Guest Post-Teaching your kids about oil spills

Three Jewels In My Crown would like to welcome guest blogger Shannon from Welcome To Our Wonderland.  I was extremely excited about this post because it has such relevance to the Oil Spill that is being tackled in the Gulf of Mexico right now.  This particular oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico may be history's worst ecological disaster.  However, as Shannon mentions below, oil spills occur almost daily around the world.  These oil spills threaten wildlife, sea creatures, fisheries and marshlands.  Today Shannon is presenting a fun way to teach your kids about these fragile ecosystems after an oil spill.
Welcome Shannon and take it away!!!


Hi my name is Shannon and I have a blog Welcome to our Wonderland where I love to share books and activities to go with the children's books. I taught Pre-K for 11 years and became a stay at home mom 10 years ago when my oldest was born. I've been blogging for a few years and besides writing on my blog, in the year 2009 I was a featured writer for Totally Tots having 2 weekly features: Now I Know My ABC's and Once Upon A Book.  I left at the beginning of this year since I no longer had tiny tots : I had a Preschooler. Now I'm a stay at home mom, teaching preschool to my 4 year old and blogging whenever books I can't wait to share come my way.

My girls, Gidget(4 years old)and Froggi(9 years old) love Sea Turtles, Dolphins, Manatees and other marine life so I thought this would be a gentle way to teach them what it means to have an oil spill and what can happen to all the sea animals they love.

Green Books:

Washing the Willow Tree Loon: A loon is rescued from an oil spill, cleaned and cared for before being returned to the wild. Includes information on cleaning birds.

Oil Spill: Did you know that an oil spill occurs somewhere in the world almost every day of the year?  Berger and Mirocha focus on one of the worst spills in history-the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil tanker spill-to explain in simple terms and with bold, full color illustrations why oils spills happen, how experts clean up after them, and what effect spilled oil has on ocean plants and wildlife. "A good introduction to the subject."

We got out some of Gidget's animals (a seal) and we coated them with oil (mixed with black paint) and talked about as the animals swim in the ocean water that has Oil in it they get coated and dirty and need to be rescued and cleaned or they won't make it.

Then we took paintbrushes and little towels and washed off the oil coated baby seal with Dawn and he was all better and would survive.











Gidget did really well with this lesson and really understood what was happening to
the sea life. I was proud of her and LOVED this Everyday Is Earth Day lesson!

Green Step: We bought Dawn so we could activate our code and donate 1 dollar to the
"Save Wildlife Fund" they have.

Green Website: Dawn Saving Wildlife: for every bottle you buy 1 dollar goes to saving wildlife. For over 30 years Dawn has been used to clean wildlife after oil spills.
http://www.dawn-dish.com/en_US/savingwildlife/home.do

For a Messy Outside Alternative: My girls got out all their marine mammal’s and they coated them in mud, then they took them to the cleaning station: one with clean water and one with a towel to house them after they are clean. They had their Dawn dish soap, Q-tips, soft wash clothes. This has been a huge hit and the girls have played it often!