I have two boys that just love for me to read “Going On a Bear Hunt.” We borrowed it from the library on Monday and I’ve now got it memorized because we read it so much. I saw a great activity at http://mylittlehappies.blogspot.com/2012/03/were-going-on-bear-hunt.html that goes with this book. Please take look at that site. She takes her kids on a bear hunt in the backyard. It’s so adorable. I decided that we too would go on a bear hunt. What I ended up with was a lesson in expectations. Let’s just say that while my pictures look somewhat calm and planned, what mostly happened could be compared to a wild group of drunk indians going on a bear hunt. With that said, here’s our bear hunt today.
We’re going on a bear hunt.
We’re going to catch a big one.
What a beautiful day!
We’re not scared.
I took our book outside with us on this beautiful day and read it out loud as we acted out the pages.
Oh-oh! Long, wavy grass. We can’t go over it. We can’t go under it. Oh, no! We’ve got to go through it!
As you can see, the boys ran through the grass, around the shed and looped back through the grass many times.
Oh-oh! A deep, cold river. We can’t go over it. We can’t go under it. Oh, no! We’ve got to go through it!
Oh-oh! Thick, oozy mud. We can’t go over it. We can’t go under it. Oh, no! We’ve got to go through it!
Oh-oh! A big, dark forest. We can’t go over it. We can’t go under it. Oh, no! We’ve got to go through it!
(Ok, so our forest was circling around one tree)
Oh-oh! A swirling, whirling snowstorm. We can’t go over it. We can’t go under it. Oh, no! We’ve got to go through it!
I cut up several tissues, put them in a baggie, stuck a straw in and had the boys blow hard to make a swirling snowstorm.
Oh-oh! A narrow, gloomy cave. We can’t go over it. We can’t go under it. Oh, no! We’ve got to go through it!
In our story, we found 2 shiny wet noses! 4 big furry ears! 4 big googly eyes! We found 2 bears!!!!!! Clearly Lance knows how to handle a bear with just a stick.
That, my friend is the cleaned up version. I wish our hunt went like the little happies hunt, but here’s what happened around the good shots.
1. I hung up the wavy grass first. Mistake! Keeping kids out of it was hard while I set up the other things. Then during one of the laps on our hunt, James grabbed the streamers and tore the whole thing down. They had fun letting them fly off in the wind as they proclaimed the crepe streamers to now be kites.
2. The river, my biggest competitor to getting the boys to do the hunt. I filled the boat with water. They played in it before I even got the rest of the stuff besides the grass set up. Note, don’t set this up in the order of the book. It will help you out. This wasn’t supposed to be a messy activity, but I know my boys and why I thought I could keep it clean and orderly, I don’t know. They had the best fun sitting down in the water. Then later during the mud time, James got distracted and decided to pull a David Letterman on me. He threw everything that he could find into the water and just stood there looking at it as if he was doing a giant “Does it sink or float?” experiment. It took a lot of coaxing to get him back to the hunt.
3. The boys loved blowing the tissue around, so much so that Lance wouldn’t put the bag down but carried it for the rest of the hunt. After our hunt, they found the bag and dumped it all out so it looked like my backyard really did snow.
4. The cave. Lance just wanted to pour water and sand all over the top of my furry blanket. Not cool! Laundry coming soon.
5. Our bears even went for a quick swim to see if they sank or floated.
So, that’s the real story of our bear hunt. Great pictures with a crazy interlude between each one. As soon as I let go of my expectations of how this would play out, we all three had a good time. So dive into your own bear hunt, just remember your child’s natural bent will go into play here too. This is well worth the effort. Happy hunting!
Mercies Raining Down 