First Year Reflections

It's been about a year since we started the homeschooling journey.  What a year!  It began almost suddenly, out of necessity and the realization that the available public school would not work for Mr. K.  In hindsight, that shouldn't have been too surprising.  We've always known he was wired a little differently from his age-mates (upon seeing a lobster in a tank for the first time at about 11 months, he signed "fish-bug"), but that didn't become as drastically obvious until he was thrown into a class with 23 others.  But this is not the post for a detailing our problems with "the system".  This is the post about how this first year of homeschooling has been eye-opening and how we are finding our way through.

My usual instict, before I start any new thing, is to research the heck out of it.  Then at somepoint my gut says, "ok, you know all you need to know for now, jump in and come back and fill in the gaps later when you find out what they are."  Because we pulled Mr. K out of public school fairly quickly, I could not do as much research as I might otherwise about homeschooling methods and local resources.  No matter.  The internet swooped in to save the day.  I found a couple message boards and online communities to ask questions and find a place to start. 

The first thing I discovered, is that just like public school or anywhere else, making friends and finding your community can be hard.  We don't fit in with the conservative Christian homeschooling community, which, like in most places, is the majority around here.  It did take a little while, but I'm hooked in now with a secular network of open-minded, diverse homeschoolers in our region and made some good friends who we have much in common with. 

The second thing I discovered, is that OMG homeschooling can be big business!  There are dozens of books on methods, a million different types of curricula, piles and piles of available enrichment materials, and vast websites exhorting you to why one particular thing is better than all the others.  Many people have very strong opinions about the "right" way to homeschool, and many of those people are very articulate and well-reasoned, and it is easy to lose the forest through the trees and forget what works for your kids and family, and the reasons why you chose to homeschool in the first place.

The third thing I discovered, and that I hope to continue to re-discover and re-evaluate in the coming months and years, is that my children are by nature curious, eager to learn, and a joy to be around.  I knew this before, I did, when they were both toddlers and then pre-school age.  When both kids were small I found a used copy of "The Unschooling Handbook" and read it, embracing many of the ideas within as the way we'd raise the kids when they were tiny and into the school years.  Then I lost this knowledge when Mr. K started having trouble in the kindergarten, reacting to his increasing behavior problems with additonal strictness and more rules, just the way the public school did.  This was the wrong approach--what really needed was more room, more time to learn according to his clock, not according to an educationally basic but rigid schedule with mandatory "circle time" that was torture for his wiggly self.   He needed to learn in his hands-on, bookish, accelerated way and be treated respectfully, treated more like the man he will someday be...what's that old line: I am raising adults, not children.  Something like that. 

A last thing I discovered is that the types of methods and curricula that work best for us are open-ended and highly adaptable.  Extensive scriptedness is DOA.  Anything that talks down to a child's intelligence will be given at minimum an eyebrow and likely the boot.  Work that exists in a vaccuum from other things we are studying or from our lives will be quickly viewed as busywork, so any of the "skills" such as writing that may come slower need to be done in a relaxed and loving manner and integrated with other interesting studies.  The kids are pretty self-motivated for their ages, and interesting projects and work that can be child-driven is wonderful, but I need to stay rightthere for guidance and support.   On our "this works" list for us right now is MBTP, BFSU, Brave Writer/The Writer's Jungle, and Math Mammoth.  For now, we have turned out to be eclectic but Charlotte Mason-y homeschoolers with strong respect for both Unschooling and Classical schools of thought.  Most of our learning comes from good books and hands-on activities, and wonders never cease, the kids actually seem to enjoy working together, most of the time.

If I had to predict the future (and of course I can't) I think that the kids may get more Unschooly as they age and can take more responsibility for their own learning.  Someday, they may even want to return to public school.  We'll cross that bridge when it comes.  I don't know exactly where we are headed, but this last year has been endlessly interesting and rewarding, and I look forward to seeing where we go next.

Two Wetlands

It's been another long, gray PNW winter.  Whenever the sun breaks for a few minutes, everyone in the area dashes outside to enjoy the weak sunshine and soak up Vitamin D.  Our little family took one little hike the last sunny day and enjoyed it so much we immediately drove down the highway to take a second one.  Both were through wetland areas, but very different types of wetlands which made for interesting observations. 

First was West Hylebos Wetlands Park, an inland forest bog (swamp).  The skunk cabbage is just blooming and not too stinky, yet...we learned that another name for skunk cabbage is "swamp lantern" and I much prefer that name for such a luminous plant!

Most of these bogs in the Puget Sound have long since been destroyed by peat mining, but by some accident this one still exists.  It is amazing to see the giant trees, just barely upright on the super soft and saturated ground. In many, many places, the giant trees toppled and their huge root wads are up on display.  When the trees come up they may destroy the walkway.

The kids very much enjoyed the easy hike and loved taking pictures of the interesting surroundings.

We decided to go back and do it again in each season to observe the changes. 

It was such an easy and enjoyable morning hike, that none of us wanted to go home yet and we decided to do a second trail after lunch. 

Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge!  We'd gone here with some homeschool friends during the week, but because we were with a group, we didn't get very far on the trails.  We went much, much farther this time.

Nisqually wetland is a seashore delta, a very different and much larger wetland than the Hylebos Creek area.  Lots of Canada Geese and interesting shorebirds to watch.

As usual I forgot the guidebooks.  (Why can I not ever remember the guidebooks???) And I can't remember what kind of bird is that green-footed one. 

My eagle-eyed kids spotted some amorphous blobs attached to some drowned vegetation, see it?

Frog eggs, we think.  Neato!

We had some good discussions afterward comparing and contrasting the two areas and the different types of life and vegetation.  I asked Big K which one he liked better and he said, "The second one.  Because we went farther."  Methinks he's going to be going through a lot of hiking shoes.

Whooooo loves tiny bones?

This week we finally took advantage of K's interest in owls (he just finished #10 in the Gaurdians of Ga'hoole series) and L's interest in birds and skeletons.  Owl pellets!

Ours were from American Science and Surplus.  It said two pellets would be in the package, but there was just one.  Oh well, it was a large one, so I broke it in half and each child got to work on half.

It did not take long to start finding bones.

One fairly large skull started to emerge quickly, too.

All in all, we ended up with the remains of three separate skulls and lots of fascinating little bones. 

K had fun using the included pamphlet to identify different bones and the species...we think we had at least two vole skulls, with the third skull too broken to really make an attempt.

In the end Mr. K even wanted to arrange all the bones in a museum-style display.

A few bucks well spent, for sure.  I appear to have whetted their appetite for dissection, however.  Ms. L found page 20 of the Home Science Tools catalog and has asked to dissect a starfish!  Someday, kiddo.  Baby steps.

Trilobitten

My dear sister knitted me a trilobite for my birthday!  Miss L adopted it immediately and named it "Trilo". 

He's already been on all sorts of prehistoric adventures, most of which involve skittering all over people nearby.

Miss L's love of fossils has resulted in pretty sophisticated prehistorical knowledge for a 5-year-old, but that notwithstanding, at one point she looked up at me and said, "what did trilobites eat?"

So we looked it up.  Yay for a well-stocked home library!  "Small particulates" was what it said, though, so then we launched into a mini-study of what modern crustaceans eat.  Seaweed and sea creature eggs and whatever else comes across their path. 

All the trilos in the house have been swarming all the play kitchen foods ever since.   If you're interested in making one of these, my sis said it was a fun little project on Ravelry.  He matches my own trilobite stichings, too.  We are being overrun...

Armchair Geology (Rocks, Minerals, and Earth Science for Homeschoolers, Part 3)

Continued from Part 2.  You had a great field trip, you went out and had a great time looking at those sparkly stones, or those cliffs, or that rocky shoreline.  Or maybe the weather is bad and you are waiting for summer adventures.  What now?  How do you learn more, or encourage questions, or get more inspiration? 

OMG ya'll.  So many ways.  It's hard to go really wrong.  The only way to go wrong would be to stop now.  Natural history museums, websites, and tv shows are great, but a good book is something special.  Good books rock! (pun intended.)  So that is where I focus here, starting with guidebooks, then some engaging topics on the rock cycle and general geology topics, and finishing with a long list of my favorite kinds of books--the ones that explore history and the connections between us humans and the physical earth. As usual, for each general topic I've tried to recommend solid titles for each level, elementary to high school and adult.

A note on curriculum:  I do not think a "curriculum" is necessary to learn a lot about rocks, minerals, and earth science,  but if that is what you are looking for, my favorite science curriculum in Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding.  I'll do a review of that someday, but suffice it to say it is a robust, wide-ranging science curriculum that integrates all the strands of science.  It works great for my kids and my natural approach.  If you take a different approach than I, and want  to teach one subsection of science at at time with more explicit direct instructions or workbook pages to complete, R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey's Earth & Space is solid for early elementary.  Intellego Unit Studies also offer interesting units on earth science topics.  With that said, though, a decent small rock collection like this one can really enrich any rocks and minerals curriculum and is highly recommended.  Now, on to the book lists!

Rocks and Minerals Guidebooks are best when they have beautiful pictures and interesting information, not just dry statistics or drawings that do not show a rock clearly.  My favorites:

• For early elementary, Rocks and Minerals (Eye Wonder) can be a good choice. 
• My kids like the Eye Wonder book, but often prefer to flip through a solid but approachable guidebook for adults like the Smithsonian or DK Pockets.  These are also nice to slip in a backpack for a field trip.
• If you have an older elementary to adult enthusiast in the house,  Smithsonian Rock and Gem and Smithsonian Earth are gorgeous.  Can be a wonderful gift in addition to fascinating browsing.

General Geology and the Rock Cycle

• For the youngest, Sand to Stone and Back Again is a wonderful picture book with eloquent prose.
• Magic School Bus Inside the Earth is a modern classic for early elementary.  Can't miss.  
• Elementary students may also enjoy some of the activities in Geology Rocks! 50 Hands-On Activities to Explore the Earth.
• Middle school to adult amateur can learn a lot from the very straightforward The Practical Geologist by Dougal Dixon.
• High school to adult may find The Field Guide to Geology as a solid and clear explanation of some higher-level geological principles.  Combined with John McPhee's Pulitzer Prize-winning Annals of the Former World, which eloquently follows working geologists as they travel across the country and explain North American geology, you could have a solid high school-level geology course. 

The Good Stuff! Where Geology and Human History Connect.  IMO one of the best ways to encourage interest in earth science topics is to study how humans have used, studied, and interacted with the earth and the world around us.  The books below cover a wide variety of earth science topics and include some of my favorite books.  Some in the homeschooling world would call most of these "living books".  I find that name a little silly.  They are just good books written in an engaging, narrative way that can turn a dry subject into something fascinating. 

• Have you ever really noticed salt?  Seriously.  It's the only stone people eat, and they used to fight wars over it.  Two books by Mark Kurlansky are very good: The Story of Salt for kids, and Salt: A World History for adults.
• If you want to think BIG, and read about the evolution of the earth, touching on changing theories over time, famous scientists, and many other science topics, Bill Bryson has written just the thing, with humor and enthusiasm.  A Really Short History of Nearly Everything for kids, and A Short History of Nearly Everything for high school/adult.
• Sometime when you're at the beach pull out the magnifying glass and look at the sand.  Then come home and compare your beach sand to the beautiful photos in A Grain of Sand: Nature's Secret Wonder by Dr. Gary Greenberg.  For young kids, Jump Into Science: Sand could be worthwhile. The website SandAtlas.org has amazing photos of sand from all over the world. 
• If you liked the close up photos in the above title, the close up photos of minerals and precious stones in Within the Stone: Nature's Abstract Art by Bill Atkinson might blow your mind.  I have used this book for inspiration for art projects more than once.
• Many people are fascinated by diamonds.  For the youngest, The Rock Factory is a gentle choice that also covers the rock cycle.  The discovery of diamonds in Canada in recent history is also fascinating-- for late elementary through middle school this story is told in Treasure Under the Tundra.  For adults, the same story is told in Barren Lands by Kevin Krajick, which is one of my top 10 geology books ever.
• The story of gems and precious stones is wrapped up with stories of power and intrigue throughout human history.  The best of these for adults is Jewels: A Secret History, by Victoria Finlay.  Ms. Finlay also wrote the fascinating book Color: A Natural History of the Palette about pigments, many of which are rare stones.  Either of these books could be a great choice for high school or a read-aloud for older elementary or higher.
• Most people don't think much about building stone, but people have built their homes and workspaces from stone since time immemorial.  For adults/high school, Stories in Stone: Travels in Urban Geology by David Williams explores the sites and stories of many historic stone sites in North America.  What's So Great about Granite? by Jennifer Carey covers similar information but skews younger.  Stone Wall Secrets by Kristine and Robert Thorson is for older elementary and is very well done. 
• Most people realize that coal is an important, but dirty, source of power.  But what else do you know about it, was it always this way?  Coal: A Human History by Barbara Freese tells more of the story for high school/adults. A slice of life in coal mining country in the early 1900s is told for late elementary and middle school in Growing Up in Coal Country by Susan Campbell Bartoletti.  For the younger elementary students, Coal by Ron Edwards is a gentle introduction to this complex subject.
• Poetry and prose.  Rocks and stone and our interactions with them can be poetic.  Really.  Try Byrd Baylor books like Everybody Needs A Rock for kids, or Terry Tempest Williams Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert for high school/adult. 

Whew!  I better quit while I'm ahead.  This list may change over time, I'm always finding new books and there are many more good titles on other earth science topics, too.  I've got lists already on volcanoes,  dinosaurs/paleontology, and Washington State geology, but drop me a line if you'd like any more specific recommendations, it might end up as a future book list post!

Field trippin' (Rocks, Minerals, and Earth Science for Homeschoolers, Part 2)

Continued from Part 1.  Now that you are thinking about rocks and earth science, and you're on board with the field trips, now what?  What do you take with you, where should you go to see the good stuff? 

Now, none of these things are mandatory to a good field trip experience, but they do help.  If you are a hiker, you've already got most of the important things.  This is my geology field trip packing list:

1. A small first aid kit.  Doesn't have to be fancy, but if you find yourself without at least band aids and moleskin, you're gauranteed to need them.  But I shouldn't even have to mention that, because you already have something like this in the car, and the little one would be superfluous, right?  Right?
2. Bags!  A comfy, roomy backpack to carry your gear (I like water bottle pockets and lots of nooks and crannies with a big central open area), and more ziplock baggies than you're going to expect, to carry the ever-important snacks, keep trash separate, and cart home small pebbly treasures.  Trust me on this one. 
3. A camera.  It is so pretty outside!  And kids are so cute!  And sometimes you need to take a picture of a flower or something you want to identify later.
4. A notebook.  If you make a habit of spending time outside in damp weather, rite-in-the-rain is a good idea.  If you are a fair-weather field tripper, whatever notebook you prefer. 
5. A magnifying glass or hand lens.  Any old magnifying glass will do, but if you are feeling fancy, my kids love to use my hand lens under my supervision.  Good optical quality, small, conveniently hangs around the neck on a lanyard.  Just gotta get your eye up close to the thing, that's the trick.  A student hand lens I wouldn't feel too bad about scratching up is this one.  I find having a magnifying glass or hand lens on me far more important than the next item...
6. A rock hammer.  Geologists use these to crack open rocks to see "fresh" material inside and kids just find it fun to bank on rocks, but they don't vary too much and you really don't need one for casual field trips.  Mine usually stays in the car.  Estwing makes the nicest rock hammers, but the budget models do fine for student use. 
7. Safety glasses.  If you are bringing #6, bring these too.  Shards of flying rock hurt.  Minimize the chance you'll need that first aid kit.  Buy cheap ones at the hardware store or kid-size ones online, not a big deal which kind because you're not wearing them very long.
8. Water and snacks.  Seriously.  Do not forget the water and snacks. 
9. Layers for conditions warmer or cooler than expected.  A change of socks can be a wise use of space. 
10. A hat, season dependent.  Toque for winter, wide-brimmed hat for summer.  Sometimes both but that's for the advanced class. 
11. Map of and/or to the destination and compass.  Not mandatory for your afternoon stroll at the beach on the other side of town, but anywhere unfamiliar or mountainous, a good idea.  We keep a Gazetteer in our car at all times, just in case a road trip breaks out.  If there is a specific destination in mind where we will be spending some time, I'll often have a specific map as well, which brings me to...

OK.  All packed up.  Now, where do we go? 

Good question!  I am often overwhelmed by too many options.  The way I see it, there's two kinds of field trips: the afternoon trip, and the destination trip.  Each has a slightly different kind of destination and mindset. 

The afternoon trip is somewhere nearby, within an hour or so, that you can see a little nature, low-key and easy.  Since we live in the Puget Sound, we have a couple state park beaches we like to visit on this kind of trip.  You get familiar with these areas and go to them more than once, and over time get to see the small changes that occur seasonally and yearly.   Other good choices for this kind of trip, depending on your location, could be a river delta, sand dunes, a rocky creek, a lakeside.

The destination trip is longer and gets you really outside the comfort zone.  Depending on how far you can travel, it can take a day or a weekend or a week.  Day trip destinations are good if they are 1-3 hours away and have lots of good interesting stuff to spend 4-6 hours when there.  Finding the day trip destinations can be tricky, since you often already think you've been everywhere in your area, but that is rarely really true. 

Good places to look for destination field trip location ideas:

1. State Parks.  Any you've missed? 
2. National Parks.  These places are our national treasures for a reason.  Don't just do the "car tour" if you can help it; after a liesurely stroll through the interpretive center, ask a ranger for recommendations for a good short hike and get away from the crowds.  Remember though not to collect any rock samples from these heavily-traveled and protected areas.
3. The website for your state's Department of Geology.  Sometimes it's called a Geological Survey, or is a part of a Natural Resources division, or something like that.  But every state has one.  Many of these state departments have education as a part of their mission statement and have good lists of local resources and field trip locations for you to browse.
4. Regional geology guidebooks.  There are Roadside Geology and/or Geology Underfoot guides published for many states.  While these books are written for adults, many kids also find them interesting to browse.   There is also a growing collection of regional geology guides/activity books for kids by Cynthia Brown being published for children that can be worth a look.
5. If you want to try rockhounding (intentionally looking for and collecting specific mineral specimens), hook up with your local rock and gem clubs for guidance. Rockhounding books exist and give information on where to find specific types of rocks/minerals in an area, but even with those guides it is often difficult to find specific things on purpose and the legalities regarding rockhounding vary from place to place.
6. Hiking guidebooks or websites like this one.  The point is just to go outside and look around, not find a world-class unique geological feature at every stop.  Most hiking guides for an area that bill themselves as "With Kids" or "Easy Day Hikes" have wonderful places in your area that kids can enjoy.  Sometimes you can cross-reference these hikes with the regional geology guidebook to help explain what you're seeing and that, is fun!
7. And one of my favorites--Serendipity!  Don't plan a specific destination.  Pick a direction and go.  Take a few turns in the road you've never taken before.  Take that Gazetteer with you and see what you find in that area you've never been. 

Now, you know where you're going, or you just got back and want to find out more about the pretty stones you found or that crazy rock formation or that big mountain.  Where to start for further reading and keep that enthusiasm going?  See Part 3.

Look Around! (Rocks, Minerals, and Earth Science Resources for Homeschoolers, Part 1)

Rocks are often fascinating for kids.  They come in so many different colors, and some are sparkly, and some are pretty or clear or spotted, and a lot of them look like the gravel in the driveway. 

Unfortunately, it is this last part that causes many adults and parents brush off a kid's interest in a pebble as a boring rock.  Even the well-meaning homeschooling parent often overlooks the humble pebble, treating earth science as an afterthought or a less-important scientific sibling to biology or chemistry or physics.  This is a missed opportunity.  All the sciences are dependent upon each other, and earth sciences are an easy and gentle way to introduce your kids to nature, cultivate skills of observation, and even act as a "gateway drug" to a lifelong love of science and nature.  When I was a small child, my grandmother, a hardcore mineral collector with many rare, world class specimens in her collection, gave my sister and I wooden collection boxes with a few nice specimens, and took us along on a few rockhound expeditions.  Combined with my parents that encouraged my budding love of driveway pebbles and other interesting things to be found out-of-doors, little did anyone know it would eventually lead me to a couple degrees in geology and a hand lens in every backpack.  So, suffice it to say, I have strong opinions about how to teach our kids about geology and earth sciences. 

And I'm not too shy to share, haha! 

Parents, the single most important thing to encourage an interest in earth sciences in your kids, is to go outside and look around.  (This also works for interest in lots of other topics, too, but I'm trying to stay on track here.)  Try going somewhere new, or someplace you enjoyed but haven't been in a while.  Both you and the kids.  Get away from the city or subdivision where you can't see the land beneath you any more.  A groomed city park is great for playdates, but not the place to go for earth science.  Go to the mountains, or the beach, or the river, or the desert, or wherever you can get close to the land without the covering of man-made changes we are so used to seeing.  Have a nice, relaxing outing.  While you are there, open your eyes and LOOK.  You might notice things you never saw before.  "Huh, I never noticed these black sand grains at this beach."  "Wow, the bend of this river is a lot narrower than it was last summer."  "Dang, that's a big rock!" 

These observations lead to questions, naturally.  "Why is that mountain shaped that way?"  "How come this part of the trail is so much steeper than that first part?"  "What's up with all these little sparkly bits in this boulder?" 

There, now you and the kids, you're already thinking like scientists.  It's ok if you don't know the answers.  And, it's ok, even essential, to tell the kids you don't know the answers--and to tell them you will try to find out, or to gather more information.  "Hmm, good question, let's take a picture of that cliff and ask the Ranger about it."  "I don't know, I've never noticed that before!  Let's go see if the rocks over there are the same."  "Beats me, good observation!  Why don't we come back next month, and see if it is different."

If the kids don't have questions, parents, YOU have the questions and curiosity, model that for the kids.  Honest curiosity and enthusiasm is infectious.  Kids will more than likely catch on.  You can't fake it though, kids see right through that.  At least, mine do!  If it's an off afternoon or the weather is bad or you should have stopped for lunch an hour ago, oh well.  Don't force it.  Go have a snack.  It's the habits of observation and curiosity and investigation that are crucial, not any one specific experience.

And, there you go.  Those habits in themselves will get you pretty far.  To encourage further interest in specific earth science and rocks and minerals study, there are some helpful tools that are easy to put in a backpack or the trunk of the car, though.  And I've put them in Part 2.