Field Trip to Ballard Nature Center

What a week this has been for us. Caleb started math fact drill. Then he worked on the -er, -ur, and -aw sound in reading. Then Simeon started learning the letter S-- the sound it makes, how to write it, and to identify words that start with the S sound. We will pull it all together with a lapbook next week. Then we will work on one letter per week. We did a craft project making napkin rings and we started reading The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling this week. Our school week ended with a trip to Ballard Nature Center where Patty never fails to present an interesting, educational, hands on experience for the children. She talked about pond ecology and showed the children tadpoles, baby blue gill and possibly bass, a crawdad, and a spider. I learned that a baby fish is called a fry. Then there was another presentation about nocturnal animals complete with a game where the children identified various nocturnal animals with flashlights. Then we went for a nature walk. Patty talked with us about how various seeds are dispersed, caught grasshoppers, saw animal tracks, turtles, squirrel nests, frogs, and so much I could not even list it all. Caleb found a crawdad on our walk. Then we saw a snapping turtle in the middle of the trail on our walk back to the center. It was a terrific, fun learning time for all.