Heroes and Ice!

Week of January 31st:

Theme: Heroes
Adventures in Nature Theme: Ice...Frozen Fun
Music: Frederic Chopin

Watching the Big Change

I love when Aidyn takes the initiative to learn on his own. Last night Aidyn asked to watch one of his Geo Kids videos. We have a set of adorable kid-friendly National Geographic videos, and Aidyn selected the Metamorphosis video. In his bed together, we watched the antics of animals and talked about the big change. He remembers when we watched the caterpillar to butterfly cycle last year, but he also relearned that other animals go through changes as well. I love hearing him identify animals that I assumed he didn't know the names of such as sea otters and mosquitoes. I also love how inquisitive he is and his flood of why questions.

Even when we do not formally plan subjects out, education can't help but leak in!

Anything Can Happen Week

This fourth week of homeschool is officially an "off week," but I decided to tweak it with the theme of 'Anything Can Happen!" If we get the itch to tour some random cookie factory, we will. If we elect to spend the day fingerpainting, baking bread, reading comics, or watching Sesame Street, we will. On library day, I'll ask Aidyn to pick out whichever books/videos/cds he wants. Basically, we will not have any structured or preplanned activities but will follow the whim of learning and playing. After all our accomplishments and activities this month, this is sure to be a welcomed break!

Indoor Gardens Synopsis

Of course, the most exciting objective this week was adopting our new family member, Sabor the Leopard Gecko. Our family has been peeking in her terrarium every day and coaxing her to lick our hands and fingers. We're learning how to care for her, feed her, interact with her, and give her her space when she needs it. This experience has also helped us talk about desert plants and climate--a welcomed subject in the midst of a wet winter storm! Additionally, our family has been reading informational books on geckos and has learned much in terms of their expected behavior, temperament, and needs.

This was also my first week back to school/work, so we're adjusting to the newly hectic schedule. I anticipate that much of the 'structured learning' will take place in the morning hours with games and extra fun activities for the late afternoons/evenings and weekends.

Reptile Observation

This week spent learning about our leopard gecko through reading and observation has been so fun! In the mornings, Aidyn's first thought is to check on "baby gecko." We peek into her terrarium and usually find her cuddled in her hollow log. The knowledge of her being nocturnal was fully realized this week as we often caught her napping and not doing much else. There have been late nights and early mornings when the glow of her purple nightlight exposed her nightly habits. She then ventures out of her safe spot and roams through her tiny desert. We once spied her right on top of her log looking like the queen of her world!

We also learned more about her eating habits. Initially we provided her with a scoop of mealworms but noticed that she barely touched them. Worried that she wasn't getting enough to eat, we revisited Petsmart for a professional opinion. The clerk filled us in on her usual diet, and a book from the library explained that pet store lizards may not recognize a certain food item as a meal if they didn't have it frequently enough. The case with the mealworms was that she only had them only occasionally. What she was used to was crickets. Yes. Live crickets! Live crickets dusted with calcium powder, I might add. Doesn't that sound fancy? So we picked up a carton of small, live crickets. Since adding two to her tank, she's gobbled up one already.

I'm sure we could have read all these things in a textbook and probably watched them on a documentary but something about experiencing this beautiful creature teaches us so much more. Some things that we've learned I cannot even put into words, but it runs the gamut from learning about lizards' idiosyncrasies to taking responsibility for caring for a pet. The root of that logic is why I adore homeschool; I want us to touch, see, feel, experience these things instead of only reading about it in a cold textbook. I'm sure we won't be able to do it all, but the things we do learn about with multi-module methods will surely stand out.

Leopard Gecko

The majority of yesterday was spent in learning how to create an indoor desert garden/terrarium and adopting a new family member: a leopard gecko.

I researched how to construct a desert garden and created a simple illustration to show Aidyn. We first went to library to check out lizard/desert books, and then we went to our local Petsmart to meet some live specimens. We shopped around for basic needs while I explained the function of each to Aidyn. When we finally returned home, Aidyn and I made a living desert. He helped place tiny pebbles on the bottom of the tank. Next we scattered natural moss over the pebbles. We then added cactus-specific soil. Carefully, we placed two succulent plants, that Aidyn had chosen earlier, in opposite corners of the terrarium. To create multiple hiding spots for our soon-to-be adopted lizard, we situated a hollow piece of a tree limb, rocks, and moss throughout our desert environment. While placing the lamp on the tank, I talked with Aidyn about a reptile's need for external heat as they cannot regulate it within themselves as we mammals can. Daddy, at one time being an avid lizard owner himself, checked out our progress and further talked about the characteristics and needs of lizards. Once we had everything squared away, we returned to the pet shop and chose our new family member. We selected the quiet, easy-going leopard gecko and wrangled up a name for her. We decided on Sabor, the leopard from Tarzan and an Edgar Rice Burroughs-created word.

In the short amount of time that we've had her thus far, observing her has been quite interesting. Through this sort of peeking in through the glass and careful petting and holding, Aidyn is absorbing things a book could never teach him--the experience of watching a live animal, of caring for a pet, of sampling how certain animals behave. We look forward to daily observations and learning more about the personality of Sabor and the behavior of geckos in general.

Indoor Gardens

Week of January 18th:

Theme: Pets
Adventures in Nature theme: Growing Indoor Gardens
Music: Jacob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn

Our main objective this week is to construct an indoor desert garden. We are economically searching for an aquarium and materials to make a desert scene including pebbles, charcoal, desert-type soil, and cacti. We aim to read both fiction and nonfiction books about the desert and its inhabitants, namely reptiles. There is a possibility that we adopt a leopard gecko or similar reptile to observe in our desert garden. This week is sure to be exciting and scientific!

We're also going to be working on number recognition, counting, and simple math problems, listening to a new composer, and adjusting to a new schedule as I am soon due back to work and school.