As today is the end of term One I thought I would post a picture of my arch nemesis, Henny Penny, the homeschooling chicken! Her major role in the educational process is to stare forlornly through the patio window waiting to be hugged,...(yes. really.)...Poop on the doormat and consume any,books, written work,experiments or materials that are not closely guarded.
We kicked off this year with an awesome unit called, Scavengers,Predators and Decomposers. Part of which involved experiments on Mould and Bacteria. This of course filled our windowsills and fridges with decomposing foodstuffs for over three weeks, whilst the said items were weighed,photographed and generally admired on a daily basis by the kids. It made for interesting dinner party conversation with our non home schooling friends and gave the kids the chance to use a microscope and explore the visually stunning world of microbe photography. Undoubtedly my favourite moment was being presented with a plastic bag of black fluffy unidentifiable rotten stuff from the depths of a car boot with the excited comment.."Its for you, isnt it GREAT!" ...( and no, this was not a child)
This unit also provided my favourite Comment from my DH: "could you come to the fridge for a moment and identify just what is or isnt an experiment so I can eat?"
Dinosaurs was another popular topic we covered, using the excellent i pad app from the American Museum of Natural History,"AMNH.Dinosaurs HD".It wasnt free but everyone thought it was well worth the money. It was a great app and proved very useful to link in to the previous terms work that we had done on classification and evolution.Also everyone loved watching the DVD series, "Chased by Dinosaurs with Nigel Marvin" and it was a great extension activity to look into the CGI and robotics used. It also tied in with the Dinos alive Exhibit and the work on Fossils and Meteorites,Sadly we didnt get to go out and Fossick this term, as I was concerned my Pommie eyeballs might melt in the midday heat of Gingin,but we did get to handle some great Trilobite fossils and I found some nice resources, A book called. "The Fossil Factory by Niles Eldridge" was a winner with DS 6 and a little i pad app called "Earth Stories"
We also ventured into the realm of Earth Science and Geology. We invested in a DIY kit for schools from Sci tech. These are two large containers designed to provide a term of science based lessons for about 12 kids on a variety of different themes.We clubbed together to get the "Rock on kit" which explores rocks, minerals and earth science .It cost $155 for a term and was packed full of rock samples, resources, experiments, students / teacher worksheets and materials. It provides a good framework of Aus Curr Linked activities .We really enjoyed it and will probably get another one next term.(Sarah Forbes Co ordinates these kits and is very helpful).We had excursions to Crystal Caves at Yanchep and Perth Mint and but I highly recommend a visit to the Earth Museum at the Geology Faculty at UWA for budding Rockhounds.
My Personal High Point was Crafting an Aboriginal stone tool from, Kangaroo Poo Glue, a stick, flint and a tin can in my friends new house whilst she was at work,closely followed by my low point in realizing the chickens had eaten my newly made Aboriginal stone tool,leaving only the faint aroma of marsupial droppings in the kitchen.
We started our history module on Ancient Civilisations with Mesopotamia and in the process made some great bread,bricks and Cuniform tablets. Henny passed comment on my baking skills by ignoring the bread and partially consuming the clay bricks.We also discovered a great timeline i pad app "Timeline Eons"and the worlds most annoying song.... and Just for you Pete, in case you are missing it
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAMRTGv82Zo
The irrepressible Mrs W was tackling a myriad unlikely combinations during her fun Friday sessions,which our reviewers felt were "super awesome" Including, The Water Cycle, Visible light spectrum , Aquifers, Limericks, Persuasive text, Debating and also releasing previously domesticated Helium balloons back into the wild. (whilst also encouraging us to all bunk off on occasions)
All in all we had a fabulous time and topped it off with a great homeschooling Geology packed long weekend in Kalgoorlie.Mrs D and myself got gold fever and had to be forcibly removed from the panning activity,and a state of "OVER" ness was declared on camper trailers for the rest of the duration of her life!
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