A Hidden Habitat

I haven't written on this blog for a very long time now... almost 5 years now. In fact, I haven't written much at all in the past year. But, I miss it, so I may try keeping up with this blog again, if I can find the time.

Hannah is wrapping up her freshman year at the local high school, which Ben will also attend when he is a freshman next year. Becca is finishing 6th grade, and Kayla will actually be old enough for kindergarten next year!

I have been furthering my own education a bit as well. In the fall, I completed classes to become an Ohio Certified Volunteer Naturalist (OCVN), and this spring, I attended the Environmental Education Council of Ohio (EECO) annual conference. I have loved nature education since I was in college and worked at the Philadelphia Zoo. Though my certification was in Social Studies Secondary Education, I always had a longing to teach about nature and wildlife. Because of this passion, I have been volunteering a lot at our local nature center. I recently helped with a 5-week nature journaling program for 4th graders at an urban elementary school, and I will be assisting with many field trips at the nature center this spring. I love it!

I have also been incorporating even more environmental education into our homeschooling. This week, Ben had to take the state Geometry test on two separate mornings as part of his preparation for entering high school. The beautiful weather inspired me to take the rest of the school day outdoors.

We walked around our property and talked about nature - what we saw and what we wondered about. Becca kept dashing around looking under rocks and logs for red-backed salamanders, which we find all over our property. She did find a few, including this large gray one and one that measured only an inch from head to tail.

As we rounded the "hairpin," as the kids call the sharp bend in the walking path around our property, we glanced at all of the logs in various stages of decay next to the path. "Hey," I told her, "you should see if you can flip one of those really rotting logs and see what you find underneath." The log ended up being so rotten that it pulled apart instead of turning over.

 First, we noticed patches of white fungus spread across the inside of the log.

As we looked closer, we began to see even more signs of life: a tiny mushroom, a spider web and a small brown spider, myriads of tunnels with reddish brown ants scurrying through them, a salamander, a centipede, a beetle, and five or six of these beautifully colored millipedes. An entire miniature ecosystem lay hidden within an old log on the forest floor.

We decided to examine the millipedes a little more closely before returning them safely to their

rotting log. We learned that they are called Euryurus leachii, or Leach's millipede, and they primarily live in decaying hardwoods. Apparently, they even glow under a black light, though we didn't have the opportunity to test that out.

Becca, in particular, seemed to love this investigation. She and I talked about all of the things she had found, as we walked back toward the house. She wanted to find some way to demonstrate what she had learned. At first, she mentioned drawing a picture, but then we discussed other ways she could model the hidden habitat we had discovered. When we got inside, she instantly collected her craft supplies and got to work. I love her final results!

On the outside/front, she used green yarn to create a soft bed of moss with patches of bark showing through. She added a turkey tail fungus to the edge.

The front flips up to reveal the inside of the log, where she drew a millipede, ants and their tunnels, a centipede, a worm, a spider and a web, a mushroom, and streaks of white fungus.

I look forward to doing even more nature exploring with the kids in the future. I am amazed at how much we can learn when we begin to ask questions and look beneath the surface of what we see.  Just as we had to peel back the layers of the log to see the hidden world inside, we can also discover hidden realms of knowledge by just taking the time to stop and dig a little deeper into the world around us.

Back to Fun

I was going to title this post “Back to Work,” but that did not seem to fit the beginning of our school year so far. Sure, we have done quite a bit of work – math pages, grammar worksheets, history memory cards – and we have had to arrange teaching times around the baby’s naps. But, we have also had a lot of fun.

On Monday, Hannah and Ben learned about the center of gravity. They began by figuring out how to balance a potato on a ruler, using only a pair of forks. Then, they used what they learned to balance a broom on the palm of their hands by first identifying the broom’s center of gravity.

We also had our first Phys. Ed. Class on Monday. A few years ago, I got a free fitness and health package from Subway, including two pedometers, a stopwatch, and a year’s worth of lesson ideas and activities. The kids have gym once a week at co-op, but I want to add a bit to their learning at home as well. The kids loved experimenting with the pedometers, counting the steps needed to walk around the house or get the mail. Becca has even decided to eat a healthy breakfast every day, so she can feed her brain and maybe get better grades on her school work.

Today, Becca experimented with reading maps. I made a map of our property and marked several “treasures” on it. Then, she used the map to find the treasures – just a few nickles and gumballs. She needed a bit of help from Hannah to find the last few, but I may mark some more treasures next week and let her try again until she gets the hang of it.

I think everyone’s favorite lesson this week came from our new geography curriculum – Mapping the World with Art. We read a brief lesson on ancient maps and then followed several steps to draw maps of Mesopotamia. The kids’ maps are surprisingly good! The curriculum is supposed to be for ages 10 and older, but even Becca could follow the steps to draw a decent map. By the end of the year, the kids should be able to draw a map of the entire world!

After we drew the maps, we used edible chocolate clay to make Babylonian-type maps, using chopsticks and drawing cuneiform markings on them. I baked them, and everyone enjoyed delicious, warm chocolate map cookies with a glass of milk as an after school snack. I intended to take photos, but they did not last long enough. Geography should be a lot of fun this year!

I am so thankful that the kids have been working more willingly this school year. Perhaps they are just older and more mature. (They are in 2^nd, 4^th, and 5^th grade now!) Or, maybe they work better with checklists of work to accomplish instead of scheduling subjects at specific times. Regardless of the reason, they have been finishing their regular work more quickly, which leaves room for a lot more fun and experimentation. This should be a wonderful year!

City Mice, Country Mice

This school year so far has slightly resembled the fable "The Town Mouse and the Country Mouse."

In August, when school began, we lived in a smallish brick home on a busy street in the city. For recess each day, the kids played outside in our small backyard, with strict instructions to never leave our property or get too close to the road. They quickly tired of playing in the small yard and yearned for more freedom - freedom I could not grant because of the neighborhood in which we lived.

At the end of September, we moved into our new home, on 5 acres of land in the middle of the country. The kids roam the property, playing in and out of the woods, leaping over the small stream, never tiring of playing and exploring.

Hannah has named her favorite trees, and she constantly shows me interesting bugs she finds. The first day, Hannah excitedly brought me a giant leopard moth caterpillar, and this weekend, we laughed together at the dancing of a colony of beech blight aphids on a tree branch. We also found a particularly odd cluster of bugs, which we finally identified as adult and nymph oak tree hoppers. And, this evening, Becca discovered a walking stick in the living room as she headed up to bed. The kids love looking up and identifying all of the interesting species of bugs.

Of course, the one type of bug none of them like is spiders, particularly the wolf spiders which keep coming into our home. Yesterday, Hannah picked up her sneaker and a large one fell out, and today, one kept creeping out from under the wall in the school room as we worked. Josh finally caught that one this evening and relocated it to the barn, hoping that might keep it from returning to the house.

We also all enjoy seeing wildlife we rarely or never saw in the city - dozens of deer, chipmunks, squirrels, blue jays, cardinals, sparrows, nuthatches, chickadees, Carolina wrens, tufted titmice, downy woodpeckers, and red-bellied woodpeckers. Two mornings, we even had a great blue heron land in the yard! And, this is only autumn. I cannot imagine all of the birds and animals that will be here in the summer! Hannah has been begging to work on her bird project again, creating her own bird guide for all of the different birds she sees. I love that all of this nature and beauty surrounding us inspires them to want to learn.

(See the deer in that photo? I am amazed at how well they blend in, especially in the evening.)

We have definitely had to adjust quite a bit to living in the country, but we love it. My kids (and I) may be "city mice," but unlike the mouse in Aesop's fable, we feel perfectly at home in the country and have no desire to go back. This city mouse would rather be a country mouse any day!

Project Fridays

This school year has been so busy that I have not taken the time to write blog posts as often as I have wanted. We have been busily working through spelling lists, learning multiple digit addition and multiplication, memorizing parts of speech, practicing the piano, learning to swim, dancing, tumbling, and so on. Most Fridays, however, we take a break from our day-to-day assignments and work on a project together.

In January, after we finished reading My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George, I gave Hannah and Ben each a box, set out the craft supplies, and told them to make a shadowbox based on the book. Both kids ended up making a model of Sam Gribley's woods and his home in the tree trunk, so I took advantage of that to teach them a little about habitats. On each side of the box, they glued a piece of card stock and labeled them with the title of the book, "Sam Gribley's Habitat," and the different aspects of his habitat: food, water, and shelter. Then, under those headings, they listed ways that Sam was able to obtain those things in the woods. For example, he drank water from a fresh spring, he hunted for animals with his falcon and ate edible plants, and he created a home in a hollow tree. The finished projects are lovely!

On the Friday before the Super Bowl, we dedicated the entire day to football-related activities. I found an amazing free resource on the website for the Pro Football Hall of Fame and combined with with another packet I got as a freebie from Currclick. I printed out a ton of pages, punched holes in them, and put them in folders for each kid. We began the day by bundling up and heading out to a nearby sports field, where we had a punt, pass, and kick contest, raced through various football drills, and performed an experiment to figure out why a football has its shape, instead of being perfectly round. Back at home, they learned about Roman Numerals (since that is how they label Super Bowls), did some football-themed math, read and wrote poems about football, learned about the first African American inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, discovered how to read nutrition labels to eat a healthy diet (like a good athlete should!), and even designed their own football team mascots, pennants, and jerseys!

Also, in February, we had the opportunity for an amazing project on the planets. Now, as a family, we enjoy listening to classical music, and one of our favorites is The Planets by Holst. Josh discovered that the Springfield Symphony would be putting on a show called "Out of This World," featuring a live performance of The Planets, lovely NASA images from space, and dramatic presentations by an astronomy professor and an acting troupe. In preparation, we listened to the music several times and talked about the names of each planet and how the origins of those names inspired the songs. I also found a free space lapbook at www.homeschoolshare.com, and I used portions of that and our Children's Atlas of the Universe to put together a wonderful project on the planets. Additionally, I used the student guide provided by the symphony and resources from our Galloping the Globe study of Italy (which includes a section on space because Galileo was from Italy). I was out of town with the youth group on the evening of the show, but despite the two-hour drive each way, Josh and his mom took the kids to the performance, and they loved it! In fact, Becca announced on the way home that it was "better than Chuck E. Cheese's!"

We have had so much fun with our "Project Fridays" so far this school year. I believe that the kids have learned more from them than anything they have learned out of a text book. Even though I have to work a little harder to fit all of their other school work into only four days each week, I am certain that we will continue with Project Fridays for a long time!

A "Taste" of History

One Saturday in September, a sudden rainstorm hit the farmer's market while I shopped. I quickly ducked from tent to tent, purchasing my normal fruits and vegetables. The last booth just had sweets, which I normally never purchase. However, because of the weather, I set down my bags and talked for a while with the vendor. As we spoke, I noticed some beautiful, molded cookies for sale and asked about them.

The baker told me that the cookies were called springerle cookies and that they originated in Switzerland and southern Germany as far back as the 14th century. He explained that each family would have handcrafted wooden molds and would make these cookies on special occasions, such as weddings, engagements and holidays. In fact, people would often give springerle cookies in the same way we give out Christmas cards. Traditionally, bakers flavor the cookies with anise, but many also use flavors like orange or lemon. After the wonderful history lesson, I decided to purchase three lovely, orange-flavored cookies to teach the kids a little about German history.

A few days later, I made each child a cup of hot tea. Now, I know that Germany is not known for its tea, but I decided that I would rather not give my kids any coffee! I set the table with nice teacups and allowed each child to choose a cookie. Then, I told them about the history while we enjoyed our tasty snack. 

The kids' beautiful cookies:

The kids really enjoyed the tea party, and they learned quite a bit as well. As a lover of history (as well as a descendent of German immigrants), I love giving the kids a "taste" of history and culture that they will remember long after they forget the facts they read about in books.

And the First Month Flies By...

As I write this blog post, I cannot believe that we have already completed more than a month and a half of school! The year has been both fun and frustrating at times, filled with lessons from life and not just lessons from books.

We have traveled quite a bit - to the zoo, the children's museum, Cedar Point, and COSI. Josh took Hannah and Ben to see a football game at Virginia Tech, and I took Becca on an autumn excursion to my parents' cabin. We even drove to Grove City College for a friend's wedding and spent some time with a wonderful family near Pittsburgh. Somehow, I still managed to squeeze in a few photo shoots as well!

During this crazy month, we lost our sweet kitty, Barky, to an illness called FIP. He was young, and his sickness and death were sudden and unexpected. We took some time off of school to love him for a couple of days and then grieve our loss. The kids made memory boxes and have learned a lot about death and loss and sadness - life lessons I never expected to teach them this year.

Through all of this, we are actually making progress with school work, too. Hannah is flying through her math again, and Ben has finally mastered his addition and subtraction facts and is moving on to more difficult problems. He spent the first few weeks making and practicing flashcards from + and - 0 through + and - 9. Now, he is doing much better with his math because he has the facts memorized and no longer needs to calculate each problem in his head. Both kids like Spelling Power, although I have to keep reassuring Ben that he is supposed to get words on the pretests wrong - otherwise, he would never learn anything new!

Social Studies and Science remain the kids' favorite subjects (I will share more of those lessons in later posts), and they love doing Spanish a couple days a week, too.

For reading and language arts, we are working our way through First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind. Ben just began Level One, and Hannah just completed that book. They love the simplicity and repetition and are learning quite a bit. They especially love memorizing the poems in the book. We have been reading longer chapter books together, too. We just finished reading The Secret Garden and then listened to the Focus on the Family Radio Theatre version and watched the movie. I ordered James and the Giant Peach yesterday and hope to begin it in a week or so. I think it will appeal a little more to my adventurous Ben, though he also appreciated the lovely story in The Secret Garden.

I love our Bible curriculum this year. We are using a book called Our 24 Family Ways. Each "family way" is a kind of rule for the family follow, though really, they are more like ways of living. Each "way" has five daily lessons, a coloring page, a brief story intro, a character quality, and a Bible verse to memorize. The lessons are short enough to hold the kids' interest, but deep enough to make them think. Even my littlest has memorized the verses, and the verses are often fairly long - 2 or 3 verses at a time. Still, with repetition, they have learned the verses and the family ways very well. I also posted the family ways on our wall where everyone can read them, and when a child needs a "break" (like a time out), he or she sits and reads through the ways and then tells me which ones were not followed. I love that they are specific and thorough and well-grounded in Scripture. We begin each day with the Bible lesson and prayer, focusing on God right from the start.

Finally, with a few exceptions, I have designated Fridays as "Project Fridays." Each Friday, we put aside our regular school work and tackle a project, either together or separately. All three kids created beautiful lapbooks on the animals of their choosing, and we have begun working on making our own movie together. Our next project will likely be a "Space" lapbook, inspired by the content of the story they wrote for our movie script. These Fridays have been the most fun and educational school days, and I hope we can continue them all year!

So, as the first months of the school year fly by, hopefully I will more faithfully update this blog and share what we are studying and experiencing. As the blog's title proclaims, "learning is life" - and we are certainly spending most of our time living and learning together!

Learning Through Play

Recently, a few moms decided that our community could use a nice children's museum. They acquired some space for it downtown, and with the help of donations and many hardworking volunteers, the partially completed museum is now opened four days a week, as they raise funds to finish the remaining exhibits.

On Thursday, while Becca attended her princess ballet camp, I took Hannah and Ben across the street to the museum. We decided to become charter members, partially because we would love to have Hannah's birthday party there in the fall, but mostly because I want to support such a worthwhile effort to improve our community for families.

The kids had a blast! After walking through the museum first, to see all the exhibits, both kids started out in the gardening section. Two large raised boxes, filled with shredded rubber "dirt," plastic gardening tools, flower pots, and plastic flowers provided a fun place to dig and play without the mess of real dirt. Hannah loved this section the most and spent quite a bit of time there.

Ben's favorite section was, of course, the musical pipes. Once he figured out how to make music by hitting the ends of the pipes with the foam paddles, he enthusiastically composed his own music, hitting higher on the pipes for rhythm and hitting the ends for musical notes. He jumped back and forth from end to end, moving to the beat of the music in his head.

Both kids enjoyed grocery shopping in the little market. I smiled as they loaded their carts with fruits and veggies and other healthy choices, with only an occasional treat. Maybe they are learning something from our food choices?

The laughed together as Ben scanned Hannah's carrot as he pretended to ring up her purchases.

Both kids also enjoyed the baby doctor section, though Hannah got into it more than Ben did.

Ben preferred turning all of the dials to playing with the dolls.

Finally, the kids finished out their time in the vet exhibit. Ben played with the real stethoscopes, while Hannah doctored the various animals. She posed happily with the snake, which she has learned to love since we began reading Harry Potter this year. I think she wishes she could speak "parseltongue."

We had a wonderful time at the museum, and I had to drag them away when the time came to pick up Becca. I am sure we will return many times throughout the year, especially on those dreary days when we cannot be outside. I love that it is located less than ten minutes from our house, and we can visit it any time we want, without needing to plan ahead. I am thrilled to have such a fun place in our community!

An Outing At Last

Last weekend, I finally felt like I could get around well enough to venture out to Malabar Farm for the Maple Sugar Festival. We actually arrived very late this year, about an hour before closing. Fortunately, this meant that we could park very close to the wagon pick-up, so I did not have to hobble far through the mud in my walking boot.


The weather was perfect, warm and sunny, with lovely clouds scattered through a blue spring sky. We admired the rural countryside as we rode the horse-drawn wagons into the maple sugar area.


Ben especially enjoyed the ride:


Once we disembarked from the wagon, we walked along the path, where volunteers demonstrated the different ways people in this region used maple sugar throughout history, beginning with the Native Americans.


The kids enjoyed smelling the sweet aroma of the steam emanating from the log trough.


At the next stop, the early settlers had just finished making some maple sugar. The woman carefully cleaned the pot to boil down a new batch of syrup.


The man explained how they created maple sugar by heating the syrup to a "hard ball" stage and then cooling it across a clean, shallow log trough until it formed sugar.


He gave each guest a sample of the fresh sugar. Becca carefully studied hers before happily licking it off of her hand.


Finally, we walked over to the "Sugar Shack" where they still produce maple syrup today. The kids enjoyed hearing about the process and tasting a tiny sample of fresh syrup.


I am excited to finally do more field trips like this again. Honestly, I am glad that I broke my leg in the winter, when the snow and ice would have kept us housebound quite a bit anyway. And, now we have even more to look forward to with the coming of spring. The day turned out to be a wonderful mix of fun and learning, a perfect first outing now that my leg is healing. We could not have asked for a more beautiful day.

Pi Day

Yesterday, we celebrated "Pi Day." Since the number "pi" is rounded to 3.14, Pi Day occurs on 3/14, or March 14th. Of course, my husband explained that geeks invented Pi Day, but since most of us in this family likely fit into the "geek" category, that works for us!

Even though my kids are a bit young to fully understand the concept of pi, I decided to celebrate it anyway. Early in the day, I made a big deal out of the date, relating it to the concept of pi. Because of that, Hannah and Ben now easily associate pi with the number 3.14, although we had to work on saying "three point one four" instead of "three slash one four" like the date. They also can explain that we round to 3.14 because pi goes on forever without repeating in a pattern.

For fun, I introduced the parts of a circle: circumference, diameter, and radius. I showed them my coffee mug and used a ruler to measure the diameter. Using that number and the calculator Ben requested for Christmas, we multiplied pi times the diameter to find the circumference. "Hmmm...," I wondered aloud, looking at the ruler, "How can we check our answer?" Ben jumped up and down excitedly. "I know! I know!" he exclaimed. He ran upstairs to his room, returning in a moment with his tape measure. I grinned. "Perfect!" I told him. We measured the circumference of the mug, and the kids squealed happily when they saw that the answer was correct.

Next, I showed how to calculate the circumference of a two-inch circle on paper, including explaining to Hannah how to multiply 3.14 x 2 without using the calculator. When I saw that Hannah and Ben both seemed to grasp the concepts, I decided to attempt a slightly more difficult problem. "OK," I told them, "Tonight, I am going to make quiche for dinner. Quiche is a kind of egg pie. So we will have pie for Pi Day!" After the cheers subsided, I went on, "I make my quiche in a 9-inch pie pan. Why don't we try to calculate the circumference of the pie?" I drew a diagram of the pie on a piece of paper, and I had them tell me how to find the circumference - pi x 9. Now, Hannah understands the concept of multiplication, that 4 x 9 is the same as 9+9+9+9, but she hasn't yet memorized the facts or covered multiplication in her math curriculum. Amazingly, I wrote out 3.14 x 9 and demonstrated how to multiply 4 x 9 and carry the 3, and Hannah finished the problem herself!

Since this portion of the lesson went so well, I also briefly touched on the area of a circle and how to calculate that as well. We used the calculator to figure out the area of the pie and learned the difference between inches and square inches. Then, I turned the kids lose with the rulers, tape measure, and calculator and let them experiment with what they had learned. Surprisingly, I think they learned a lot, even though the topic is a bit beyond their current level in math.

Finally, for dinner, I did make a delicious quiche, and the kids told Josh all about their lesson, while happily eating their Pi Day pie! Today, Ben wrote this in his journal:

"Yesterday was pi day and we ate pie for dinner"

Overall, I think Pi Day turned out to be quite a success!

Beginning a Co-op

This year, some homeschooling women from my church and MOPS group banded together to form a homeschooling co-op. The group meets at the same time as MOPS, so younger kids can attend the MOPPETS kids program, and the homeschooling moms take turns teaching the school age children. I decided to participate, partly so Becca could attend MOPPETS, and partly so my kids could experience learning in a small-scale classroom setting for more than just Sunday School.

We divide the children into two age groups: kindergarten through second grade and third through fifth grade. Each meeting lasts for two hours, and the kids have two lessons, with a brief break in the middle. Both age groups study Ohio history, which makes me happy because I know little about Ohio history. Additionally, each group has a different age-specific lesson - subjects such as creative writing, poetry, photography, seasons, etiquette, and first aid. The younger kids often have arts and crafts components, and all of the kids seem to have fun!

At first, I was scheduled to teach a few of the first lessons, but my broken leg prevented me from attending. As disappointed as I felt about missing out on teaching, I felt worse for the kids, because I knew they needed a chance to get out and be with other kids. This winter has been much different than I anticipated, and we have been cooped up in the house more than I like. However, a wonderful woman in the co-op called and volunteered to drive Hannah and Ben to co-op for me! They had such a wonderful time, returning home afterward bubbling over with excitement about the lessons and the activities. Even Ben willingly sat and did the writing assignment for the next class!

In February, the other mom also drove me to co-op, and I got to teach my first lesson, helping third through fifth graders learn about photography. I am excited that I get to teach a class again, since that was my major in college and my original career plan before I had kids. I also appreciate that my children have the opportunity to learn from other teachers, spend time with other kids, and even create messy art projects that I cannot attempt at home, especially with a broken leg...

Though many of my plans have changed this winter, co-op has been a blessing for both me and the kids, giving us a bit of extra enthusiasm at a time when cabin fever threatens to become overwhelming.

***The picture of Ben working on some co-op assignments is courtesy of Hannah, who loves the digital camera she received for Christmas and takes pictures of EVERYTHING she sees... just like her mom!***

From Blanket House to Mongolian Ger

A few weeks ago, Josh built the kids a blanket house in our living room on a Saturday morning, as he has done many times in the past. This time, however, he made a huge house, using our larger dining room chairs, a sleeping bag, and several blankets. The large, roundish house fit all three kids comfortably, and sometimes both cats as well!

In this past year's World Vision Gift Catalog, I had seen a special kind of round house, built by Mongolian nomads, called a "ger" or a "yurt." The blanket house very much reminded me of these houses, and that gave me an idea. Instead of moving to the next Asian country in Galloping the Globe, I would piece together my own unit on Mongolia. Using sites like the CIA World Factbook, we researched information about the country of Mongolia and its people and began adding pages to the kids' geography notebooks.

Later in the day, I visited National Geographic's website, looking for more information or photos, and I stumbled across the opportunity to participate in a real expedition in Mongolia, by simply labeling satellite images from home. After a period of training, I could identify roads, rivers, modern structures, ancient structures, and points of interest with a reasonable amount of accuracy. I then included Hannah, allowing her to make suggestions and guiding her to understand the images better. She absolutely loved helping out as a real researcher for an actual project, and she found the satellite images quite interesting as well.

Eventually, when we wrap up the unit, we may even have a "Mongolia party," just as we had a "China party" in the fall. I had a difficult time finding Mongolian recipes easy enough for kids to prepare, but we might try making some non-lamb version of Steamed Buuz . I decided to pass on preparing fermented mare's milk however...

I love that homeschooling allows me to turn Saturday play into school day learning, to harness the kids' experiences and games and use them to teach about a country many kids have never studied. And, I enjoy seeing the kids' faces glow with excitement when I say, "Hey, let's do some geography today! What do you think?" Typically, they respond with cheers.

Strolling Through China

For the past couple of weeks, our geography curriculum has focused on China. We colored and labeled maps, explored China on the globe, and read through a few non-fiction books and a student atlas from the library. The kids learned what the flag means and colored the flag for their geography notebooks, and I pulled out an old BBC movie about pandas for them to watch. They have learned quite a bit about the country.

On our visit to the library, I also decided to get out a handful of fiction books about China to add some literature to our geography study. The Story of Ping by Marjorie Flack and Kurt Wise takes place on the Yangtze River, which the kids labeled on their maps. The Empty Pot by Demi tells about an emperor seeking his replacement and teaches about honesty and the courage to do what is right. Huy Von Lee has written a wonderful series of books teaching Chinese characters and where they come from, for example, how the symbol for fire looks like a little campfire. We chose In the Leaves because it focuses on autumn and harvest time, and it fit in well with the time of year. However, I found another favorite book in the new edition of The Seeing Stick by Jane Yolen. The story begins by telling about an emperor's blind daughter and the search for something that might help her see. An elderly man treks to the inner city with his special "seeing stick" that helps the young girl see - not with her eyes but with her hands. The illustrations are stunning, black and white in the beginning and becoming colorful and vibrant by the end. And, the end of the story is simple and lovely. I think I will be adding this book to my Christmas list!

Additionally, when I purchased my geography curriculum this summer, I stumbled across a kids' cookbook with simple recipes and activities from all over the world. The book's section on China includes instructions on making your own chopsticks and writing numbers 1-10 in Chinese. I decided that the chopsticks activity would better suit older children, but we did practice writing the numbers.

As a new family tradition, every Friday night, we have family game night, so we turned this past Friday into our "China party." The cookbook had two delicious and very easy Chinese recipes - honey-glazed chicken wings and birthday noodles with peanut sauce. On Friday morning, the kids and I made the noodles, so we could serve them cold as the recipe indicated, and we prepared the marinade for the chicken. Friday evening, I broiled the chicken and made a salad with an Asian dressing, and we all ate a delicious Chinese dinner. We even ate with chopsticks (the kids at least tried!) and had fortune cookies for dessert. For our game night, we taught the kids how to play Chinese checkers. It was such a fun way to learn about China!

Finally, we are beginning to wrap up our study so we can move on to the next country. I may still spend a little time discussing the Chinese new year and learning about parades, but we are just about finished. At this pace, I think we are strolling, rather than "galloping" around the globe, but I feel sure that the kids will remember these experiences, instead of packing them away at the end of the year with their old notebooks and completed worksheets. Their learning has not been all fun and games, but the fun and games have definitely helped with their learning!

Explorer Camp

What a busy autumn we have had! We traveled nearly every weekend in October - to Grove City College for our homecoming and Josh's reunion, to Josh's family's house for a fall festival, and to my parents' cabin in Pennsylvania for a nice visit. In between, we squeezed in Hannah's seventh birthday party, too! Part of our travels included one of my favorite homeschooling weeks so far - "Explorer Camp" at my parents' cabin.

The kids and I packed the car and left home on a Monday morning for the long drive to Pennsylvania. After a somewhat crazy car ride, which we spent listening to our Chronicles of Narnia radio dramas, we arrived at the cabin early in the evening, and the kids helped me unload the car. I placed a cardboard sign on the cabin's door, labeling it as our "Base Camp" for the week.

Because of the light drizzle, I let the kids watch Winged Migration while I made dinner and organized our things. Fortunately, everyone went to bed early to be well rested for the morning's activities.

While they slept, I planned the next day's agenda and created a map of our "base camp." I gave the rooms different names that made the cabin seem more like a camp, and I hung the map on the refrigerator.

Then, I wrote out the schedule for the day and hung it on the fridge as well.

The next day, I began the morning with breakfast and an introduction to Explorer Week. I poured the kids juice in coffee mugs and told them it was "explorer coffee," so they could begin the day like real explorers. This turned out to be one of their favorite parts of the week! Then, in light of our theme, I took our morning devotions each day from Numbers 13-14, which tells the story of the Israelite men exploring the land God promised them. We read and discussed a portion of the story each day during breakfast, and then we moved into the "explorers' lounge" for our lessons, which we referred to as "seminars" or "briefings."

Each day involved some indoor learning. During the week, we studied explorers and Christopher Columbus, eastern forests, autumn and leaves, making and reading maps and globes, finding North using the sun and on a compass, and the geography of the world. All of our curricula seemed to reach a common place at the perfect time for our trip. Our MAPS curriculum introduced real places on the globe, and our science curriculum addressed making and reading maps and finding the points of a compass. At the same time, we began Galloping the Globe by discussing the world and labeling continents and oceans. I also drew quite a bit from a wonderful resource called Woods Walk, which teaches about forests through treks in the woods. Because of the freezing temperatures that week, our indoor work allowed time for the weather to warm a bit before we bundled up and headed outside for our exploration.

The kids loved their time exploring in the woods.

Carrying their explorer notebooks, we hiked in the woods along my parents' stream and behind their pond.

We ran down the road to their property.

And, we climbed up the hill into a Ducks Unlimited project with abatement ponds designed to clean the acidic water contaminated by the mines.

The kids drew pictures and wrote notes about the many things they discovered.

Using a variety of field guides, we identified many of the things we found.

Tree Club Moss in the woods:

Witch Hazel blooming all around:

And, after studying a fallen log...

...we identified two interesting varieties of lichen - British Soldiers and Pyxie Cups:

We also identified many of the fall leaves, tracing them on similar colored construction paper and then cutting them out to make lovely fall leaf collages.

Overall, we had a wonderful week and the kids learned so much more through hands-on experiences and exploration. I think we may make this a seasonal event, except maybe winter (brrr!), so we can see how the forest changes throughout the year. This is the kind of learning that makes homeschooling so much fun!