East Boston Beach Event!

Hello again, Explorers!

I am so excited to share stories about the Constitution Beach event last week- a campfire with our partners at the YMCA! ¡Nuestro evento en la playa la semana pasada nos fue super bien, fue muy divertido y  además, fue un placer conocer a la comunidad de East Boston!

I have two left feet!

One of the highlights of the evening was, of course, the dancing. Everyone enjoyed our D.J., Damien, and he played songs that the kids could line-dance too! Our JPAs got involved, bringing their smiles and their sweet moves to the dance floor! We even had some Bachata lessons, it turns out we have some real talent on our team!

Finding clams and answering questions!

Thankfully, identifying bivalves, chatting in Spanish, and getting people to the beach are easier for me than Bachata! To get started, my fellow SHE, Nikita, and I,  ran up to the mic and made a quick announcement about going to the beach. We figured out that we had both hard-shell and soft-shell clams down in the low-tide sand, and we took advantage of that opportunity! Soon, we had kids running up to us from all over the beach saying "look what I found!". We found an oyster, some quahogs, tons of soft clams, hermit crabs, and snails! Our JPAs made sure that all of the clams got safely back into the ground, and helped get the kids excited about finding critters!

 Some really great questions were asked at this event, sometimes between chews of marshmallow, (free from the YMCA!). Some of these included: "how to clams make their shells? Do they shed them, like crabs do?" and "why is the snail coming out of its shell, but the (quahog) clam is not?" I have a little experience in teaching ESL, and though I love exploring languages, they hardly ever stick their necks out or squirt water at you- which is why working with clams keeps me happily on my feet!

I can't wait for more fun in the sand, bring your questions and your towel and come see us at our next Better Beaches event!

Until next time!
Carolyn