Great Outdoor Challenge: Day Whatever (Taking Time & Seeds)

Let's face it.  I can't blog every day.  But I'm still participating in the challenge.  And this week it really has been a challenge because of an extra busy schedule.  But I guess that's the point isn't?  To not get so caught up in the busyness that keeps us from going outside in the first place.  To take the time to enjoy the beauty of creation.   To make time to be still and to breathe. 

Yesterday we had some great outdoor time, it just took us a while to realize it.  We went to a local park, but bypassed the green grassy playgound area, for a rugged little trail off the parking lot.   A few hundred feet up the trail, the whining began.   

"I'm tired!"

"Can we have lunch now?"

"I'm hot"

"Ugh!" 

(That last one was my two-year-old pointing in the direction of the playground that we wer not heading to.)  

"Well, let's do our science experiment just up the trail a bit, and then we'll have lunch at the playground,"  I replied in my best mother voice.

Once we did get up to our experiment spot, I asked Gracie to take our supplies out of her backpack.  But she had taken the most important supply out in the van, where it still remained. 

So back to the van we went. 

When we returned with the crucial supply (more on that later), we found a little spot just off the parking lot and settled down to work.  It was just a weedy little patch, but once we sat down and took a closer look, we were amazed by all the beauty we saw:  tiny yellow flowers, ladybugs (in several stages), some edible greens, baby sunflowers, and even a hawk!  Once we slowed down, we were able to appreciate what had been around us the whole time!

And that crucial supply?  Socks! 

The girls put some of their dad's old socks over their shoes and walked through the weediest patches they could find. Today Gracie sorted through the seeds and examined them more closely.

We even found some very cool maple seeds that spin like helicopters as they fall!

Here are some great books to go along with a seed study.

Great Outdoor Challenge: Day 8

Today (er, Monday, that is) was wet and cold and rainy.  And there's nothing I love more than spending a wet, cold, and rainy day snuggled up under a blanket with a good book.  As a Southern Californian, I treasure cloudy, miserable, rainy days, because they are so few and far between.   Go outside when it's raining?  No way!  Challenge, or no challenge, I feel that I must make the most of a rainy day by staying indoors.

And more rain is expected next week.  Yippee! 

More on the Great Outdoor Challenge here.

Great Outdoor Challenge: Day 5, 6, and 7

The weekend was full of outdoorsy-ness!  It began with our monthly co-op meeting on Friday, a gathering of friends at our home Friday evening (lots of kids, lots of chaos!), and a fun birthday party on Saturday.  Lots of fun and socializing, not much time to take pictures.  Anyone else like that?

Check out more on the Great Outdoor Challenge here.

Great Outdoor Challenge: Day 4

Does it count if as being outside if you're inside a box that is outside?

Most definitely!
(Thanks to our new picnic table!)

Here's more about the challenge.

And look at everyone who's having fun with this challenge!

lisa, sanders, angelina, phyllis, sarah, christie, jennifer, debbie, dong dong, denise, luisa, joy, stephanie, cori, alex, dawn, kristen, catherine, tricia, becky, christy, ruth, kari, courtney, branflakes, jessica, renee, haiku, brynn, amy, clemencia, sherry, leslie, lise, renee, anet, jenn, marina, amy, ella, marcia, karen, beth, julie, kyndale, kelly, lizzie, eileen, ag, mari-ann, cindy, robin, nicole, debbie, julia, renee, anita, lisa, jenn, montessori, marita, jeannie, hallie, mandy, kangaroo, andrea, joey, carmen, teena, stephinie, gidget, elizabeth, emma, rosina, saminda, melissa, katie, becca, atouria, barbara, ariella, missy, elizabeth, sarah, eileen, lisa, stacy, jennifer, tulsileaf, lisa C, morticia, angela, rana, jamie, lisa c, luz

Children and Nature Awareness Month Challenge: Day 3

Taking the Children and Nature Awareness Month Challenge has really encouraged me to do more outside.  Why be inside, if I can be outside?   My husband put together our new picnic table just in time.  Since its  arrival (8 hours ago):  meals eaten outside-100%, days of school done outside-100%.  What else can we do outside?   I can't wait to see what we come up with!    

We started our plant unit today by looking at flowers. We were able to see almost the whole life cycle of a flower in our lemon tree: bud, blossom, and the very beginnings of fruit.

The Reason for a Flower (Ruth Heller's World of Nature) is a wondeful book to explain the science behind flowers to children.  It's simple enough to make the concepts clear, but includes scientific vocabulary such as anther, stigma and angiosperm.  The illustrations are beautiful and will get the attention of even young listeners.

 

Children and Nature Awareness Month Challenge: Day 2

School was done outside today, but alas, no picture.  Math is always a little more pleasant in the sunshine!

Children and Nature Awareness Month Challenge: Day 1

I read about the Children and Nature Awareness Month Challenge at 5 Orange Potatoes and thought it would be a fun project.  The challenge is to spend some time outside enjoying the outdoors each day in April, take a picture, and post it.  That's it!  It seems simple enough and will be a great way to make sure we spent time in nature every day this month. 

Even though the weather is unseasonally wet and chilly today, we were not discouraged!  We picked some cheery flowers to bring indoors and brighten up the gray day.

Critter Update

See those tiny little yellow things in a cluster?  They're ladybug eggs!  It looks like our little ladybug friend is going to be a mama!  It will be exciting to watch and observe them!

The Critters

You know you homeschool when the number of critters living in your home start to outnumber the people. 

Meet Betty the Beta fish,

our three painted ladies in their brand-new chysalides,

 

and a lovely little ladybug feasting on aphids.

And of course Lily, the dog.

Other temporary visitors have included earthworms, mealsworms, and a ziploc bag of snails, who were recently misplaced somewhere in my home. 

Yikes.

I hope that I am not the one to receive the honor of finding that bag.

Saturday's Quote

"They (children) must be left alone, left to themselves a great deal, to take in what they can of the beauty of the heavens; for of the evils of modern education few are worse than this - that the perpetual cackle of his elders leaves the poor child not a moment of time, nor an inch of space, wherein to wonder - and grow."

                                                                         Charlotte Mason from "Home Education"

Saturday's Quote

Charlotte Mason had much to say about time outdoors:

"Let me repeat, that I venture to suggest not what is practicable in any household, but what seems to me absolutely best for the children; and that in the faith that mothers work wonders once that are convinced what is demanded of them.  A journey of twenty minutes by rail or omnibus, and a luncheon basket, will make a day in the country possible to most town-dwellers:  and if one day, why not many, even every suitable day?"

                                                                                                                   Charlotte Mason from "Home Education"

So instead of asking why we should go outside, we should rather ask ourselves why not?  It can seem that there is simply no time with all the reading and math and worksheets and projects, but it is such valuable time, and so much good comes from it.  We should make it a goal to spend more time outside, rather than less. 

I'm excited to be making my way through these books.  Watch for more bits of wisdom as I come across them!

You know you homeschool when...

you go for a family hike on a Saturday and your kindergartener asks, "Is this a field trip?"
Have a great weekend, everyone!

Bird Week in Action

Bird week has shaped up to be a lot of fun. We were a bit distracted by several social opportunities because everyone else seems to be on spring break. But we plugged on as best we could with regular lessons, field trips, and even a day of "carschooling"!

The highlight for Gracie was a trip on Wednesday to the San Bernardino County Museum with her good friend who was on spring break. I gave Gracie a scavenger hunt to work on in the Bird Hall, and they both took on the challenge with gusto! The girls are definitely on their way to becoming ornithologists! They raced back and forth looking for penguins, hummingbirds, eagles, and the most colorful bird they could find.

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Academic Work museum birds

Looks like they found a water bird!Amaryllis discovered a burrowing owl!

There were several school field trips at the museum that day, but we managed to avoid the crowds for the most part. We were however able to take advantage of some special hands-on displays of bird "skins" (formerly alive but now stuffed bird specimens) complete with docents to explain to us different bird features. Did you know owls have feathers on their legs which help them fly silently? I didn't!

All that bird exploration left the girls hungry, so we were inspired to make our own nests of the edible variety. I just adapted this recipe to fit with what we had on hand and added robin's egg candies.Yum!

Today in the exploration of the topic of eggs we cracked one open and Gracie drew and labeled what she saw in her science journal. We also learned about candling, which is how you can tell if an egg is fertilized or not. We watched some eggs being candled on our favorite learning tool, youtube! We also watched some baby chicks hatch, and then some snakes hatch! I know, I know, it's not snake week, but it sure was cool!

Gracie asked a really good question tonight. "Do all baby animals come out of eggs?" That led us into a discussion of mammals. But other than mammals do all baby animals came from eggs? I know we define mammal as an animal that gives birth to live young, but I couldn't think of a non-mammal giving birth to live young, nor another birth option besides an egg or live birth. It seems like a simple question, but I've been mulling it over for a while. There's probably some very obvious examples and I'm sure I'll feel silly for asking, but can you think of any other possibilities?

5 Senses: Nature Walk

This is a great theme to get out and do some outdoor learning. It was fun to do some of my old outdoor education activities again! We went to the Rancho Santa Ana Botanical Gardens which are beautiful and more importantly, very stroller-friendly! It was a bit chilly and cloudy for us, but we didn't get rained on and it felt as if we had the place almost to ourselves!

Here's what we did:

• Read My Five Senses (Let's-Read-and-Find-Out Science 1) to set the tone and remind us of our focus.
• Touch activity: Blindfold student(s) and lead them to a tree. Have them get to know their tree by using their sense of touch. After a minute or so. Lead student(s) back to the starting point, unblindfold them and have them identify their tree.
• Smell activity: While student is blindfolded, dab a tree with a scent (vanilla or mint extract work well). have the student remove blindfold and find the tree by using their sense of smell.
• Sound activity: Blinfold the student (again!) and throw small rocks or sticks. Have the student identify the direction from which they heard the sound. If you have quiet children have them listen for 1 minute and list all the sounds they heard. (I do not have quiet children.)
• Taste activity: If you know your plants, taste an edible one. White fir, dandelion greens, and lamb's quarters are all edible. And your kids will think it's hilarious that they are eating weeds! (Seriously, this is the best way I know to get kids to eat their vegetables!)
• Sight activity: Bring a nature journal or some sort of paper. Have your child pick out a tree. Have them draw it, challenging them to look closely at the way the trunk and branches are shaped. A partner (or you) have to guess which tree they were drawing.
• Another sight activity: Find two leaves from different plants or trees. Look very closely at each and find similarities and differences. Draw or paste the leaves in the journal.

To do all these activities I put these items in a clean peanut butter jar:

• blindfold(s)
• extract
• cotton balls (to apply the extract)
• journal/paper
• pencil/crayons

Other things you might want to bring:

• magnifying glass
• binoculars
• field guides