Students in Miss Fecura’s first and second-grade classroom at Fletcher Elementary recently hit the road to tour three bustling Fletcher sugarhouses.
Each stop featured a thriving maple producer who is also a parent of a child in that classroom. The students are studying states of matter, and there is no sweeter way to observe the phenomenon first hand than to tap a Fletcher maple, collect the sap, and watch the transformation to sticky-sweet liquid gold.
Throughout the day, students each tapped their own maple tree, first learning how to identify the proper trees and tap sites. They hung buckets, learned about the importance of sugar content, studied the reverse osmosis process, heard about tap lines and how they are set up, and were in awe of the hard work and long hours it takes to produce maple syrup.
At each stop, students sampled maple treats like maple cream on crackers, maple candy, and of course, maple syrup itself. Students also learned about sustainability, seeing how many sugarhouses use the byproduct of syrup-making to clean their equipment.
They learned about the many regulations that govern syrup production, and the importance of specific weather in producing a bumper crop.
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