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Butterflies work their magic
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Carol Vigorito, a Mill Creek Park naturalist, leads a childrens program on buterflies at the Ford Nature Center Friday 7-11.
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This butterfly was on display during a nature program at Ford NAture Center at Mill Creek Park Friday.
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Michael Gensamer, 3, of Ellsworth, left. and Matthew Vitelli, 4, of Austintonwn make butterfly motions during a Friday 7-11 program on butterflies at the Ford Nature Center in Mill Creek Park.
By ASHLEY LUTHERN
Preschool programs are at Ford Nature Center three times a month.
YOUNGSTOWN — It’s never too early to learn about nature.
That was naturalist Carol Vigorito’s philosophy as she taught 10 preschoolers about butterflies at the Ford Nature Center in Mill Creek Park.
Many of the children saying the words metamorphosis and chrysalis were at an age when there are more syllables in the words than years since they’ve been born and, in fact, some of the children have been coming to the preschool programs since they were born.
“We’ve been coming for at least four years now, and my youngest [9 months old] has been here since birth,” said Shelly DiFabio of Poland, whose three daughters attended the Butterfly Magic program.
Combining coloring, crafts, story time and nature walks, the preschool learning hour has been at Mill Creek Metropark’s Ford Nature Center on Old Furnace Road for at least 12 years.
Each month, three one-hour programs are planned based on the season and what animals or plants are most likely to be visible in the park, and usually eight to 12 kids come to each program, Vigorito said.
“The idea is to teach them about the outdoors,” she said Friday.
The educational programs are valued by parents such as Leeann Vitelli of Austintown.
“I home-school my [three] boys, and when I teach about something that they’ve learned here at the nature center, they already know a lot about it and have a visual to put with the concept,” Vitelli said, adding that she always learns something new, too.
The interactive aspect of the programs that include storytelling and rhymes keeps the kids busy and interested in learning, DiFabio said.
One of her daughters soon proved to her that she had been paying attention.
“I liked the monarch butterflies, and now I know that moths sleep in the daytime,” said Brianna DiFabio, 5, who soon will be caring for a butterfly habitat in her Poland home with her two sisters, Arianna, 3, and Julianna, 9 months.
Registration for preschool programs costs $2 for Mahoning County residents and $3 for nonresidents.
“The park covers the majority of the cost, and the registration helps us plan for the number of kids,” Vigorito said. “We try not to make it expensive because we want people to come out to the park.”