How we homeschooled today #11
Bluebells, birds, and more Greek myths
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A different day because we spent nearly 6 hours at the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew.
As I wrote about in my post How We Visit Museums, I went with very specific aims: learn about tree identification using leaf shapes, and begin completing a list of a plant from every continent.
We took printouts from The Woodland Trust, our pocket tree ID book, and a typed list of continents and leaf shapes so the children could record their findings.
But of course we were surrounded by nature all day long so we learnt an awful lot more:
Identified birds from their songs using the Merlin app (if you don’t have it, get it now! It’s free and by far the best app on my phone.)
Spotted pollen everywhere from oak trees to inside tiny bluebell flowers
My daughter made an optimistic attempt at cross-pollinating two different rhododendrons using her fingertips.
We saw at least half a dozen different types of fungus on the log trail.
We explored Kew Palace, home of George III and Queen Charlotte (and some of their fifteen children).
Special mention to my husband The Common Reader who found the energy to tell the children a story off the top of his head which kept them quiet all the way home.
At home I drew a simple diagram on the blackboard showing and labelling a stamen, to capitalise on all our pollen spotting.
Listened to another episode of Greeking Out to get through a potentially fractious teatime.
The children then somehow had the energy to run around the garden with a friend.
Bedtime stories: A story from an old Pokémon magazine, and Supertato (really not my cup of tea, but they were at least very short which was just what we all needed tonight.)
Reading in bed: Ramona the Pest, and more old Pokémon magazines
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