A Day on the Farm, the Park, the Wildlife Preserve, and the Park again

THE FARM

Our homeschool Knitting Group met at the farm for our first class--we learned to finger knit. That was awesome and the kids have been doing it A LOT since then. Knitting with the needles was much trickier:

learning to knit

Comparing how long the scarves are . . . and then playing some wild game with them

Our pig! The kids, though they were told repeatedly NOT to name the pig, named the pig. Flower. I think "lunch" or "pork chop" might be more like it. But then again, I grew up on a small farm . . .

Checking out the pig pen


Playing with the chickens

Playing with friends

Goofy faces

Talking politics (so fun) . . . isn't the scenery gorgeous?


THE PARK

A couple of days later, we decided to play at the park, because the weather was gorgeous and because, well, why not.




THE WILDLIFE PRESERVE

Our group meets at least weekly and we do a variety of things. Every year we brainstorm our classes and outings (the kids are on the field trip committee) and we do whatever strikes our fancy based on our kids' interests and what we're learning. This year we're doing Physics, Group Games, Classes at the local Wildlife Preserve, field trips, and service projects.

The classes at the Wildlife Preserve are fantastic--they do creek studies (where you climb IN the creek and study the water and bugs) and field studies and all sorts of things. This class was all about Mammals. The lecture taught by the park ranger (here is where you have a potential con to homeschooling--kids getting ONLY their parents as teachers--we have the attitude that if there's a "con," we actively work to make it a "pro." We think it's important for our kids to learn from many mentors including, but not exclusively, us and we're fine with (and encourage) them learning rules and discipline from others--it's healthy and good. So, we seek out classes and opportunities for this--everyone in our group pitches in with this by teaching and mentoring and we also sign up for many classes in the community and area) was informative, fun, and interactive. He then showed a short video and then lead us on a hike to several different kinds of habitats and asked the kids all kinds of questions and had them touch all kinds of skeltons and fur and other animal "stuff."

M loves Bald Eagles! There are 2 real ones at the preserve.

The lecture and video
Answering questions about Mammal characteristics

Getting ready for our hike to visit different habitats
Habitat: Field

Habitat: Swamp/Water

Feeling animal furs

Habitat: Forest
More animal skins


THE PARK AGAIN

Remember how we got rained out of our Olympic Field Day? Well, we rescheduled to do it after our class the Wildlife Preserve. So, everyone ate lunch together at the park and then the games began--Various Relays and Shotput and Javelin and Beach Volleyball . . .

Gorgeous park!