Science Fun

This year, we have been doing mostly NOEO Science. It lends itself well to children who want to read about science in real books and then take off on tangents to discover more about a given topic. The curriculum also includes hands on projects from the Young Scientists Club. Celsius the Science Bug is a favorite guest at our house!

For instance, on this day, the Straight-haired girl is mixing up water with baking soda in an attempt to grow crystals. It didn't work. Her best guess is that we used washing soda because we didn't have enough baking soda. My guess is that the water wasn't warm enough to allow the solution to become super saturated. We will repeat the experiment to see if we can do it correctly.

The Curly-headed girl loves to write the answers to Celsius' questions in the booklets. It makes her feel like a "real scientist." So far this year, she has made a weather station and monitored the weather, learned how it affects living organisms (including herself),discovered biomes and learned a lot about birds.

One thing I like about NOEO is the ease with which it can be tied to other subjects. For instance, while we studied birds, we were reading this book. We also looked at Audubon's prints, studied individual birds and did all kinds of bird art projects.

The girls also keep a science journal. This is full of their drawings and things they have found on the internet that pique their interest - or that I have put in there to pique their interest. They can cut, glue and color to their hearts' content that way and all of the papers stay in one place. We also take photos of experiments and projects and tape them in the journals.

Here are a few good sources for biology that I have found, in no particular order:
National Aviary
Herman the Worm
Project Feeder Watch
Journey North
Ology (American Museum of Natural History)
Monterey Bay Aquarium
Great Backyard Bird Count
All About Birds
The Weather Channel Kids
Dragonfly TV