Woodland Indians field trip

We took another Native American field trip to Minnetrista in Muncie.  They had a great program to teach the kids more about the Indians that lived in this area.  We started out learning about the 3 sisters - corn, beans and squash.  They would grow all 3 seeds together (actually 3 of each seed) in one hill.  One seed was for the people, one for the animals and one for the land.  The corn would support the beans and the squash would shade the ground to prevent weed growth.



Then we learned more about the Wigwams that they built.  We saw a shell (just sticks bound together with sinew, which is animal tendon.)  They the kids helped with binding the grasses together for the outer shell.



And here is a model of what the final house would look like:



Our guide taught the kids a Native game that the Indian children would play to learn the skills they needed for hunting.  They would roll a hoop and try to throw the stick to land inside the hoop.  The smaller children would use larger hoops that the older kids.





The kids got to make a clay pot to take home with them, learned more about spears the Indians used for fishing and other fishing equipment.  We also saw birch baskets and gourd bowls.  This is the fishing net they would've used.

Football season has begun!

Nicolas is playing football with Upward again this year.  Alex was not able to play this year because there were not enough kids sign up in his age group.  Here are some picture from the last Upward game:

Maidu Tribe

For our Native American class in co-op, we studied the Maidu tribe of California.  The used seed beaters to hit the plants to knock the seeds out and then put them in the basket to collect the seeds.  The kids made their own seed baskets.



The Maidu had Bear celebrations including a large feast.  The bear was very important to them.  The kids made their Bear shakers with a bear acrostic.



Big, Eating, Arterie, Roaster



Back, Eat, Airbud, Rat

Not sure where those words came from (for either boy), or what that has to do with bears.  :)

Whales and Dolphins

To finish up our study of whales and dolphins this week, we completed the lapbooks from homeschoolshare and added them to our zoology notebooks.  We have been reading Island of the Blue Dolphins also over the last couple of weeks and will be finishing it today.  It's been great how our read-aloud went right along with our study of whales and dolphins.  Next week we will be studying seals and sea cows.  In the book, there have been hunters coming to the island to kill seals for their pelts.  We'll be done with the book, but the boys will be able to apply the science lesson to the story (I hope.)

Whale Lapbook from Homeschoolshare

Dolphin Lapbook from Homeschoolshare

Autumnal Powwow

We attended a very cool, FREE local field trip yesterday - a Native American Powwow.  Although it seemed disorganized to start (not knowing where to park or who our tour guide was going to be), we had a great morning and afternoon. 

Our first stop was to see birds of prey.


A Red - Tailed Hawk

Hawks don't have their red tail feathers until they are over one year old.  They have very good eyesight (although this one is blind in one eye.  That's why this man keeps the birds he does - they are injured and cannot live in the wild anymore.)  You have to have a special permit to have a hawk or even a hawk feather!


American Kestrel (or what Hoosiers call Sparrow Hawks)


Great Horned Owl

He did owl calls from a Screech Owl, a Barred Owl and a Great Horned Owl.  Owls also have very good eyesight.  Their eye balls are actually as large as ours, but their bodies are much smaller.  In comparison, our eyes would need to be the size of softballs or grapefruit to have the same ratio.


Harris' Hawk

We got to watch this one fly.  Very cool!


Paragrine Falcon

We learned the difference between falcon and hawk wings are that falcon wings are more streamlined and pointed for fast diving to grab their food.  Hawk wings are wider for soaring.

Our next stop was listening to Native American flute music.



This Native American woman, Rose, showed us several Native American items and how they are used.  It was great that she encouraged the kids to touch everything, something they were discouraged from doing early in the day.





And her Teepee.



Our next stop was watching and eventually learning a Native American dance - the Powwow.  There were 3 drummers on one drum playing the dance music.  They first had their grand entrance, then 2 of the younger Native Americans taught us how to dance.  Then we got our chance to go inside the dance circle.







Our last stop of the day was a bow and arrow and spear demonstration from Longbow Woman.  She used the bow and arrow to kill a deer, bear and buffalo (targets).





So this afternoon, after school was done (the day after this field trip), the boys were outside shooting at boxes with their bow and arrows.  And tomorrow they will be going to a kids program to learn more about safety of the bow and arrow with their cousins and grandparents while we are at a couple's retreat.

Whales

For Science this year, we are doing Apologia's Zoology 2 (Swimming creatures of the fifth day).  The most current chapter was on whales.  A suggestion they had was to make an ocean box and as we study certain creatures, we'll add them to the box.  Since there are 2 different kinds of whales - baleen and toothed, each boy colored a type to add to our box.  To make it look 3-d, we have cut the fish and glued part of it above the box and part of it below.  Creatures we find on top the water will be placed on top the box and creatures we find in the bottom of the ocean will be on the bottom of the inside of the box and we'll include all creatures in between.  Here is a picture of our box after we added whales.



Nicolas did the dolphin (toothed whale) on the left and Alex did the humpback whale and baby (baleen whale) on the right.

Alex's history

For Alex's history this year, he's using the curriculum "Mystery of History".  He begins with creation and goes through biblical and world history in order.  For one of his assignments, he was to create his own animal and name it just like Adam did.



He named it Inphoizzard.

Later he had to build a ziggarat out of legos.



A ziggarat was used by the Sumarians (in present-day Iraq) to worship idols.