Friday I met the home school group for the Narrows garden trip I set up a few months ago. It was such a beautiful day I was so glad, we took a tour of a Native plants garden and had a nice long picnic and get together afterwards in the park right outside. The kids learned about some of the native plants of Brooklyn and got to see some of the things that were made of some of the trees and plants when the Native Americans and the early Dutch settlers occupied this area.
There were about 12 kids there after the tour was over, they got together and played a lot of games, had races across the lawn, played freeze tag, hide and seek, and just had a great time. F had some of his friends there and met a few new ones, J met a new friend and had her bff F there too. A basically stayed by my side except when she wandered around smelling all the new flowers.
It was just a great day and exactly what home schooling is all about. The lady giving us the tour is a school teacher and she was amazed at how different home schooled kids are compared to kids who go to school. She said that schooled kids are more contained and only know whatever their grades require them to know. The kids that were there Friday ranged from ages 4 to 10 and they all seemed to know so much she said. They seemed freer and more curious and just happier. I felt so validated by her statement :) this is one of the biggest reasons why I choose to home school, the freedom we have and the chance to learn and still be kids at the same time.. :)
W ended up staying at the park for almost 4 hours, my DH left work early and picked us up. Went home and cooked, cleaned up a bit.
Last Monday was our weekly zoo class, this time it was a class on eggs. The kids touched a chicken, saw an egg, learned all about the inside of the egg and about how various things such as acid rain affects eggs of all kinds of animals. the teacher started an experiment with 2 eggs, she put one of them in a glass of water and the other in a glass with vinegar and asked the kids what they thought would happen to the eggs in 1 week.
They also got to make a craft with an egg. J and a got to participate as well since a few kids didn't show up due to the bad traffic. J was so happy she got to decorate the egg.
She just loves anything to do with animals.
We ate lunch with 2 other HS ing families and then walked over to the Lefferts house for some fun at the old homestead. The kids dug in the garden and found various insects, tried out colonial type toys (F used stilts to try and walk)
got chives to take home and grow. F and his friend Z also played chess inside the house and just had fun in the sun.
We then walked to the central library and took out a book for the book club we will be attending in Queens in the next few weeks.
It was a loonggg day :).
The next day F decided he wanted to do an experiment with some chalk and put some pieces in water and another one in vinegar.
No comments:
Post a Comment