So, I've been doing fairly bitsy peicey science with Frodo this year... we had Dr. Joe's awesome classes in term 1 (and will have them again starting next week, for 5 weeks!) and we did a bit of a mini astronomy unit leading up to the Transit of Venus and the eclipse just before it.  But I was still on the fence about an actual *program* for us to use between all that other 'real life' science. I had found one I liked, only to find out through research that the authors' intent was to plant seeds about Intelligent Design in the minds of the youngsters using it.  I was not impressed.  It's not my business what other home schooling parents teach their kids (although being perfectly honest, I don't think teaching ID or creationism sets them up particularly well for future studies or careers that are influenced by science) but I think selling something that is glossed over to make it *look* like actual secular science, when it is in fact not, is just dirty pool.   So... I scrapped that idea and commenced to testing other programs!
 Both cells have a nice strawberry for the nucleus :)   The rectangular one is a plant cell, with it's cell wall keeping it nice and blocky...and it's many chloroplasts (aka melon balls of honeydew lol) which are what make the plant green.  The animal cell, which is all blobby & round, only gets a nucleus (although we did discuss a bit about some of the other parts as well)  and is yummy mango jelly :)  (which is jello for American readers!)

Here's an up close.

 The other experiment involved looking up close at a cell we're all pretty familiar with, especially at breakfast time,  the good old chicken egg!   We cracked one into a bowl and used a hand magnifying glass to check out the blastodisc (basically the nucleus of a chicken egg) and than discussed which parts are actually cell parts, and which parts are there to protect the cell itself.

I'm also finding the activity based nature of it really working much better for him with his ADHD issues as well... almost no time in his seat listening to me prattle on, just getting straight to it!  We do MOST of it at the kitchen bench, so he can stand, lean, perch on one foot or whatever he needs to do.

Completing lab sheets!

A sample of the really good lab sheets that come with the program. Frodo announced that it looked more like an avocado than an egg after he coloured it... methinks lunch was looming in his mind?? lol

After this, it's on to the human body systems... awesome.. I get to pull out my many excellent x-rays for this heh heh.

In other news, we've been booking it to get through the first 'unit' of history odyssey so that next week we can skip ahead and do the (rather huge) unit on the ancient Greeks... to coincide with the Olympics!   And Frodo has learned how to find the area of a triangle in math :P  Funny thing, the boy really enjoys math that involves formulae as opposed to computations!    We also did a spot of gardening and planted up some strawberries, capsicum and some herbs to revitalize the potted veggie 'patch' a bit :)

Grow my little pretties, grow!  (we won't discuss the horrid state of the 'garden' on the other side of that fence.. it's at a 50degree angle and impossible to maintain *sigh*  not that the real estate agents care!)

 Frodo & I had to do a bit of shopping on Thursday, so we popped out for a cuppa (and hot chocolate) and he asked if he could go browsing at EB.  So, off down the hall he went feeling pretty independent hehehe...It's not that far, and I can see the entrance, so I didn't have a nutty about it lol.

 We also finished up our unit of History Odyssey on the Ancient Egyptians.  Frodo has enjoyed them, as he really does think all things Egypt are pretty cool, but I think it'll be nice to move on to something else now!  We made a little file folder game of Senet, which ancient Egyptians used to play.  Each person has 5 pieces and you throw the sticks and move depending on how many marked sides are up.  We added a bit of fun by using marshmallows lol (we didn't have black & white beans as suggested).... and when you hopped off the board, you got to eat your piece hehehe.  Whoever won, got to eat ALL the remaining pieces. We elected to put them in a cup of hot chocolate though.


Off to enjoy the crisp winter afternoon & pick the schoolies up!

This week we are talking about our favourite subject to teach our kids, great topic :D  

I'd have to say that hands down, my favourite 'subject' to teach the boys is science.  The world and how things in it work and grow are totally fascinating to me.  The boys have endless excitement to learn about these things.  Now they love learning in general, but math & grammar just can't muster the excitement & passion in small boys that the inner workings of the natural world can!   Just tonight we were outside on the veranda, since it was a warmish evening (but cool enough for no bugs to pester us!), and Merry was all excited because he found a puff ball.  You know... those little round fungus thingies that release spores when you squish them.  That was investigated for ages. 

Then Frodo pointed out Venus, shining brightly in  the mostly darkened sky...and went on to look for Mars & Jupiter as well (not sure if we got those right.. must have a peek at google sky and see!)  

Then there was possum spotting (on the neighbors roof, thankfully, not ours lol... they're noisy little buggers!) and checking out the moth that was hanging out on the brick wall near the light.   All this scientific exploration, and we have a rather sterile and boring little tiny suburban backyard.

One of the reasons that science is my favourite, is that the internet makes SO much more available than ever before.  We don't have a telescope, but we can hop on google sky and it's almost like we do!  No microscope either (yet!), but there are up close images of slides of just about ANYTHING you can imagine online.   Then there are the local interactive things like the planetarium and science centre and nature reserves.  Endless possibilities.  

The looks of awe on their faces when we do an activity or experiment and they see the end results is just totally worth all the work.