Wii's and Reflection

I know Hunter hasn't had much of a spotlight on here lately, but he said something the other day that made me laugh.

We were watching Netflix with the Wii and he suddenly commented,

"Mom, wouldn't it be cool if the Wii remote could reflect off of me and then bounce back to the sensor?"

Haha, I need to write down this kid's random antics more often. :)

"The LORD make his face shine upon thee, and be gracious unto thee:" 

Numbers 6:25

Hunter is 6 years, 3 months old

Learning the Order of the Scientific Method

Putting in order the steps of the scientific method

One of the things we have been learning about in our biology lessons is the definition of hypothesis, theory, and scientific law.

With a hypothesis being an educated guess, a theory being a hypothesis that has been tested with a significant amount of data, and a scientific law being a theory that is consistent with generations of data. On a side note, we have also discussed how even if something is a "scientific law", that does not necessarily mean we have "proved" it. Many, many "scientific laws" of the past have been overturned by new data, and many more of today will be found false in the future. Simply put, science has it's limits, and we can never truly say that science has "proved" a fact. Science is wonderful, but isn't the "god" that humanistic cultures make it out to be.

Nonetheless, this lead us to explore the steps that one takes to test a hypothesis ("like a real scientist") and how a hypothesis, through many generations of testing and collecting data, can turn into a scientific law.

I made a puzzle of the six steps of the scientific method and, as usual, it was presented with great fanfare and anticipation of the "secret steps that real scientists use" and, quite frankly, he loved it.

We discussed each step and what it meant, this time using the example of something very simple - wondering whether or not blocks would float in water. We went through each step using block floating as an example of what we wanted to find out. (Hunter's hypothesis is that it depends on what kind of block it is)

Then we practiced mixing up all the pieces and putting them back in order. We also "chanted" to steps, hoping to aid in auditory memory - "The Scientific Method: purpose, research, hypothesis, experiment, analysis, conclusion!"

Not too original I know, but it'll hopefully get the job done.

Here is a printable of the puzzle we used, this time with a "board" to match the tiles to the correct number. Enjoy!
Scientific Method Puzzle

"That through them I may prove Israel, whether they will keep the way of the LORD to walk therein, as their fathers did keep it, or not." 

Judges 2:22

This post is linked to Science Sunday at Adventures in Mommydom

Hunter is 5 years, 10 months old

Astronomy, Brain Tricks, and Documenting Procedures

Measuring the "size" of the moon in relation to a small paper circle

Remember earlier this year when we had a fun encounter finding out why the moon looked huge, orange, and bright on a particular night? (gotta love Google)

Well earlier this week was another one of those nights and, believe it or not, (ok, so it's not so hard to believe) as I was driving home from a training and saw this awesome-looking moon, I could not wait to get home and show Hunter. I was literally itching in my seat, ecstatic about showing him.

By the time I did get home, the moon wasn't quite as orange but still nonetheless bright and "big" looking, so we ran outside with some school supplies and had a little fun learning about size constancy.

As mentioned in my previous post, the moon doesn't actually "look" bigger or is bigger at certain times than at others, but rather our brain is just playing tricks on us - it's an optical illusion.

We drew a very small circle with a compass, cut it out, and held it in front of us until it was the "same size" as the moon (at least to our eyes, of course).

Taking the same circle cut-out, we laid down on our backs and held the circle up towards the sky. When that same-sized moon is up so far in the sky, we said, it looks further away, and bigger. But when it is down "next to" the trees and houses, it appears bigger. 
 
Our brain is playing a trick on us, telling us that the moon "should" be bigger, since it appears to be as big as a house when it is near the horizon, but when we look at it up there, it looks like a far-away dot. It is really the same size no matter what.

I think this actually started to hit home for the kid because, when we first went out there, he, in all his excitement, started running towards the moon, saying that the moon was "closer" and that is why it is bigger, of course!

The idea that it was still very far away and that his brain was just playing tricks on him did seem to get him excited. This is also something we have discussed a lot in our drawing program: to really look at what you see, not what you "think" you see. It was fun to relate it and expand on it in other areas, such as this science phenomena.

This was followed by a stop in his new science journal to document the procedure (write about what we did and what we learned) and draw a picture. Using the same cut-out "moons", actually.

And since he loves to draw, this little journal will serve as a nice "memory tickler" when we come back to this page.

If I can just convince him not to rip out the drawing and hang it up in his room.

"In his days shall the righteous flourish; and abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth." 

Psalm 72:7

Hunter is 5 years, 5 months old

Welcome to Our School Rooms, Part 1 (Dining Room)

Hunter practicing penmanship at the table

Doing calendar and weather time in a science corner

A poster of the Mohs scale [rock hardness] from an insert in Simon
Basher's Rocks and Minerals: A Gem of a Book

Window art: clear transparencies of the water cycle, cloud types, and
a poster strip of different kinds of weather

Window clings of the planets

Detail of posters near little table

http://heartofthematteronline.com/nbtsbh-2010-week-2">

Meteor Stencils?

The other day while we were decorating a recycled frozen juice container to make Hunter's new pencil can, Hunter was going through his pack of stencils to decide which ones would make the cut and said,

"I want to use the crab, the dinosaur, and the meteor."

Don't your stencil kits have meteors in them?

"Is not God in the height of heaven? and behold the height of the stars, how high they are!" 

Job 22:12

Hunter is 5 years, 4 months old

Speed of Sound... Or Faster

You know what is a fun science phenomena we get to experience every day here on a military installation?

Sound [obviously] and its speed.

Jets fill the airspace in our neighborhood. Occasionally it will be loud enough to rattle the windows. Or make it so you have to pause while ordering from the drive thru at McDonalds. Or produce crying babies and flustered employees from hitting a sonic boom over the Exchange.

But one of the coolest things is how, as we watch a jet (or six) gliding across the horizon in the California sky, the sound of the jet is always a good, well, not sure of the exact length, but always a good distance behind the jet. You hear the jet in one place, but see it in another.

This has resulted in many impromptu discussions on the speed of sound (and light, for that matter, because they somehow tend to go together). 

Mom is not usually all that fancy in planning crafty science experiments but, in short, we've just observed this frequent phenomena, talked about how sound is a wave and has a speed, talked about how sound is actually just vibration (using our own mouths making an "ahhh" note to illustrate) and how our brain interprets the different vibrations and recognizes them as different sounds.

We've also used the whole talking-through-a-paper-towel-tube thing to learn about sound's behavior more.

But who needs paper towel tubes when you've got F/A-18's?

"And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice."  

Exodus 19:19

Hunter is 5 years, 4 months old

Passing Time with Dinosaurs

Hunter learning about dinosaurs with his World Wizzard while I cut his hair.

Because for some reason in this house hair cuts and car trips tend to big on bits of intelligence and other such encyclopedic knowledge pursuits.

In a Doman house, things just work out that way I guess. :)

"Cut off thine hair, O Jerusalem, and cast it away..." 

Jeremiah 7:29

Hunter is 5 years, 4 months old

Walking through the Science Encyclopedias

Hunter really loves to draw.

And in the past few months, he has become quite keen on writing, too.

So we have decided to combine this along with his interest in science to create a sort of copy work / narrating activity that also involves illustration.

It started out as just reading together for leisure (from some science encyclopedias we got for $1 at a yard sale). But then I decided to go ahead and have him "narrate" what we just read (tell me what we just learned about, in his own words) and he started wanting to draw about it, too.

Which resulted in this...

The aardvark is an african mammal. It digs in dirt and scoops up ants and termit[es] with its tongue. Its scientific name is Orycteropus afer.

Yes, I realize that he misspelled termites and that, for some reason, he put "name is" after its name. But we'll work on that.

The "copy work" aspect is that I write down what he tells me, and then he in turn copies it in onto his story paper (which has unfortunately large lines, making for not too much space to write).

This has been great to work on his drawing (we have been having lessons on drawing what you see and really paying attention to the way the lines go), his comprehension and speaking skills (hence the narration part), and the copy work is to work on his spelling, punctuation, word spacing, and ideally handwriting (although he didn't exactly do his "best" handwriting here, but not too bad).

This is an activity that, if I would have assigned it to him a year and a half ago, he would have hated. But now he actually found it quite enjoyable, and is looking forward to illustrating (and narrating) the encyclopedia entries for abacus and abrasion and absolute zero (good luck on that one, right?).

"...Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua..." 

Exodus 17:14

Hunter is 5 years, 4 months old

Periodic Table in Song, part one

We tend to make up a lot of songs to the tune of "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star".

I know. It's not all that original. But it's the memory part that counts, right?

This particular little jingle (starring the names and numbers of the periodic table of the elements) is one we made up a learned a long time ago (I'm guessing a year and a half or more) but have recently been revisiting.

We're singing along to the next ten elements now (sodium through calcium) and hoping to work our way through all 114 or so, ten at a time.

This has recently provoked an interest in what elements are and a fascination of the idea that "everything in the world is made out of these element" and, also, having the names come up other random places (such as oxygen and sodium) which provoke more learning.

It is nice how that works, isn't it? You learn something "by rote" but then, of course, you have that information in your brain. Which tends to pop up everywhere, like finding Van Gogh in bathroom art or seeing Texas in clouds. Or realizing that neon is the element that makes up those neat lights and helium is what makes those balloons float.

Connections. It's all about making connections. But you have to have the facts there in order to connect them.

And singing those facts? Well, that just makes it all the more fun. And I think that, perhaps, kindergartners really don't have a preference for one, two, buckle my shoe over hydrogen, helium, lithium.


Just sayin.

"...in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat..." 

2 Peter 3:10

Hunter, in video, is 5 years, 3 months old 

Playing with the Properties of Light

"Behold, he spreadeth his light upon it, and covereth the bottom of the sea." 

Job 36:30

Hunter is 5 years, 3 months old

Pet Stores and Encyclopedic Knowledge

Window shopping education. Who knew?

We have recently discovered the educational (and entertaining) joys of window shopping at Petsmart, a fun little venture that came about by us randomly wandering through the strip mall stores in town for lack of anything better to do and essentially, because it was fun.

We have been on little excursions to pet stores before. The last time I wrote about one was when we went to this little downtown shop, over two years ago. But although our previous pet-trecks have been great fun and also quite educational, our more recent visits to Petsmart have been all the more enlightening because of one simple thing: labeling.

See, Glenn Doman believed that, if at all possible, you should give your child the most exact, precise, and clear information you can. That means telling your child that "There is a pretty robin!" not just a "bird" (or even worse, "birdy" or "tweet tweet").

Even better than telling your your child there is a pretty robin would be to tell your child that "There is a pretty bird called an American Robin [its actual name] and the pretty bird's scientific name is Turdus migratorius!" If you have that information, of course.

They both take the exact same amount of time and effort. But as you can quite obviously see, they both don't have the exact same amount of impact or effect by far.

And while browsing through the awesome variety of reptiles, small mammals, arachnids and birds in the super store, we were delightfully enlightened by such precise, clear, discreet (and interesting) names as the veiled chameleon, the red-eared slider turtle, the rose-haired tarantula, the ball python, the bearded dragon lizard, the zebra finch, and the fancy green-cheeked conure, just to name a few.

What was equally delightful was that they not only had such wonderfully specific names below each creature's cage but also little bits and pieces such as its scientific name, its habitat, lifespan, species' characteristics and fun facts.

What a splendid (and free) way to not only enjoy the turtle munching lettuce or the mice flipping each other on the exercise wheel or the parrots having conversations but also to learn so much right then and there without any effort or researching on the parent's part.

All at just a stop at the mall.

"And out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field, and every fowl of the air; and brought them unto Adam to see what he would call them: and whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof." 

Genesis 2:19

Hunter is 5 years, 3 months old

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"Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not."

Jeremiah 33:3

Hunter is 5 years, 2 months old

Traveling with Dinosaurs through the Land of Nod

We're being chased by Velociraptors near the Pishon river, being hired by Jubal's family in the land of Cush, swimming frantically away from a great Plesiosaurus, and finding gold in the land of Havilah.

And learning about ancient biblical history hasn't ever been more fun, I think.

It's a shame this closet treasure is long out of publication (originally published in 1988) but we played The Great Dinosaur Adventure: an educational game of creation and bible knowledge for the first time all the way through last night and had an awesome time.

The history of the people, places, and events of the first ten chapters of Genesis are woven throughout this fun and educational board game, focusing specifically around the time before and directly after the flood.

Traveling around the board with your dinosaur pawn, you make your way through the lands of Nod, Havilah, Assyria and Cush where the four rivers of Eden flow. The board is filled with pictures of dinosaurs, peoples of the Bible, and other geographically and historically interesting tidbits of this time period of the first two thousand years of human history. Land on an event card and you might get sent on a gem mining hunt in Havilah, running from twelve-inch long dragon flies, or farming with Cain's great grandsons in Assyria.

You also might happen to land on take a card in which you get to draw from a thick stack of dinosaur-themed cards and get a chance at answering some multiple-choice or true or false questions. These range from the scientific method to fossils to the ice age to giant kangaroos and sea monsters, with dozens of topics being covered including geology and archeology, changes in human life span, climate, and animal behavior, loads of information about dinosaurs and other extinct animals, the men of this time period in the Bible, and the biblical account of creation.


He loves the dinosaur theme, and I love having a resource for teaching him about dinosaurs that isn't drenched in evolutionary propaganda. Funny how there is an amazing amount of evidence that dinosaurs and humans indeed existed together, yet it doesn't "fit" with the evolutionist's theory so it is ignored. One simple little site I have enjoyed on this topic is Forbidden History: Dinosaurs and the Bible.

We have been casually studying ancient history over the past year of so, so this will be a splendid and invaluable addition to our learning adventures. So little is known and understood by most Christians about the biblical history pre-Egypt, and even I myself have learned so much in the very recent past. I am deeply excited to be sharing these things with my son and giving him an early understanding of the true account of world history.

And what better or more interesting way to do it than a game, no?

"Behold now behemoth, which I made with thee; he eateth grass as an ox. Lo now, his strength is in his loins, and his force is in the navel of his belly. He moveth his tail like a cedar: the sinews of his stones are wrapped together." 

Job 40:15-17

Hunter is 5 years, 1 month old

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"Know therefore this day, and consider it in thine heart, that the LORD he is God in heaven above, and upon the earth beneath: there is none else."

Isaiah 34:16

Hunter is 5 years, 0 months old

How to Get a Five-Year-Old to Sit Intently Still for Five Minutes

I got a rare comment from Hunter today while we were going on our run.

We had just stopped to watch an American Robin pull a worm out of the ground and a swarm of mosquitoes that were mating. A neat adventure that incurred about thirty seconds each of our observation and conversation before moving on.

Then we walked up to this small tree and I pointed out another bird hopping around in the branches, and we noticed that he had a small twig in his mouth.

"Look at that twig in his mouth, Hunter. I'll bet he's making a nest for his babies."

I tried to continue on in my usual discussion of the phenomena that lay before us but got quickly cut off.

"Shh, you gotta be real quiet Mom" he cautiously whispered.

"Ok" I said carefully, then proceeded to whisper on about the bird.

"Don't talk Mom," he said in the most polite way he could muster.

I could tell this was serious.

He then proceeded to watch the bird hopping around in the tree, picking at various twigs (in an attempt to find the perfect one I'm sure), tilting its head, and doing whatever else birds tend to do in trees, perfectly still for nearly five minutes. He even got a bit flustered when I took a picture, apparently thinking I would disturb the bird.

When he was done, he walked back to the sidewalk, shouted "Let's go! I'll bet I can beat you to the sign!" and started sprinting down the path, back to his normal self. It's funny to see the things that can turn this rambunctious, active little boy into the most concentrated, serious bird-watcher.

For five minutes at least.

"Then are they glad because they be quiet; so he bringeth them unto their desired haven."

Psalm 107:30

Hunter is 5 years, 0 months old

Dendrology

den·drol·o·gy

[den-drol-uh-jee]

–noun

1. the branch of botany dealing with trees and shrubs.

2. the scientific study of trees and other woody plants.

A couple of weeks ago we were thrilled to notice beautiful trees all over the base flowering in the spring sun. This has led us to talking about how the flowers on trees will turn into some kind of fruit, whether it be berries, oranges, or whatever. Now whenever Hunter sees a tree with flowers on it he excitedly yells, "Mom, those are going to turn into fruit!"

I used to think that the clean-cut, carefully-manicured, overly-pesticided environment of the base was going to be void of many nature experiences. But things continue to pop up from mushroom discoveries to insects to leaves to birds. It's not exactly a nature preserve but there is still much to be learned and explored.

Dendrology, aka studying trees, is one thing I am very excited about. There are so many interesting trees around here and such a great variety, I can't wait to put them in our tree book and start learning the names of some of them. Even just on the base, there is this peculiar and interesting mix of palms, pines, and deciduous trees in all these crazy shapes and sizes. Today we found a palm tree that looked like a ten-foot pineapple and one with cactus-like spikes on the leaves.

I want to make tree-study a year-long biology adventure (i.e. pictures of the tree in spring, summer, fall, and winter) but with my eminent disorganization and sidetrackedness at times, this goal never seems to be realized (this has been something I have wanted to do since Hunter was two and a half).

But maybe with our upcoming focus on biology this year for kindergarten, my motivation will be a little higher and my persistence more consistent. Maybe.

But anyway, even if I don't manage to get a perfect picture with every desired tree at every season, we are still going to be setting out and exploring trees, doing bark-rubbings, collecting leaves, flowers, and twigs for our nearly-empty book, and maybe learning a thing or two about each. I love free resources and I love the internet, so for those of you who feel the same, here are some of the super dendrology resources we will be using:

• Enature.com has a wonderful online field guide of over 900 trees. You can browse by category (like Palms or Needle-leaf Conifers) and then narrow your search by biological families or by location (choose from fourteen different North American regions). It is very cool.
• Arborday.org has a great Tree Identification Glossary. I really like this one and need to make up some Doman-style word cards with these.

For a physical copy you can carry around with you (you know, like when you're actually out there looking at the trees), we use the DK Smithsonian Trees Handbook. It's really nice and has tons of pictures, not only for learning about the species of trees themselves but for many dendrology topics in general, like identifying leaves and types of bark. It's very cool in my opinion.

Happy learning!

"As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth."

Psalm 103:15

Hunter is 5 years, 0 months old

Experimenting with Force, Pressure, and the Volume of Air

"One is so near to another, that no air can come between them."

Job 41:16

Hunter is 4 years, 11 months old

Lasers and Garages

Hunter discovered the secrets of the garage door today.

It came about in quite a humorous way, actually. Jokingly, while Hunter was about to walk into the garage, Brandon decided to close the door on him. Which of course startled Hunter and made it so that he didn't finish his quest to get inside. I showed him that, the door was not going to shut on him anyway though, because of the laser beam that would set it off if it was disrupted.

"Try it" I said.

This lead to repeated bouts of Hunter running in and out of the garage, setting off the safety switch and preventing the door from closing. And him laughing mightily in excitment and triumph. And him carefully examining the little boxes where the invisible light beams come out. And a little bit of talk about different kinds of light waves and how they behave.

Now onto solving his persistent questioning of how it is that the door opens with the push of a button half a block down the road.

The neighbors must think we're crazy.

"Haste thee, escape thither; for I cannot do anything till thou be come thither..."

Genesis 19:22

Hunter is 4 years, 11 months old

Mommy, Why is the Moon Orange?

"Why is the moon orange, Mommy?"

This question came up the other day while we were driving (at night) and we saw the coolest, hugest, bright orange moon at the end of the road. It was so amazing!

We found out later that the moon gets orange for the same reason that the sun (and sky) gets orange when it's setting - because of refraction. When the moon (or sun) is so close to the horizon, the light has to travel through a lot more of the atmosphere before it gets to us, and in the process a lot of the light rays get bounced around, or refracted. Hence, mostly only the longest rays make it to our eyes (reds, oranges, etc.).

It helped a lot that he has a general understanding of the concepts of light and color from reading The Magic School Bus Makes a Rainbow (many, many times). This was his favorite book for a while, which [confession] frustrated me at the time because it was kind of long (and he would ask to read it multiple times a day), but I suppose the time investment was a good thing!

And about the huge-looking thing? Well, I had no idea why the moon (and sun) looked so much bigger at some times than at others, and this particular incident inclined me to find out. My best guess was some sort of magnification effect, but I guess that it's all just an optical illusion! I was totally shocked to find this out but I guess our brain can play some pretty amazing tricks on us. I read this article at HowStuffWorks, which had some ideas for experimenting more with the phenomena of optical illusions (called size constancy in reference to the "moon illusion").

I didn't really explain this part to Hunter yet. But I suppose that, next time it comes up, I'll have some sort of feasible explanation for him.

"If I beheld the sun when it shined, or the moon walking in brightness..."

Job 31:26

Hunter is 4 years, 11 months old

Hunter is Going to Mars!

Ok, so he's not really going to Mars (anytime soon at least). But his name is!

The other day we were on NASA's Play and Learn section and found this neat little thing they're doing,
Send Your Name to Mars. You can put your name and information in and it will be included in a microchip that is going to Mars in 2011 on the Mars Science Laboratory rover.

Cool little idea to get kids interested, isn't it?

"...to the sun, and to the moon, and to the planets, and to all the host of heaven." 

2 Kings 23:5

Hunter is 4 years, 10 months old