Birds of Prey Field Trip

Our homeschool group visited Wheatley Birds of Prey on October 10. It was an incredible experience, thoroughly enjoyed by kids and adults. Clive and Jayne, the handlers, are both very knowledgeable and personable.
Holding a Barn Owl was definitely a highlight...

Kestral

Sky, a Peregrine Falcon, feasting after her flight. 

Sky

Hannah slept through most of the outing.

Eagle Owl

Check out those eyelids.

Red Kites

Sarah continued our nature unit on birds of prey with a lesson on Red Kites.

As well as facts about the birds, we learned much about the history of Red Kites in Britain.

Worksheets were completed to revise the lesson.

Everyone also completed a painting of a Red Kite. An outline was provided by Sarah.

Noah's painting

Birds of Prey

On Thursday, Sarah began our series on birds of prey. Our homeschool group has been an immense blessing, and I'm so thankful for the fellowship and teaching of the other moms.

Noah: Bigger than a Kestrel; Smaller than a Golden Eagle

Thursday School: Trees in Spring and French Brunch

After Davinia's lesson on trees in spring, students compiled a booklet with information related to four common British trees. 

Noah was SO diligent in finding and writing information about each tree on his fact pages.

 We had our second annual French brunch. So much fun and oh so yummy.

Each of the kids decorated a French-themed placemat while waiting for everyone to be served.

Each child requested various foods and drinks in French. Maeva asks Caleb, "Qu'est-ce que tu vourdrez?"

Pre-States Trip

I was really busy leading up to our 7 week States trip, and posting pictures was not a high priority. School went on as usual until the day before departure. Here's a snippet of our work:

Science: Identifying matter attracted to magnets

Can a magnet attract through plastic?

Can a magnet attract through glass?

 Kirsty did a fantastic lesson on birds.

British birds - Color by number

Painting a Robin

We found the mass of pebbles using our balance bucket and hexagrams.

Thursday, September 26

Jolly Music lesson...

Caleb keeps beat with his new claves.

I believe they're using yelling voices here.

The little guys are captivated by their French teacher.

 Kirsty led a fantastic lesson on leaves followed by several activities and crafts.

The younger group did a matching game with leaves and Usborne identification cards.

Caleb shows off some of his collected leaves.

Noah works on his leaf rubbings.

Thursdays: French and Seeds

We met our new French teacher! This year, we have an older group and a younger group. All of the kids really seemed to enjoy their first lesson of the term!

Older Group French Lesson

Here's Caleb's work from his French lesson.

Kirsty discusses seeds with the younger group.

The older group creating their seed craft.

Sarah brought a good sampling of seeds for observation.

Seed Dispersal

Our first Thursday nature lesson with friends was last week, but I failed to take photos. I hosted this week, and we learned about seed dispersal.

'Performing Seeds' - Drop a little water on wild oat seeds, and they'll dance.

 After our lesson, we went on a walk through the nature reserve and hunted for seeds.

Beatrice and Noah are great friends.

Amelia and Caleb tromp through the reserve.

Some of the crew watched the horses.

This is a great group of kids!

We'll return to the Boltons' home next week and will have our first music and French class of the school year.

Snails

Hands-on nature lessons are so much fun!

Lizzie is recording her observations/ snail measurements.

Noah's feeling the snail's movements.

Cooper, Alice, and Florence are watching the snail move from below. Cornstarch was applied to the glass in hopes of an eating demonstration, but the snails were not interested.

Why is everyone cheering?

Because a snail has nearly reached the finish line of his ramp race. The children guessed his time and then recorded his actual time of completion.

Finally, there were snail races. The big guys always won.

La, La, La and Ladybirds

Kirsty has done an excellent job teaching music this term. So much fun!

After a lesson on ladybirds, it was time for a craft. The younger crew got started while the older finished a worksheet.

Field Trip: Oxford University Museum of Natural History

We've focused on insects and other mini-beasts during our nature time this term. Kirsty organized a field trip to the Museum of Natural History for a workshop entitled: Minibeast Madness. It was excellent! The education officer was well-informed and engaging.

There's a 15 child minimum, so other homeschoolers joined our normal crew.

Madagascar Hissing Cockroach

The girls had a go too.

After the workshop, we explored the museum.

Noah sprawled out on the floor to sketch one of the exhibits.

The honeybee hive was a big hit and was GREAT reinforcement of the previous week's lesson on honeybees. The comb is inside the glass, and the bees are able to travel through a tunnel outside of the museum to collect pollen at University Parks and other locations. We watched them do their waggle dance.

The exhibits are great and the architecture is not too shabby.