brightly colored flowers and leaves.

So what does this have to do with math and science? Plenty! As we explore ephemeral art this month, you’ll be amazed by the many STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math) learning opportunities that ephemeral art projects can provide—and the many early learning standards or benchmarks for math and science that you can meet through this amazingly fun art form.

When we begin to experiment with ephemeral art, we use natural resources (sticks, stones, leaves, ice, shells, sand) to create our own original designs. For the children, this involves collecting, sorting, grouping, designing and often patterning. This hands-on learning can be used to deepen children’s understanding of the aesthetic qualities of natural materials, to enrich their vocabulary and to get their creative juices flowing. Earth art is creative fun that can be done by everyone!

When children engage in design, they often use nonstandard units to measure length and capacity. They use vocabulary that describes and compares length, height, weight, capacity and size. They express wonder and curiosity about their world by asking questions, solving problems and creating art that may change course in the middle of their design process. Land art allows children to develop and use models to represent their ideas, observations and explanations through their designs. All of these creative endeavors will meet Illinois Early Learning Standards—and will very likely meet your state or institution’s early learning requirements as well.

We love to create our own earth art using whatever natural materials have made their way into our program. Sometimes, to get the children’s creative juices flowing, I will do the collecting and sorting. I will often model the process for the children by sitting quietly within sight and starting my own design. Sometimes the children will work on individual projects and, at other times, they will collaborate on group projects. We never know quite when the inspiration will kick in or where the design process will take us.

Our students understand that their creations are a gift to all who see them. But they also accept the reality that their art is ephemeral and may not be there when we return to the sites of our creative endeavors.

I feel that this concept comes rather easily to children who spend many hours outdoors. They understand that the seasons, weather and wildlife are ever-changing. The plant that they could jump over yesterday has literally grown overnight. The tree stumps that they balanced on yesterday are now slippery from the overnight rain. Growing up with these daily changes and challenges allows children to understand that their artwork, their building projects and even the vegetables in their garden may disappear overnight. We have some mighty hungry rabbits and raccoons in our neighborhood. Snapping a picture to document the learning and sharing it with friends and family helps to remind the kids that everything about nature is ephemeral.

This month, I have a challenge for you. Currently, as we spend the majority of our days closer to home, wouldn’t this be a great time to share earth art with our neighbors? To create visual offerings on the sidewalk, in the park or in the forest for passersby to discover and enjoy?

So embrace the pause! Bring joy into the lives of strangers by creating ephemeral art and fostering the development of early math and science skills in our youngest learners!

Growing your own food can happen anywhere. From a small planter on the window sill to tilling the soil in your yard. Personally, I enjoy a mixture of pots and raised planters. Hardware stores with garden centers or Greenhouses are great resources to help you get started. I use pots for large root vegetables, potatoes and sweet potatoes, and for herbs that will take over the yard like mint or lemon balm. Trust me on the lemon balm! My son convinced me to put it in my raised planter several years ago and I am still regularly pulling it out because it is trying to overrun my carrots, strawberries, and melons.

At my former child care, spring was full of garden planning. I love how easy it was to incorporate a variety of different math explorations into growing food we would eat for our snacks or lunch. First we would count the number of pots that would be used for vegetables/fruits compared to flowers. Then, the seed packets were spread out on the table and the children voted on which ones they wanted to grow. There were a limited number of pots, so we could not plant all of the seeds. Peas, beans, and carrots were some of the favorites.  My family liked large tomatoes but the preschoolers did not until I introduced both cherry and pear varieties. These quickly became an annual favorite. Their small size, fun shape, sweet taste, and quick growing was intriguing to them. They would spend time during the day counting the yellow flowers and green tomatoes talking about how many they would eat.

After cleaning, the group would decide how many tomatoes each person would get to eat. This was a great way to explore the concepts of division and “fair”. Anyone with young children can validate that children will quickly notice if you have more than they do. This also gave us the chance to explore fractions in a fun and engaging way. When there was not an even amount, which happened often, we would cut up the remaining tomatoes so that everyone would have a piece. This gave me the opportunity to talk with the children about fractions, such as ½, ⅓ , and ¼. Cutting a cherry or pear tomato into 1/4ths takes some practice! There is a great trick that you can use with two plates to cut large groups in ½ quickly. Click here to watch! There was a great deal of counting and recounting to make sure everyone had the same amount. Then the feast would begin.

In my area, starting in June, there are several farmers markets that offer a wide variety of seasonal goodies to take home. Everything from fresh fruits and vegetables, to canned jams and pickled garlic, to pints of honey. It is an explosion of different flavors and textures for the taste buds. Though many vendors will take credit cards several of them still prefer the old fashion method of paying with cash. This can lead to a wonderful opportunity for children to learn about how currency is used for exchanged.

My boys enjoyed visiting the farmers market in their youth both locally and wherever we traveled. We would gather some loose change from around the house then stop by the local bank to get some dollar bills, mostly one’s and five’s to make it easy for counting. On Main Street we would visit the different vendors to check out all of the yummy items offered. Larger items such as watermelons we would leave that until the end of the shopping, though reflecting back we should have learned from some of the other families and simply brought our little red wagon.

When we would find something that looked tasty, there would be a discussion about the price to make sure that we had enough money and whether we wanted to spend that much. We encouraged the boys to count out the amount of dollars and cents needed to purchase the item. Mathematical concepts such as addition and subtraction were practiced in this fun and interactive manner. We all got to interact with other people and the boys were able to satisfy their hunger…and…for anyone with young children,  you know this can be a leading factor in many decisions. These interactions helped to bring the abstract concept of large numbers, 100/500/1000, into the real world for them because these numbers simply became $1/$5/$10. Quarters, dimes, and nickels were quickly added to figure out how to make change.

Some activities to try before venturing out into the Farmers Market are:

• Practice exchanging coins. Start out simple with exchanging pennies for nickels, dimes and quarters.
• Move up to creating different ways to exchange the coins for a dollar.
• Model the use of cash when possible while shopping for small purchases.
• Think about simple games that you can play using coins.
• If you child has a piggy bank full of coins offer to exchange them for larger coins and dollar bills.

Helping children how to understand the impact of money will assist them in making wise purchases as they grow into adults. Both of my boys, now adults, are very comfortable with handling currency because they were able to explore this concept in a real world situation that was in a low risk atmosphere where they interacted with adults who supported their exploration of money.

This was a great exploration activity for me regarding early counting skills. We would count the number of holes. Then go out to the flower beds to find that number of different types of flowers to cut and bring inside. As I placed the flower stems into the holes I  my understanding of numbers and one-to-one correspondence developed in a positive way. There were not red marks on a paper if I had the wrong amount, simply extra flowers that would need a different vase. Sometime there would be too few and together we would figure out how many more were needed. This type of self correction made it easy for me to understand the one-to-one relationships between the number of holes and the number of flowers

I spent many hours arranging and then re-arranging flowers in the frog. The number of flowers always remained the same when I filled up all of the holes.  As a young child this surprised me because young children are starting to learn that the number of items remain the same even when you rearrange item in several different ways.

From the time I opened my child care until it closed, there were at least 2 flower pots with flower plants in the outside play area. This allowed for a wide variety of exploration and discussion. Some of the favorite activities that the children completed were:

• Counting seeds, creating a hole in the dirt, placing a seed, then covering it up.
• Measuring out the water that would be given to the plant in a plastic measuring cup.
• Marking on the calendar the days that we watered the flowers and the days where the soil was moist so we did not need to.
• Placing a ruler next to the plant and noticing how much it grew over the days.
• Counting the number of flowers and buds.
• Comparing the number of petals or size of the different flowers.

Another benefit for this type of learning about math is that flower pots helps children to connect with nature in a meaningful way. They begin to understand the cycle of living things and what plants need in order to thrive. Children have the ability to explore in an environment that supports their growing minds. Plus there is the added benefit of being able to bring some beautiful colors and smells into the home.

Flower gardens are easy to grow in almost any climate. I live in what is call a High Desert where there is limited rain, an average of 300 days of sunshine, surrounded by mountains, with temperatures that can fluctuate over 20 degrees from the hottest to coldest part of the day, and the town sits at 4,500 feet above sea level. The key to success is to talk with your local Extension Office or Garden Center to see what grows best in your area. Note: It is important to consider the spread of the plant as some can quickly spread when planted in the ground. I had mint one year that spread into the lawn and roses…… but oh it smelled amazing.

The addition sign (+) shows that one number is to be added to the other.  If children have concrete examples of items in front of them and they are asked to count how many items there are all together, they are adding.  If you were to put 3 apples on a table top and then draw a large + sign and put 3 apples on the other side of it, the message is that the two sets of apples should be added together.  The representation of the equals (=) sign lets them know that the total number equals both sets all together.

The same is true for the minus (-) sign.  Children tend to understand the concept of take away more readily than subtraction, so I encourage you to use take away when you ask children to subtract.  You can add the word subtract so they can become familiar with it, but take away provides a concrete and visual description of the concept that supports the preoperational and the concrete operational child.

Try and add these three mathematical signs into your classroom.  When creating visual cues for children, use these signs to support the message you are communicating.   Find ways to incorporate the language of “addition,” “take away,” and “equals” into your conversations with the children.

Understand addition, and understand subtraction.

• CCSS.Math.Content.K.OA.A.1 Represent addition and subtraction with objects, fingers, mental images, drawings¹, sounds (e.g., claps), acting out situations, verbal explanations, expressions, or equations.
• CCSS.Math.Content.K.OA.A.2 Solve addition and subtraction word problems, and add and subtract within 10, e.g., by using objects or drawings to represent the problem.
• CCSS.Math.Content.K.OA.A.3 Decompose numbers less than or equal to 10 into pairs in more than one way, e.g., by using objects or drawings, and record each decomposition by a drawing or equation (e.g., 5 = 2 + 3 and 5 = 4 + 1).
• CCSS.Math.Content.K.OA.A.4 For any number from 1 to 9, find the number that makes 10 when added to the given number, e.g., by using objects or drawings, and record the answer with a drawing or equation.
• CCSS.Math.Content.K.OA.A.5 Fluently add and subtract within 5.

¹ Drawings need not show details, but should show the mathematics in the problem. (This applies wherever drawings are mentioned in the Standards.)

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I appreciate the authors’ intent in this standard as they have clearly limited the learning outcomes for kindergarten-aged children by specifically restricting the range of numbers that children should be able to compute to and from.  Keeping it within a manageable range recognizes the complexity of the standard and manages expectations of children.

In the early childhood world, we explore this algebraic thinking (simple addition and subtraction) through songs and finger plays (5 Little Ducks Went Out One Day, 5 Green and Speckled Frogs, Way up High in the Apple Tree) using our fingers as visual cues to help children see one less duck or frog by folding our fingers down.  Usually, children still need to count the fingers that are still out as they are not quite able to “take away” yet. “Taking away” requires that children can go backward – but remember, many young children have simply memorized the numbers in order but reversing the order is very hard to do.

Simple addition using objects should be introduced during play.  If children are playing with blocks and they need “1 more”, be sure to verbalize that, reinforcing the vocabulary and the concept that “1 more” is “adding 1” to the set.  Keep it simple with numbers under 5.  If you find that you have children who are grasping this fairly well, broaden the number range to 10.

There are also great ways to incorporate mathematical concepts into the projects.  Take a look at this one.

Here, the teacher provides the petals, stems, and flower centers.  The numbers are already written on the centers, so the children simply have to put as many leaves on their flowers as required.  This is a good one for younger children.  You can challenge the older children by creating simple addition problems with the flowers.  Give an older child 2 flower centers (a 2 and a 3), have them complete their flowers and then have them calculate how many petals both flowers have all together.  Once they figure that out, they can create another flower with the total number of petals.