Wolf Run Wildlife Refuge

In May we had the opportunity to visit Wolf Run Wildlife Refuge with our homeschool co-op, BHLC. It was so interesting and the kids loved it! Instead of gifts for her 7th birthday, Reagan had requested donations for Wolf Run so we took those with us when we visited.

~

The first animals we had the opportunity to see and interact with were some wolf pups that had recently been rescued. The kids loved having the opportunity to pet the pups and they were pretty adorable! Having said that, I can't think who in their right mind would think it was a good idea to adopt or try to raise wolves...

 

 

 McKinley loves "puppies"

 Many of the adult wolves or wolf dogs (I can't remember which these were anymore) were quite friendly and interested in having attention from the kids.

 They also had a number of other animals that had been rescued including deer. They also had a mountain lion, pigs, coyotes and a number of other animals.

 This was one of their tamer wolves and one of the ones they use for education purposes when the visit events throughout the year. What a gorgeous animal!

 If you have any interest in learning more about or supporting Wolf Run Wild Life Refuge, please visit their website at http://www.wolfrun.org/ .

Camoflauge Project

 All my posts have been social recently, but we were actually doing school last year too. :) It's so far past that I haven't necessarily wanted to take the time to sort through all the project pictures, but this one was neat enough I thought I would share it. The point is to help kids understand how camouflage works as well as the idea of survival of the fittest.

~

You need M&Ms and Skittles for this project. You sort the M&Ms by color and place them on a plate (I think it suggested around 50). You then put 5-10 of each color of Skittle in a bowl. Here is a picture of what you would be handing to your child/student.

 Next you tell the kids you are going to have them mix their M&Ms and Skittles and give them something like 20 seconds to sort them again. For fun I think it also mentioned you could tell the kids they do not want to "catch" any M&Ms because they are poisonous!

 Then you're off and your kids get to see first hand how camouflage works in nature as it is obviously much easier to sort the Skittles that don't match than the M&Ms that do. Pretty cool! :) We followed this up with a couple of books on habitats and how animals use camouflage to their advantage.

And here is another use for M&Ms one of my munchkins discovered... Not sure M&M pizza sounds very appealing to me but no one asked me either... lol :)

"Going Batty" in the Lueker Household - October 2013

Using the book "Going Batty" from the Magic School Bus series as inspiration, we spent a week in October having fun studying bats. We began our week by reading the book and then making some bats of our own.

 I gave each of the kids a sheet of black construction paper and asked them to fold it in half.

 Next I asked them to begin tearing their paper however they liked but not the folded side.

 Here are the somewhat unique bats we created using this simple technique :)

 Since we learned bats like to eat bugs I decided to let Jackson practice identifying numbers as well as developing his one to one correlation skills by using the bat he made along with our bug manipulatives for the week. I would give him a number and he chose the bugs his bat wanted to eat.

As you can see Jackson thought this math was lots of fun!

 He especially loved feeding his bat spiders.

 Another day we used sponge painting for some more bat art

 The kids all thought the sponges were so much fun. It cracks me up what they find amusing sometimes... lol :) Seeing these smiles makes me realize I need to find another project involving sponge painting for them. :)

 They each chose a couple of colors of paint which I gave them on a plate and they began to sponge away. There was a bit of confusion about whether they were sponging the black sheet of paper (yes) or the bat (ended up being a cool by-product), but once they (specifically Reagan) got it figured out the project turned out pretty well.

 By sponging around the bat image you end up with the black silhouette of the bat.

 We decided we liked our colorful bats that were sponge painted in the process nearly as well as the intended art project. :)

 One of the primary things we learned regarding bats is how they use their ears for echo location. To experience echo location for ourselves we played a game where everyone had the opportunity to use their ears to locate the "bugs" in the room. We created a makeshift bat costume for the kids to try out while pretending to be a bat. By blindfolding them they had to use their ears to find the rest of us "bugs" who were busy making noise with maracas and bells. Missy Reagan volunteered to be our first "Batgirl."

 

 This hiding place of Missy K's was the best. Reagan could not figure out where this meal was located. lol :)

 My own little "Batman"

 The Missy K "Batgirl"

 Among other books, we especially enjoyed this interactive book Grammy gave us some years ago on bats. The book is titled "Misunderstood BATS" by Child's Play.

This was such a fun unit study to do, especially during the month of October. :) I also have to say "The Magic School Bus" series provides such great inspiration for getting going on so many science related subjects. That and a little searching for activities on Pinterest and I find I'm on my way and having nearly as good a time planning as the kids are learning and playing! :)

Solar System Studies - Rockets in the Park - Fall 2013

Another beautiful afternoon after Classical Conversations we headed to the ball field again where two dads had built a couple of launch pads for the kids to launch rockets. I have to admit I was a bad mom and we didn't create any creative rockets. I also have to give credit to some of the other parents who helped their kids build some super cool rockets. Regardless of how the rockets looked they kids (and adults) all had a lot of fun! 

 Look at all those excited little faces!

 Kennedy getting ready for her turn

 After the dad's pumped up the launch pad to build pressure the kids pulled a string releasing the rocket into the air spewing water everywhere. So much fun! :)

 Jackson's turn

 The kids had a great time chasing after their rockets after they landed

 Reagan's turn

 Ms. Jeannette kept up with Miss McKinley while I was taking pictures for the group

 Here are a couple of my favorite pictures from the day - love these faces! :)

 

What a fun project and learning opportunity! Thanks to the dads and teachers who made this project possible! We do love our CC group!

Solar System Studies - Model Solar System - Fall 2013

Our Classical Conversations group headed to a baseball field one day this fall to build a to scale model of our solar system. This was such a fabulous way to increase the kids understanding of the size of our solar system. Here's Reagan and one of her classmates caring the "sun" to the baseball field.

 Getting organized and beginning to measure

 The little brothers had fun running around the baseball field while the big kids worked to put our solar system together.

 Getting final instructions on how to visit all the planets

 Here are some of the kids with the inner planets and sun. Golf balls were used to demonstrate the difference in size between the "Rocky Midgets" (including Earth) and the sun. Actually, Mercury and Mars were only the size of a marble!

 

The tutors (teachers) had cards for each planet that explained distance, size and other details about each planet.

 The kids traveled by class between the planets where the tutors explained the differences between the planets. Here is the first of the "Gas Giants," Jupiter, represented by a soccer ball. The kids also discussed and laid out the number of moons around each planet (using marbles).

  Getting a look at Saturn and it's rings

 

 Here the kids are creating the asteroid belt between the inner and outer planets using more marbles

A picture of the first five planets including the completed asteroid belt

 Moving out into the outer reaches of the solar system with a visit to Uranus 

   The entire solar system; Neptune is pretty far out there!

What a great way to explore and understand the size of our solar system! I'm so thankful for Classical Conversations and projects like this that the kids get to do with their classmates and friends!