Deer in the Garden (KB)

What started as a random conversation this morning about deer eating the plants in my garden turned into a full fledged K project today!!! I was complaining to the Kiddos and asked them what would be a good solution to keeping the deer out of the garden. The first suggestion was to shoot and eat the deer! I laughed and said, "that is what Myles (my husband) would like to do", but I explained about hunting season and told them it was illegal to shoot a deer right now. Other suggestions were discussed, and eventually someone suggested to put an animal in the garden to scare the deer. Quickly, someone else suggested putting sounds in the garden to scare deer away. I asked them, "which do you think would work better.... a fake animal or animal sounds?" We were puzzled, but when I asked, "How could we figure out the answer to this?", someone suggested we should talk to a animal/plant expert and they thought Myles would be the perfect choice. I pulled out the iPad and we facetimed Myles. When we posed our question to him, he first asked the Kiddos, "When do you see deer?" "At night" they answered. He then posed the question, "Do you think they can see well at night?" "No", the answered. "So what other sense could they use instead of sight?" Myles asked. Eventually, the Kiddos figured out the senses of hearing and smell. Myles explained that deer have very good ears and noses and can hear and smell things we can't. Quickly, the Kiddos figured out that sounds and smells would be better decoys than a fake animal. Once we hung up, I challenged the Kiddos if they wanted to, to do draw a plan of how they thought they could keep deer out of a garden.  Once their plans were finished, using random materials, the Kiddos built a replica of their plan. I love days like this where a random conversation can spark creativity, collaboration, and deeper level thinking! See your  child's portfolio to hear about their deer prevention strategy!!!