Summer Camp Recap: Wonderful Worm Math

By Carolyn Carlins, Facilitator, Phipps Science Education and Research

Summer Camp Recap is our weekly seasonal segment featuring our summer camp programs. This is the place for camp parents to find pictures of their campers in action and see the fun things we did all week. It’s also a great place for educators to pick up craft, story and lesson ideas for their own early childhood programs.

Last week our 4 –6 year old campers wiggled through the conservatory as we learned about worms and how they help the earth! Each day we talked about a different aspect of a worm’s life underground: anatomy, compost, and the ecosystem of soil. 

Throughout the week we explored the world of worms through math, art, the dirt outdoors, and by observations in our notebooks. By counting the body parts of our wiggly friends, campers learned how worms use two sets of muscles, five hearts, one mouth and zero eyes to navigate under our feet. 

Using our vermicomposter (worm composter), we conducted an experiment to see which foods (carrots, apples, peaches or cantaloupe) were our worms’ favorites. We hope our campers continue to discover worms in their own backyard!

Backyard Science: Make your own composter out of recycled materials! Use an old two-liter bottle to create a small composter, by cutting the top off of an old two-liter bottle and filling the bottle with soil and worms. Place old food scraps such as apples cores, banana skins and coffee grounds to your composter. Sprinkle top with shredded paper and recover with the top of the two-liter bottle, then watch your worms at work!