First Field Trip of 2012

Although the weather is starting to feel like we could go swimming soon, the weather was quite cold for our first field trip in January 2012.  We went to the homeschool day at an indoor water park about an hour from home.  There were quite a few of the kids friends there... and TONS of people we didn't know.  We had a lot of fun.  Thomas did not come out with us though, so I just took a few pictures to commemorate our first time there, and our first time at an indoor water park.  The price was less than 1/2 of the normal price.  We will definitely try to go again and take Daddy with us on another homescool day.  The day was like a mini-vacation (and we don't really go on vacation, so this was a real treat).

Mahaffie Stagecoach Stop and Farmstead

We so enjoy living history that we participate in doing living history ourselves.  Not surprising that our first field trip of the new school year was to the Mahaffie Stagecoach Stop and Farmstead in Kansas.  Mahaffie had some free family nights during the summer, and we enjoyed the one on the Civil War (Civil
War reenacting is what we do).  We got some great ideas for the next Civil War Days for the kids club.  We also enjoyed our very first Stagecoach ride!

Civil War Weekend

We had a great field trip on Friday for the Student Enrichment Day of our local Historical Festival. The festival centers on the Civil War time period. I planned the field trip for our homeschool co-op. The kids all had a great time. They got to learn dances from the period.

They played period games.

They learned about instruments that would be played by young boys in the army. This was taught by one of the co-creators of the Civil War Kids Club. He is the eleven year old boy kneeling in the center of the picture. He did a wonderful job teaching and sharing with the kids. I think all the moms were impressed with him.

They learned about clocks (which was not as interesting...Ellie and some of the other kids look really bored in that picture). They did get to do an experiment, which I think they all enjoyed. I didn't get a picture of that though, because I was trying to help.

They learned about spinning and weaving and Civil War Military "stuff" (no picutures of that). The man who taught them about the Civil War Military "stuff" also had hard tack for us to try. Wyatt is now in love with hard tack. I got a recipe off the internet and another from one of our librarians today. He cannot wait for us to make hard tack. He says, "Hard tack is better than ice cream".

They also got to go on a wagon ride. Everyone got a chance to drive the horses! Ellie declined, because of her allergies. I drove the horses though. I told Thomas that I'm ready to get a team. My great-grandpa Edgar had a team of horses. Their names were Closer and Sweetheart! True story!

The wind was blowing like crazy that day, so unfortunately Ellie's allergies were also going like crazy. She is allergic to dogs and horses, both of which were present, and has some seasonal allergies. I wasn't thinking, and left her allergy pills in the car. I had to run against the wind to get them for her. Meanwhile, all the kids (except for my two...Wyatt is really careful of his and Sister's allergies) were petting the horses...then she is pushing them away when they try to hug her. Ugh! Also, almost all the families with us have dogs in their houses...so they could have been "carriers". Ellie is so sensitive that one day my sister had been at her future mother-in-laws (who keeps a large indoor dog) and then sat down with Ellie at our Mom & Dad's with her same clothes on; Ellie had a really bad allergic reaction. Since then, my sister is always careful to change their clothes after they've been there and are going to see Ellie.

My kids and I continued with the Civil War weekend fun on Saturday (while the Hubby was playing in a Tennis Tournament...which he won his division). Since they joined the Civil War Kids Club, they got to dress up and reenact at the actual festival on Saturday. They participated in three reenactments. I wish I would have posed them while they were still in costume at the festival, but I will think better next time.

They also got to do a cool thing called Pioneers in the Woods; which someone took a lot of care and time to put together! They went to different stations learning about life in pioneer days (based on the Little House on the Prairie series by Laura Ingalls Wilder). At the end they got to eat squirrel stew (which my children declined, but I thought looked yummy) cooked over an open fire, apple cider, apple crisp, and cornbread muffins.

Here is a funny one. You've probably heard the expression: "You got a bee in your bonnett?". Well, Ellie literally had a bee in her bonnett on Saturday! Then we bought her a mob cap at one of the booths for $2.50 (the guy had everything 1/2 off, because he was going out of business), and she got a bee in her mob cab!!

There was a homeschool family (who also taught dance at the Student Enrichment Day) who had a camp site where they were making biscuits and apple butter on an open fire. I don't know if I've ever had biscuits made with lard (I always make them with butter or shortening), but they were delicious. The apple butter was really good, too. The kids liked them, too. Guess I need to learn to cook on an open fire.

Everyone there volunteered to do what they were doing. It was really awesome. After the big battle reenactment, I took my kids home to change clothes. Then we came back for the dance.

Oh, my goodness, the dance was so much fun!!! The homeschool mom, who taught at the Student Enrichment Day, taught this huge group of people all these folk dances like Red River Valley, the Virginia Reel, and many more that I don't remember the name of. The kids joined in, people got mixed up, we ate a lot of barn dust, but everyone was laughing, smiling, and having a great time.

I knew some of the moves like do-si-do, swing your partner, alemand left & right, chain, and star from learning square dancing, and couple of folk dances, in school. My parents and I took square dancing, and line dancing, lessons my Senior year of high school. I also remembered that I took square dancing for one of my PE credits in college. I don't remember the last time I had so much fun and got exercise at the same time! My legs were sore the next day, but it was worth it!

Oh, no! I just realized that the date on my camera is showing European style (day, month, year) instead of American style (month, day, year). I need to fix that, or I will be really confused on the date of my pictures!

First Field Trip of the Year!

Yesterday we went on our first field trip of the new school year. We started doing the Kansas City Passport to Adventure last year. The Passport is a booklet that you pick up at one of the partipating locations and get stamped. Each location has a question to answer. After the child answers the question, they get a small prize, like sticker, a pin, a ruler, etc. The locations are all Museums, Living History Locales, or Nature Conservatories; which means they are all educational. If the child gets stamps at 15 of the 22 locations before the end of October, they send in their passport for a prize package. We tried to do the passport last year, but didn't complete the required stops to get the kids their prize package in time.

This year, we got in on the first day of the Passport to Adventure at our last Co-op field trip to Missouri Town. The summer did not go as planned, so until yesterday, the kids still just had one stamp on their passports. My friend, Colleen, and her kids are working on their passports, too. She suggested we go to two places yesterday. We agreed, so we all packed pinics and set out for Burr Oaks Woods Conservation Nature Center and Kemper Outdoor Education Center.

I think my kids were a little disappointed that the Conservation Center no longer had the giant log inside to play puppets, but that did have a cool giant frog that we took pictures on. We walked the Tree Trail at Burr Oaks, along with the Guide and Activity Sheet from the mailbox at the beginning of the trail. I think everyone had a great time; although we were all sticky and sweaty by the time we finished the trail. The worst part was the bugs that invaded our picnic: giant ants and daddy-long-legs spiders.

At Kemper Outdoor Center, the butterfly garden was gorgeous. There were quite a few interesting things to see inside, but the kids all like the black cat that was running around. The most interesting thing for me was the frogs and the GIANT tadpoles. These tadpoles "heads" were at least as big as a child's fist!! I'd never seen tadpoles that weren't smaller than my own fingers (at least not that I remember!). The tadpoles were inside of a beautiful goldfish pond.

I should've had Ellie take the waterbottle out of her scooter pocket. I do not look like myself. Those are my old glasses, but I wear them often with the kids. They are very sturdy.

Two field trips in one day, and more school when we got home (as requested, or rather begged, by the children) is my idea of a pretty good day of school!

Living History

Today was our last official field trip of the year for Co-op. We had a great turn out. Everyone who signed up was able to attend. We had six families.
This was the group (minus me).





We are so lucky to live near Kansas City. We went to Missouri Town 1855, which is a living history site in Jackson County. We had the place nearly to ourselves on a beautiful day! The sun was shining, the temperature was nearly 60 degrees, with a brisk breeze.

The kids petted oxen and horses, learned about life in 1855, loved visiting the blacksmith, all took a turn feeding chickens, and sawing firewood! They answered and asked lots of questions. They also all began their Kansas City Passport to Adventure for 2009.

My hubby was able to join us for this field trip and we got some priceless pictures. Ellie and I bought bonnets. We wanted them last year when we went, but didn't get them. I totally love wearing the bonnet! The bonnet is better than sunglasses, and it keeps your ears warm from the cold breeze. Plus, I enjoy the Caroline Ingalls look (too bad I wasn't wearing a dress). :)

On the way home, the kids were going on about how they'd like to live Pioneer style. They want to be self sufficient: dig a well, have our own animals, grow our own food, no electricity, etc... even sawing our firewood! The only idea they didn't like was giving up some of their toys. We'll see how that goes. The husband and I have talked about going Amish... (not actually becoming Amish, but living Amish-style: horse and buggy, farming, no modern amenities).

Learning Should Be Fun!

I am the Field Trip Chair for our Co-op. I have been wanting to take the kids to a CYT (Christian Youth Theater) production for at least a couple of years now. When I saw that our local CYT was putting on School House Rock!, I knew we had to arrange a field trip.

As a kid, School House Rock was one of my favorite cartoons on Saturday mornings. I love music. I love music and learning put together. How can you go wrong with a combination like that? Music makes learning fun and makes facts easier to remember. I don't think I ever wouldn't passed the states test if we hadn't learned Fifty Nifty United States for the Spring Pageant at school.

I really enjoyed the "Live! Junior" version of School House Rock!. The play starts as a new teacher is waking up early to prepare for his first day of teaching. He turns on the TV and there is School House Rock...which comes to life in his Rec' Room. About half way through the play he says how great the songs are and how they are reminding him: of what you don't learn in school about teaching: "That learning should be fun!"

That's another reason why I was first interested in homeschooling. I believe that learning should be fun. Schooling should instill a love of learning and a thirst for knowledge in a child. I had many wonderful teachers in my school time, but I also had some who were not so wonderful. A teacher can excite a student about learning, or make learning a chore, or even a bore. I know that my brother, sister, and husband were bored many times in school. They were not challenged to their full capabilities. I did not want that for my children.

I love that homeschooling allows them to learn at their own pace. My kindergarten son is doing first grade math. I know he would be bored in regular school. He would probably finish his work early, and then get into trouble because he was bored. I know that is just speculation, my imagination, but that's the other thing about homeschooling: I know my son better than anyone, but God. So, I'm pretty sure I'm imagining fairly accurately.

My daughter is slower with math, more like her mother. I just didn't feel comfortable with math. I made good grades, but I honestly didn't "get" the ease of math until I started teaching her. Ironically, she doesn't "get" math, unless her Daddy is teaching her. We can say almost the exact same thing to her, but when he says it, it makes sense to her. That's not to say I didn't "get" formulas, etc...just use the formula and it works. Other classmates wanted to know "Why?". That never bothered me. I don't think I was ever taught math quite the right way for my learning style.

Another great thing about homeschooling is that I can use my children's learning styles to make learning easier and more fun! I can tailor their lessons to each of them. Find me another school that has such a small student to teacher ratio!

I am not a Science buff, but my kids LOVE Science. I try to follow their lead where that is concerned. For Kindergarten, Ellie was really into Outer Space and the Planets. So, although Science is usually not much of a subject, if any, in Kindergarten, we studied Astronomy! I can finally name all the planets in order! Both Ellie and Wyatt can point out the planets and name them faster than I can. Two years later, Ellie still gets SUPER excited when there is a NASA homeschooling video conference at the library! Wyatt will say Science is one of his favorite subjects, too, but Ellie does get more excited about Science.

I love when the kids say "You are the most fun Mom!"