On April 1st, the Fours class received two leopard frog tadpoles.  We were told the full metamorphosis would take 12-16 weeks, so we knew that the children would probably not see the whole process, but we did expect that they would be able to see some significant change.

It was disappointing to see the weeks go by without the tadpoles doing much more than grow fatter.  Luckily, they were still fascinating for the children, and just their interactions and habits proved to be interesting enough.  With Meg's--our science teacher--help, we explored frogs' life cycle and habits, we did endless observational drawings, and made charts recording the tadpoles' growth (at least they were definitely getting bigger!)

By the last day of school, on June 11th, one of the tadpoles had two minuscule back legs, almost impossible to see.  Disappointed, I cleaned the tank, packed the tadpoles in a bag, and took the whole thing home, unsure of what I'd do with them.

Meg, our science teacher, suspected we had not received leopard frog tadpoles, but bullfrog ones instead, which take between two and three years to go through the full metamorphosis... 

A couple of weeks into summer vacation, and still only back legs on one tadpole and no sign of change on the other.   I was starting to think that Meg was indeed right.  But then my sons noticed that there were actually two tiny front legs on the growing tadpole.  There was hope!

And indeed, after leaving them in a friend's care for a few days while my family went away to celebrate the Fourth of July... Big change awaited us!

I was informed by my First Grader (who had done a whole unit on frogs at school), that we had only one tadpole, and the other one was now a froglet.   It was absolutely amazing to see how quickly things progressed once the front legs appeared.  The froglet got a rock in the tank so he could rest now that he had lungs, and within a few days his tail disappeared and we had a real frog!
It was sad to think that my students had not seen this transformation, but I could at least send their parents and email with pictures; and it was so fun to receive all the children's responses.

Next school year, we will get tadpoles earlier so that we all get to see first hand this truly amazing process.

Ana Sancho-Rumeu
Fours Teacher

If you walked down Park Avenue by the synagogue this summer, you may have thought a new pool club opened – but no- it’s the Kaplan Summer Camp sprinkler park!
Over 100 campers had fun cooling off during water play, stretching during movement class, exploring science projects, playing sports and games, running around during playground time and spending an entire week building with recycled materials and thinking of new ways to use them.

Stepping into our classrooms you may have found a beach, a circus, an undersea adventure, a Where the Wild Things mural or a bunch of monkeys from Caps for Sale!   The fun and learning never stop. 
Many of our campers are Kaplan regulars while others are newbies to our fun and nurturing Kaplan community. 

The Kaplan Campers have had a great time acting out some of our favorite stories and performing shows for each other during the Creative Arts weeks.

The Dragonflies looked at Cloudy with A Chance of Meatballs and created their own land of Chewandswallow where all of the food falls from the sky.  We made orange juice rain, clouds of waffles and blueberries, and giant pizzas that flew in from the northeast (with a healthy side of kale).  Our story continued with a giant parachute pancake that landed on our heads.

The Fireflies, Crickets, and Butterflies explored the differences and similarities between bats and birds with Stellaluna.  We did lots of flying and hanging upside down from our feet.  We even made a giant nest from recycled paper and cardboard that held the entire group.  The campers’ favorite part of the story was pretending to eat bugs and imagining how yucky that must be. 

The Caterpillars had already read Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus in their classroom and had made pigeon puppets.  We went a little deeper into the story by painting our own giant bus and individual steering wheels.  We sang “The Wheels on the Bus” and drove our bus to the zoo, a farm, and the beach where danced like different animals and practiced our swimming (while popping lots of bubbles!).

Kaplan Summer Camp ran this summer from June 16th -August 1st .  We were open from 8:00-6:00, Monday – Friday.    If you are interested in having your child attend camp next summer, contact the Kaplan office in March 2015. 

Rachelle Grossman
Director