Seed Experiment

The "Seeds Sprout!" book had a science experiment recommendation we decided to try out. During the course of the book there was a discussion on the coats of seeds. The coats need to soften in order for the seeds to sprout. The experiment was to soak some seeds in warm water for an hour and then compare their growth with seeds which had not been placed in water. We decided to try this experiment with watermelon and pea seeds.

 Here the girls are removing the seeds from the water to place in damp paper towels. We also placed dry seeds in damp paper towels.

 All three kids checking out the results on Day 2. The watermelon seeds had done nothing. The soaked pea seeds looked like that might be in the beginning stages of sprouting but it was a little difficult to tell.

 By Day 3 there was no doubt regarding the peas (although the watermelon seeds had still done nothing)

 Examining the results

 On the left are the dry peas while on the right are the seeds which had been soaked. Clearly the soaked peas won the race!

Berries On Brian Station - Week 2

Visiting the farm to pick up more fresh vegetables and see how everything was growing seemed to fit right into our science theme for the week as well. As always, the kids had a fabulous time checking everything out, especially the chickens. Farmer Erik showed them how they could pick grass and clover for the chickens. Then he showed them a special space in the chicken wire to feed them. All three kids had a fabulous time feeding the chickens and the chickens came running as soon as they realized what we were up too.

 Jackson was determined to get his grass through the chicken wire all by himself

 Jackson loves Good Boy

 Farmer Erik gave both the girls beautiful flowers for their hair

 Missy K with "chicken feed" in hand

 Farmer Erik showing the girls how to use a blade of grass between your hands as a whistle (look at those blackberry bushes behind them - I can't wait to be enjoying those!!!)

 Jackson loves cats too! He gets so excited everytime he sees one of our cats as well. I think Jackson is going to be our animal lover because he goes nuts over any animal he sees everytime he sees them.

 When we got home I made "ants on a log" from the fresh celery we had picked up from the farm for a snack. Reagan came up with her own concoction and decided she wanted "ants on the ground" instead. 

 Kennedy wanted a super huge "ants on a log" snack to enjoy

We're loving our fresh local produce!

Science - Seeds

Because of all the yard and garden work we've been doing around here it seemed timely to spend a week studying seeds and how they grow for our science lessons. This tied nicely into our Story of the World theme as well because they periodically include lessons on ancient agriculture (we discussed ancient agriculture once before when we learned how Nomads began farming and we built the Shaduf as an early irrigation system).

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Here the girls are looking at about half a dozen different types of seeds and disscussing the similarities and differences between them. Due to a science experiment that will appear in a different post, we were specifically looking at the coats of each seed and how hard or soft they were.

Just for fun, we planted some sunflowers and tomatoes from some kits we had received (from Grammy I think). I'm not sure about the purpose of these tiny pots as the plants are already exploding out of them less than a week later!

 After reading "The Carrot Seed" we went outside to see how our own carrots were doing. After a week in the ground they were beginning to surface.

 The corn was beginning to pop out of the ground as well

 These are the three books which prompted our week long lesson on seeds. The first was a suggested reading from Story of the World (it's too much for the girls but I find it helpful to read as background knowledge to discuss with them as is appropriate and fits into our other lessons). The second was a random library pick by Kennedy but fit perfectly into our science theme (especially since we had just planted carrot seeds in our garden). The third was a book I selected to enhance their learning and a bit more on the girl's level than "Ancient Agriculture."

Berries on Bryan Station Farm

As I mentioned on our old blog we found a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm to become involved with this summer. As well as fresh vegetables and fruit from May-October, we have been enjoying fresh eggs. The kids love visiting the farm and seeing the chickens. Last week was our first trip to the farm to do an actual vegetable pickup but we still had to stop and see the chickens. The chickens usually roam around the farm but right now they're caged because Farmer Erik says they love strawberries and they are not free to eat their fill of those yummy treats!

 Jackson can not get enough of the chickens!!!

 Reagan and Kennedy think they're pretty cool too

 Our next stop was the barn where we had the opportunity to taste some of those yummy strawberries the chickens were banned from eating. All three kids were glad the chickens hadn't been given the opportunity to gobble up the strawberries!

 The only thing Jackson might love more than Grammy and chickens is strawberries! lol :)

 I'm being serious... the only way I could get Jackson to agree to get in the van and leave the farm in a peaceful way was to bribe him with another strawberry. Then he happily got into his seat to enjoy another delicious treat. Yum!

I'm looking forward to enjoying all the wonderful produce from the CSA this summer! The kids can't wait for weekly farm visits, regardless of whether or not we come home with anything, unless of course Farmer Erick gives us a chicken or more strawberries, then life in the Lueker household would be pretty close to perfect! I wonder what our HOA would make of chickens... Maybe we can move them into Cooper's house!?!?! lol :)

Vegetable Garden

In March we planted a number of different vegetables which we intended to transplant into a small vegetable garden this spring. If you're interested, you can check out those efforts on our old blog at http://luekermunchkins.blogspot.com/2012/04/planting-veggies.html . Most of our vegetables did quite well. The only thing that did not make it was the watermelon, but we knew we were planting it out of season and for that reason didn't entirely expect it to survive. Reagan wanted to plant the watermelon so badly, however, I thought it would be a good learning opportunity, and it was. As it turns out, there's a reason plants have seasons and as I mentioned the watermelon didn't make it. ;) 

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The first weekend in May Grammy and Grand-Dad helped us put this small vegetable garden in our backyard, thank you so much! Thank you also to Aunt Dorothy who gave us some of the larger plants she received from her partner Paul. Those were a very welcome addition!

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Besides our transplants, we also planted carrots, corn and watermelon. I had originally intended to have the kids help put everything in the ground but it was a busy day so Grand-Dad helped me plant our garden without any little helpers. They were happy checking out the end results and showed no distress in not having been included in the planting. :)

The girls looked at the garden and moved right on along to the swingset while Jackson enjoyed the opportunity to explore.

  Jackson especially enjoyed the tomato cages and picking up clods of dirt.

 I know many of you might laugh at the idea of even calling this a garden. I kind of have to as well. Compared to what my parents did growing up it's a joke. Having said that, I can't tell you how proud I am of myself for finally getting my act together to even accomplish this much. :) I've been talking about it for a long time with no action. We might not have a ton, but I can't wait to enjoy some great home grown vegetables this summer! Hopefully things will go well and we can expand our efforts next year. :)

Thank you to everyone who provided assistance in creating our happy little vegetable garden! :)

The First Nomads Become Farmers

We learned about nomads during our second week of study. The first part of the week we learned about what kinds of food nomads ate (anything they could find), where they slept (tents or caves depending on the climate), and why they moved so frequently (to find food and shelter). The second part of the week was dedicated to learning how nomads began to settle and become farmers. Part of this was learning about early irrigation systems such as the Shaduf which made it possible to grow crops. The farmers would dig canals from the river and use this lever system to irrigate their crops. We decided to try our hand at building a Shaduf of our own. I began by having the girls clear the sand from a portion of our sand/water table to create the canal. 

 The girls then decided our hose was the Euphrates river and used it to fill their newly created canal

 Next we headed into the yard to locate a rock to serve as the weight for our Shaduf as well as sticks to build the rest of the system.

 The girls located sticks in a Y shape to serve as the supports. They filled small cups around their bases to anchor them.

 Next (with my assistance) they tied the rock they had found to serve as a weight to one end of their lever

 They also used twine to connect the two sticks to finish the lever

 Next we tied a small plastic bucket to the end of our lever to retrieve the water. At first I felt guilty about the plastic bucket but I didn't have any leather animal pelts lying around to create a water tight bag... Then I thought, hey, they used whatever they could find and what we can find is a small plastic bucket! So while the actual result may not have been completely authentic the spirit was!

 We decided to use our Shaduf to water the vegetables we had planted several weeks earlier. They were easy to move to the sand table and it seemed appropriate given that we were building this as a way to explore early farming techniques.

 We also learned that once nomads settled and became farmers they began to build more permanent structures for homes. We learned they frequently used mudbricks to build their homes. Although I hadn't planned it, somewhere near the end of watering our veggies with our Shaduf one of the girls asked if we could make a mudbrick house. That sounded like a great idea to me so I gave them each a measuring cup to help shape their blocks and away they went. They had to experiment a bit with the sand to water ratio to get their bricks to hold together. In all honestly I probably should have let them experiment with that process a bit more and directed much less, but we had a limited amount of sand (compared to water) and I didn't want to end up with them being a complete water/sand mess as we had somewhere else to be later in the day.

 We used sticks across the top and then added more bricks to create a roof

 The girls with their version of an ancient mudbrick house