“I found a bug!” proclaimed 5-year-old Francesca Criscione as she dug in the dirt with a teaspoon.

Participating in the three-day “Mysteries of Decay” class at the Avery House Nature Center, Francesca was very excited to discover wriggling and crawling examples of some of the decomposers she’d been learning about.

Held from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week while public schools are closed for teacher in-service days, the class provides the children with a chance to connect with nature and their parents the chance to get some work done.

“We feel that by teaching kids about their environment, they can take that and they can go and have better appreciation for their environment,” said Meika Vingelen, nature program director at Avery House Nature Center. “They also learn more about their place in the natural environment and their connection to the natural environment.”

As the kindergartners and first-graders dug little holes with their spoons, they continued a running commentary on what they found.

“I found a worm!” Francesca yelled, even more delighted than when she’d found the bug. Immediately a cluster of children crowded around her to see the specimen.

Francesca had no qualms about holding the worm as the other kids inspected it.

“Oh, it’s so cute,” she said.

A few minutes later Francesca popped her head up again.

“I found an ant!” she called out. This latest discovery drew little attention. Obviously worms were the pinnacle.

“Worms can be considered a decomposer,” said 8-year-old Ethan Sauret, who’d spent the morning learning about three types of organisms that break down the soil — fungus, bacteria and invertebrates.

“They don’t have spines,” Ethan explained. “They can freely move their bodies.”

Ethan seemed to be absorbing a lot of knowledge. He quickly yelled out the answer when program instructor Anne Yemaya asked about the first two layers of soil they were digging in.

“Duff and litter,” he said. “Remove the duff and litter.”

The curriculum at the nature center meets the criteria for a few of the science-related state learning benchmarks that the students are working toward in school, Vingelen said. The class is not officially endorsed by the Corvallis School District.

“Unlike doing it in the classroom, we try to do it outside and play games and do hands-on stuff,” said Vingelen.

The Avery House Nature Center, a subsidiary of the Corvallis Environmental Center, offers nature classes on various teacher in-service and parent-teacher conference days throughout the school year, as well as in the summer. Nature play pre-school programs are offered for children ages 3 through 6 each Thursday.

For more information about programs and classes for children or adults at the nature center call 758-6198 or go to www.corvallisenvironmentalcenter.org.