Some animals use mud!

Today we wondered why or how animals use paru/ mud. 

I mean , we love to play in it here at Uxbridge but could it be useful to us if we were an animal?

Teacher Laura asked some children to put mud on her arm in the morning and we waited all day to see what would happen to it. At mat time we all had a feel of the thick, dry dirt stuck to her arm. Have a look! It looks like elephant skin! So leathery and wrinkly. 

She asked the children why animals use mud.

Charlotte said “ they like to play in it.”

Riya said “ they like to get gānti , gānti is how we say messy in India.” 

She asked again a further question of “how animals with no fur keep safe from the sun when they live in very hot places? Do their  Mum’s put sun cream on them?”

Zoe said “ The animals use the mud like suncream!” 

We also talked about how cool mud can be to splash around in and how some animals use it to cool off! 

This is an idea that we will revisit and encourage our tamariki to question. Wondering about how animals do their daily tasks. They might be more clever than we think!