I’ve been looking around recently for a way to encourage focus on our hikes. For the past year, the changing terrain and low branches have provided Bean with enough physical challenge that she happily hiked along, focused on staying upright.

But, she’s nailed down the hiking part and now I wanted to a way to get more out of our hikes. The “this is nature, it’s pretty cool” stuff.

And that’s how I stumbled on The Specimen Bag.

Children are natural hoarders. Bean routinely collects acorns, rocks, and leaves wherever we go. The Specimen Bag takes her natural foraging a step further, into Educational territory. (Yes, it looks suspiciously like a Ziploc sandwich bag, but it works!)

The specimen bag is hers to hold, and the instructions are to put anything interesting in it. (I do call it a “specimen bag” to her; her eyes get wide with This is Big Girl Stuff seriousness.

As a 2 year old, Bean puts pretty much everything she comes across into her specimen bag. Every seashell, rock, pebble, twig, leaf gets tossed in. I also tried this out with my 5 year old nieces, and they did an excellent job of picking out leaves or rocks that had something truly special about them (leaves dotted with insect eggs, for instance).

Before we leave, we dump out Bean’s bag and she picks out her favorite seashells/rocks/twigs/leaves.

For a 2 year old, once home, she can clean off her specimens in a pail of water. Or, you know, play with the water and make splashes, the fact that anything comes out clean is just a pleasant side effect. She’s also learning that sediments sink to the bottom, and she enjoys whirling the sediments and watching them fall again. Density! Fun with science!

Once everything is dried off, the collection goes on a tray, on her toy shelf, for further independent exploration.

For the 5 year olds, we spread their collection out on picnic blankets and grouped similarly shaped leaves. Then, laying on blankets in the sunshine, we used an iPad and nature book and tried to identify the leaves and rocks. (I wasn’t a stickler here for proper identification. We discussed the shape of the leaf (pointy or rounded? long or short) and matched them to their closest approximation in online leaf charts. I figure it’s more about encouraging their curiosity and teaching them leaf shapes at this age.)

It was a fantastic afternoon. I could see light bulbs going off — “HUH, so this leaf belongs to a Maple Tree. And these are….ladybug eggs?!” Ding ding ding ding!

So far, the specimen bag has been a huge hit, even among very different age groups. For Bean, it provides a way to focus her toddler exuberance and energy. For older kids, it gives their hike a purpose. And most of the fun continued all through the day after we took the specimens home. Just a lovely educational, relaxing day.