Rewild The World, George Monbiot

Tinker Crate

My son is so excited! I just ordered a subscription to Tinker Crate for him to try. He thinks of himself as a creator but we find it hard to gather all the items he needs for projects. Tinker Crate takes care of that with a kit sent to you.  They call it  "A laboratory for hands-on experiments delivered every month" .  All materials are included.

From their website  "Tinker Crate inspires kids to explore and learn about science, engineering, and technology—and have fun doing it. Every month, a new crate to help kids develop a tinkering mindset and creative problem solving skills."

His first kit has not arrived yet, but I will update you on how he liked it. Just so you know, this is not a sponsored post, I paid for this myself and have not had any contact with the company. They do however offer a referral policy if others buy from your link. $10 off for them and a $10 credit for you. The link in this post includes that code. So if you were thinking about trying Tinker Crate, we both get a reward!

What We Are Working On

 

From time to time, folks ask my son what he's learning about this year. So in the interest of sharing great resources, here's our list:

1. Life of Fred, Decimals and Percents:  Math was never so much fun! My son has read almost all the books just for the story, then we go back and do the math problems

2. Balance Benders Level 1:  Logic and algebraic reasoning puzzles from The Critical Thinking Co.

3. Word Roots A2:  Teaches students the meanings of Latin and Greek prefixes, roots, and suffixes commonly used in English. Also from The Critical Thinking Co.

4. Developing Critical Thinking Through Science, Book 2:  Hands-on, minds-on activities that help students learn basic physical science principles and the scientific method of investigation. From The Critical Thinking Co. as well (can you see a pattern here?).

5. Jacob's Ladder Reading Comprehension Program,Level 2 :  By the Center for Gifted Education at the College of William and Mary

6. The Story of the World: History for the Classical Child: The Middle Ages: From the Fall of Rome to the Rise of the Renaissance :  This text is a very fast read for my son, but it then provides a foundation for further research when an event or historical figure catches his interest.

My son will turn 9 this year and he still loves to read just for his own entertainment (yeah!). He reads both fiction and non-fiction as he pleases. At the moment he is reading a very old volume of Aesop's Fables that was mine as a child.

Those are the only texts or workbooks we will use, but of course video and online learning is mixed in. He has learned a great deal about computer language and skills just from his online game creations and Minecraft play.

In between helping me care for my pet sitting clients, we just follow his interests the rest of the time.

He also has decided he wants to document things more (thoughts, ideas, findings etc.), so he is getting writing time in on his own as well. This is much better than me asking him to write something specific, which never worked!

Please Don't Feed the Animals.

Earlier this week, we went out for a walk along the canal by our house.  Other than this waterbird perched on a branch, we could not see much of anything in the water.

Most of the canal was covered over by thick water lettuce. So since it was almost lunch time, we decided to get some chicken and have lunch at the park.

Which was then abruptly interrupted by this guy!  Five minutes after sitting down, out of the woods he came marching. Nose in the air and heading right for our table. Seems KFC is potent raccoon bait!
He had no fear at all, so I assume someone has been feeding him. Really bad idea! Dangerous for us and for him.  We said our goodbyes and went home to eat our chicken in peace.

Florida Tank Update

 Our Florida freshwater tank is doing great!

All the plants are growing and we haven't lost a single fish.

So far the Flagfish are getting along with everyone.

I tried to get some good photos of the males, but it's amazing how hard it is to photograph moving fish!

This is the best shot of the larger male Florida Flagfish.

  Isn't he beautiful!

Another Fish Tale

I know they may be hard to see, but our Molly had babies! If you look close you can see the tiny fry in these photos. There are about fifteen altogether. Not sure if they will make it, some will be eaten unfortunately. If they did all survive every time, we would run out of tank space fast! So we will let nature take it's course and see.

New Aquarium for our Florida Fish

Our ditch fish are getting new digs!  We have been busy setting up a 29 gallon tank for them. It's quite an improvement over the little 2 gallon they have been in. Right now we are waiting for the water to cycle and establish some good bacteria. There are some live plants, a few snails and a couple of common mollies in it for now.

So far all is well and we will add the others in a week or two.  On our last net dipping we caught two sailfin mollies and a flag fish.  We still have the 10 gallon tank with the pet store fish, but my son is obsessed with the ditch fish we found and wants to keep going to see what else we can discover. Florida has quite an array of critters in our ditches and canals. Not to mention a few not so friendly guys too, but we are steering clear of them!

Our Backyard Hawk

I think I was interrupting his dinner.

He seemed annoyed with the timing of my photo opt :)

All About Weather Felt Board Set

 

I've added a few new felt board sets to my Etsy shop. This one is all about the weather and includes fifteen laminated images backed with Velcro dots that will stick to any felt or flannel board.

I also created new, all cats and all dogs sets. You can find these and many others in my Etsy shop. Thanks for looking!

Summer Science Projects

image: USDA

This summer we are planning some science projects involving local resources. First up will be collecting water samples and viewing their microscopic contents.

My good friend, the local veterinarian, loaned us her extra microscope for our studies. We are so grateful for her assistance with extra supplies and learning materials, I would not have access to otherwise (not free anyway)!

I found some great links online for identification and experiment ideas:

Protist Park : Contains an introduction to Protists (pond life) and video gallery of mini movies and a cool short story with the movie links included in order.

Nikon MicroscopyU : This site contains many great live video and image galleries for many subjects including pond life. Ton's of educational material here!

The Freshwater Life: Has everything you new to know about collecting samples, growing specimens and identifying them. Lots to learn!

So we are going hunting for pond scum is Florida's swamps and ponds (well, around the neighborhood anyway). Hope we make it back alive!

Home Education Resources

Passing on a couple of cool and more important, free resources! First up, a great Venn diagram of the three branches of government. It shows who is responsible for what on each level: local, state and federal. You can download it and print it out here at Kids Discover.

We have a subscription to Kids Discover magazine also and love it (no ads)! They have other lesson plans and resources for parents and teachers there too.

For free human biology and science  DVDs and Cd's,  go to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
They also have some printed materials free that they ship as well.
Check out their Cool Science link for interactive educational help for children of all ages.

I'm always thrilled to find quality resources on the web and will pass them on when I do!

January Sky Watch

Look what we saw in the early evening sky this week!

My son and I were so lucky to be able to see both Jupiter and Venus shortly after dark.

Jupiter is in the upper left highlighted in yellow and Venus is below the moon on the right, in the red triangle. 

This time I even remembered to get my camera (yeah mom!).

To join in the fun, go to EarthSky and see what to look for

each night of the year. If you blink you'll miss them, don't wait!

Florida Orchids

After three years of sitting in this evergreen tree, my orchid finally bloomed! I'm not sure of the name because it was a plant I rescued from someone who threw it out. I have placed it in several trees in my yard but this is the one that it took hold in and began to bloom.

The tree it finally likes was one of those tiny live Christmas trees they sell in Lowes. It was the first Christmas tree I had when I moved into my house twenty some years ago. I planted in the yard and now it's about twelve feet tall!

The blooms are so tiny and delicate, I'm sure they won't last long. Now I need to identify the orchid. Since it has decided to live, I will try to help it along. It's survival of the fittest in my yard!

Mushrooms Everywhere

With all the rain we had last weekend, a bumper crop of wild mushrooms have popped up!

These are a very delicate shade of pale yellow. I'm haven't identified them yet but I'm working on it.

Meanwhile this week we are keeping a close eye on Hurricane Irene. Say goodnight Irene, and goodbye!

From The Garden

My night blooming cactus has three flower buds this year! Last year I missed the bloom so I'll have to pay close attention this year

to catch a photo.

Simple but so pretty pale pink potato flower blooms.
My that's a lot of P's!

We found these two tiny (they are pea size) lizard eggs in an empty flower pot. Not sure if they will hatch but we brought them in to watch, just in case. We covered them after the photo.

Indoor Ant Hill

My son received an Ant Hillfor Christmas this year. It came with a coupon to order live ants to be shipped later. We had to wait for warmer weather to have them shipped so they did not freeze en route.

The Western Harvester Ants arrived this week and we quickly set up their new home. Within a few hours they already started several tunnels.

By day number two, they had really moved things around. It seems a few of them died over night but according to the instructions, that is normal.

We fed them a sunflower seed and a tiny piece of carrot. That much food is supposed to be enough for a few days, along with a drop of water now and then.

My son expected to see a queen ant but apparently it is illegal to ship the queens across state lines. The instructions said the ants will live for several weeks, but I'm skeptical.

They don't seem too perky today. I may end up taking pity on them and talking my son into releasing them. Mom's a real softy, even when it comes to ants.

The Vultures Win by One!

Last week went to the birds, literally! We have been counting and charting birds we see in the neighborhood. Actually we saw quite a few more, but ran out of chart space.

After naming the species, we noted feeding and nesting habits, plus our best guess on beak types.

When the week was through we added up the tally. Lo and behold, the Vultures win!

Not exactly sure what that says about our neighborhood (ha ha) but we sure had fun with this chart.

Florida Ground Dove

I've been watching this little family of ground doves for a few weeks now. They have taken up residence under my bird feeder. Ground Doves are rarely seen in Florida now due to habitat destruction.

Unlike the more prevalent Mourning Dove, the Ground Dove is much smaller and has a shorter tail. I hope they stay around, they are very cute and seem to stick together in tight knit family groups.

Quick and Easy Volcano Model

It's landforms week at our house and yes, we made a volcano model. It's not exactly like the ones in the instructions we followed. I decided not to use paper mache or clay to form the volcano, my son doesn't have the patience yet to wait very long for the end results.

Instead we used crumpled up kraft paper (it's already brown) and wrapped it around an empty bottle. I taped it down around the top of the bottle with masking tape. We added a couple of crumpled paper boulders and some toy dinosaurs for scenery. I lined the cardboard box with a puppy training pad, just in case things got messy.

After the first attempt at adding baking soda to vinegar, we waited for the eruption and nothing happened. So I added a little more vinegar and gave the mountain a swish to mix it. Then we finally got some foamy, barely pink (a few drops of red food coloring was not enough!) lava erupting over the top.
It was anti-climatic for me to say the least, but my son thought it was still pretty cool! The best part was he could build it and see it erupt all within about an hour! I'm sure we will make a more realistic and technically correct one when he is older.

Black Swallowtail Butterfly

Our timing was perfect! We were outside on the front porch early last evening and this is what we saw emerging from one of the cocoons that had attached to a patio plant.

This is the same caterpillar that I wrote about on our parsley plant. He climbed over to the pot next to the parsley to make his cocoon. His cocoon was green and he is an Eastern Black Swallowtail.

We still have an other cocoon that is on the same plant, that is brown. I know it's another swallowtail butterfly, but I don't know what color it will be.

According to my research, the cocoon colors can be different for the same butterflies, so we will have to wait and see. I wonder if we will as lucky with our timing to catch a photo before the next one flies away?