homeschool

Field Work Friday – Playing the Guitar

July 18, 2014 by Amy

Musical instruments are exciting. Hard to play, perhaps not exciting to practice, but always exciting to be able to hang out, make music, and bring people together.

Pastor Jason, a Duke seminary student interning at Warren’s Grove UMC this summer, is a great guitarist. He’s also wonderful with children, and so he agreed to give us a group guitar lesson.

He began by teaching us about different types of guitars – classical, electric, and acoustic.

Then he taught us about the parts of the guitar, how to place our fingers to make chords, and then he gave each child a chance to strum his guitar.

Pastor Jason also knows how to play the drums, and he brought along an African drum. He taught the kids how to make different sounds with it by tapping it with different parts of their hands.

Each kid got a chance to try that out, too ….

and they really liked it!

Then Pastor Jason taught us how to make patterns and rhythms by tapping on our legs and imitating his drums.

He closed by playing Down in My Heart and letting us all sing along. The kids loved it, and it was a great way to hear how the guitar could pull our voices and chords together.

Thanks, Pastor Jason, for sharing your time and talents with us!

Do you play an instrument? How did you learn?

Field Work Friday – The Fire Station

July 18, 2014 by Amy

The fire station has been, in my opinion, one of our most informative visits so far. Maybe that’s because one of their main goals is to educate so that they aren’t needed – but at any rate, the firefighters who visited with us were wonderful.

The fire fighters took us back to their training room first and we watched a short cartoon about how quickly a fire can engulf a house and how make an emergency plan – planning an escape route, meeting place, and knowing the exits from each room of the house.

Then they modeled their gear and let us hear how the air tanks sound. They gave each child a backpack full of coloring books, stickers, informational pamphlets, keychains, cups, etc. My little firefighter wears his backpack – ahem, his air tank – around the house now when he’s fighting a fire!

After that we went out to the bay and got to climb on some trucks. The firefighters answered questions about various parts and purposes and let the kids really check it all out.

Some even posed for pictures.

We decided that the giant bumpers made great places to pose for pictures. What cute firefighters!

This small vehicle is ridden by the fire chief in parades. This was by far the kids’ favorite – it was more their size!

My little firefighter became so into fire safety during our study of it this week that we ended up having a whole family discussion about it after visiting the fire station. We designated a neighbor’s porch as our emergency meeting place and even practiced climbing out of a window (to alleviate our daughter’s fears of how it would work). Our smoke detectors have new batteries and we still pray that God will guard us from a fire, but should it happen, my short fire crew of fire fighters knows what to do.

If you’ve never visited your local fire station, give them a call. Who knows – you might learn something, too!

Field Work Friday – Ethiopia

July 18, 2014 by Amy

This week we had a very special guest – a local man who has made several mission trips to Ethiopia – and is planning his next one.

Jason began by telling us a bit about himself and how God has led him to Ethiopia. From there we learned about its location and climate.

Ethiopia is a land-locked country west of the Horn of Africa. It’s dry most of the year but does have a rainy season, and while many people think of animals when they think of this country, there are far more animals in Kenya to the south. Despite this, snakes and hyenas do populate the country. Hyenas are dangerous to people and in some places towns consist of ‘compounds’ with guarded gates at night where hyenas roam the streets, searching for food.

It takes 16 hours to fly from North Carolina to Ethiopia’s capital city and then another 16 hours to travel by Land Rover to the southern villages where Jason works. Outside of the city the roads are rough dirt and full of potholes, people, and animals. He said that honking is an acceptable means of asking people to watch out!

Ethiopia is the only African county that was never colonized. Because of that, and because an Ethiopian man visited with Paul in the Bible and there were early Christian settlements there, Ethiopia is quite friendly to foreign missionaries. It is not the only faith there, however; another popular one being Islam.

Jason brought along a laptop and showed us pictures and videos of his travels. Despite the extreme dryness, the landscape was very green and beautiful.

These mission trips each serve a specific purpose and help established Christian groups in Ethiopia. The extreme poverty of the rural areas makes communication and shopping difficult, and so Bibles are in short supply. Armed with an arsenal of Bibles, Jason’s group gets to distribute them – but the demand is great for Bibles in their own language. While they pass them out for free, they need a way to decide who gets each limited quantity, so the requirement is the recitation of a scripture passage. People wanting to get a Bible borrow one from a friend, learn the required passage, and then come to the distribution point and recite it. In this picture, you can see the elders standing around a man reciting his passage and going up to receive his Bible.

What was especially humbling about watching this video was seeing the man dancing in his excitement, reciting his passage, and knowing that he would walk hours home carrying it – after walking hours to get there. Bibles are so rare and precious that the people are willing to put that much effort into acquiring one – and there were crowds of people waiting for this chance. How often do I claim I’m too tired – it’s too hard to understand – I don’t like this translation – and not even pick it up? To me, this was convicting.

Because people are poor and many live far away from commercial businesses, they are skilled at making things for themselves. (There is a market day in each town to buy, sell, or trade for the goods they need.) This hat was an example of something that they made to fill a need – and the craftsmanship was beautiful!

This shirt was another. It was subtly colorful and had embroidery on the collar and cuffs.

Jason purchased this ball on one of his trips for his son. The embroidery on each circle features letters of their alphabet.

This is an Ethiopian coin.

Jason went waayyyy above and beyond the call of duty. Not only did he make time in his busy schedule to speak to us, but he also brought an Ethiopian dollar for each of the children.

He brought a favorite Ethiopian snack, too: /fond-i-shaa./ (No idea how to spell that – but that’s my phonetic version.) Popcorn!

My Little Man is excited about his popcorn. He’s also been telling everyone about the bumpy roads and grassy houses of “Indotheopia.” I’m sure he’ll figure out the name soon.

I hear that there’s an Ethiopian restaurant in Raleigh. Maybe one of these days we’ll venture down and try something new!

I didn’t realize I had so many preconceived notions about Ethiopia until I heard Jason speak. It sounds like a beautiful, friendly, wild, hardworking nation.

What nation would you like to learn more about??

Field Work Friday – Eating Egyptian

July 18, 2014 by Amy

Whenever we study a specific culture or country, I try to find a place where we can eat something with the particular spices or preparations from that place.

Finding Egyptian food wasn’t exactly easy, but we found a Mediterranean restaurant in downtown Raleigh called Shish Kabob. Since Egypt is bordered on the north by the Mediterranean Sea, we thought they might have something Egyptian-like to offer – and at the very least, it would be a new food experience for us.

We weren’t mistaken.

We chose to order two different dishes and share them among us. (I didn’t think to take pictures until after I had divided the dishes. The original portions were much larger.)

Our marinated and flame-grilled beef kabobs came served with spiced rice, a sauce, and warm pita.

A falafel was a very new dish to me. It was served in a long hoagie-style roll with lettuce, tomato, and tzatziki sauce.

While the basic ingredients weren’t too foreign to us, we weren’t sure exactly what spices were in things or what the sauces might be like, and so we had lots of questions. The man at the counter was very patient with us and answered all of our questions. He even gave us a stuffed grape leaf for free so that we could try it! We appreciated his kindness – and the opportunity to try something we might not have otherwise.

Shish Kabob is a carry-out restaurant at the downtown Raleigh location, but the weather was beautiful and there are lots of tables just outside, so we enjoyed a picnic dinner with friends. I divided our food among us and we dug in.

The kids loved the kebobs. It was straight-up delicious meat, tender and flavorful. They loved it.

They thought the rice was okay. I thought it was rather exotic. We were all curious to know what spices it contained, as it had a very unique flavor, but when we asked, we were told “seven.” I guess it’s their secret blend!

I particularly enjoyed the falafel. Rather like a vegetarian meatball, it was crunchy on the outside but warm and soft on the inside. It had a surprising kick of spice to it, which I liked a lot – but the kids didn’t. It was too much for them.

Their favorite item was the pita. It was soft and warm, and both kids wanted extra. It was definitely an exciting find.

We don’t have a Shish Kabob location near us, so it isn’t a place we’ll be able to visit too often. Our dinner was so yummy, though, that we’ll definitely be back.

Have you ever eaten Egyptian food?

Field Work Friday – Scavenger Hunts at Duke Gardens

July 18, 2014 by Amy

This week we ventured to the Sarah P. Duke Gardens, part of Duke University. I planned several scavenger hunt sheets so that our children, who usually range in age from 1 to 8, could all participate in some way.

Because the temperature was supposed to get into the mid-90s, we met at 9 AM. After arranging our meeting places and picking up maps, we headed out into the 50+ acre garden.

While I was excited about searching out different items with My Little Man and then discussing them with the group as a whole over a picnic lunch, I was very excited to introduce my friend Noelle to our group.

Noelle has been honing her photography skills for years and agreed to take pictures of our children while we hunted throughout the garden. Because this particular garden is so diverse and has so many fountains and special features, it makes the perfect place for special pictures.

(If you would live in our neck of the woods and would like fabulous pictures of your children or next event, you can check out Noelle’s blog. Contact her for more information!)

We’ll have Noelle’s pictures back soon, but you can see some of the topics for the various scavenger hunts. We didn’t do all of these, but we found pieces of them all ….

For those of us doing the number hunt, we found a plant with ONE main base.

For those people doing the color search, we found an animal with RED wings.

We found a rock that could be used like a chair, just as Jessie did in The Boxcar Children, for those people doing the literature hunt.

We found SPHERICAL flowers, a shape needed on the shape hunt.

Of course, all that hunting made us very hot and thirsty ..

It was tempting to just step right off those stones …

but we stuck to our water bottles, instead.

If you would like to take these scavenger hunts outside yourself, you can find copies of them here.

Have you done an old-fashioned scavenger hunt lately? What interesting things can you find in your backyard or local park?

Field Work Friday – Duke Chapel

July 18, 2014 by Amy

This week we ventured somewhere a bit different: Duke Chapel on the Duke University Campus in Durham, North Carolina.

Knowing only that it’s a beautiful church, we were anxious to see what it looks like – and we weren’t disappointed!

We parked in a nearby parking garage and walked up to the Chapel from the side.

Doesn’t it look old and Gothic?

We learned from our fabulous tour guide Betty that it’s neither. In true Gothic architecture, the tower is over the altar or on either side of it, but the people who commissioned this building wanted it to stand out – so they had a large tower built over the Narthex.

The stone for this enormous building came from nearby Hillsborough.

Wow.

The detail work in this building is amazing. Everything is hand-carved from wood or stone. As you walk through the large oak doors into the Narthex, six statues stand on either side. I must confess that I can’t remember who all of these men were, but Martin Luther stands on the left of the doorway and in the above picture, Robert E. Lee is in the middle.

The ceiling of the Narthex is a very long ways up – and even that is incredibly detailed.

Much of the detail work in the Chapel centers around the number three, symbolizing the Trinity. You can see it in this front-door window …

and carved into the archway above every door.

After entering the Navis, or Nave, the main part of the sanctuary, one must trek 291 feet to the altar. Must be awful for nervous brides!

There are 77 windows in the Nave consisting of over 1 million pieces of stained glass in two tiers. The upper windows feature scenes from the Old Testament, while the lower windows feature New Testament stories.

The Chapel has two organs – one in front and one in back. The one in the back is the bigger of the two and is played for an hour each day. It is absolutely enormous – and it creates very beautiful music.

Over 1500 people can attend services at this church at one time. The choir seats 150, and this area also features lots of amazing carvings.

A small chapel off to the left of the altar has a much homier feel, still with extravagantly beautiful windows …

and three sarcophagi carved from Italian marble.

Downstairs the windows are simpler …

and there’s a children’s play area, though I don’t know if I could get used to having my children attend Sunday School in a crypt. Not sure about that.

Heading back upstairs …

we looked for some of the funny quirks that the carvers created as they worked. Can you find the mouse they carved into this column?

Duke Chapel is an amazing building full of history and beauty. It’s open every weekday and for services on Sunday, so if you’re ever in the area, stop in and check it out! You won’t be sorry.

Our everyday surroundings quickly become routine and we miss the special beauty all around us. What fun attractions and architecture might be fun to explore with your child?

Field Work Friday – Visiting DOT Headquarters

July 18, 2014 by Amy

Visiting a construction site was high on my list of things-to-do, but how could our little ones get up-close-and-personal to a working dump truck? I was stumped for a bit, and finally called the local government office in charge of road repairs. I was referred several times, but finally sent to our local DOT headquarters (I didn’t even know we had one!) where the man in charge generously agreed to all an unknown number of preschoolers visit.

When I arrived at headquarters on DOT day, I was amazed to find 12 little ones. How wonderful! Two great tour guides greeted us and escorted us out to the yard, where they had lined up about five trucks of different types. They began to tell us about each one and then, to my surprise, they helped each eager child to climb on. Imagine our surprise when they actually started up each truck and allowed the children to raise and lower booms, honk horns, and push all sorts of buttons! Several of the little ones were afraid of the noise (who knew a dump truck had such a LOUD horn??) but most were fascinated.

My son – so shy! – loves wheels. We had to take a picture of him with one. Look at how large they are!

These boys were just fascinated with the asphalt lying near one of the vehicles. They had never seen it in loose form before – and because the day was so hot, it was even a bit sticky!

As we prepared to leave, our wonderful tour guides handed each child a real construction vest. Have you ever seen such a great-looking group of construction workers??

All in all, we had a FANTASTIC visit to the DOT headquarters. I definitely recommend this as a place to check out!

Field Trip Friday – Play Ball!

July 18, 2014 by Amy

You can find a lesson in everything. Today, we found all sorts of lessons at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park.

The Durham Bulls are a AAA-affiliate of the Tampa Bay Rays, and a few times each season, they hold a special Education Day.

Now, financially speaking, this is a great deal. All teachers get in free – so for a home school group like ours, that meant that fully half of our group didn’t pay for a ticket. You have the option of buying a boxed lunch for only $3.50, and there’s also a baseball-related curriculum that’s available for download. Several kid-friendly booths were set up in the concourse area, with things like Smokey the Bear, Bobber the Water Dog, and the Durham Museum of Life and Science. The museum staff brought along snakes and other animals for the students to touch and check out.

Educationally speaking, the curriculum is great. It’s written for students in grades 2 through 8, and it’s written specifically using the North Carolina Standard Course of Study. The plans are detailed and very applicable to real life, and although none of the kids who went with us today are ready to use those plans, it is very possible to alter them to our students’ levels.

Practically speaking, a day at the ball park is just plain FUN! If you have one in your area and you haven’t been, you should definitely check it out.

We go a few times each year, and my Little Man was quite excited to be back.

Of course, if your children don’t know the basic positions and rules of baseball, you could always talk about that. No matter what your focus, you must watch the game – you never when a pop fly will come heading your way!

Sometimes, even the players have to pow-wow!

Keeping score, track of batting averages, hits, runs, strikes, outs, and balls is all math. Complicate it a bit by tracking and graphing it before and/or after the game to get an idea of how your team is doing over a given period of time. Or, you could learn about other jobs related to baseball. For example, at the DBAP, the numbers on the scoreboard are changed manually.

One of the great things about this type of event is that it’s a real bonding experience. For our family, it’s something that we enjoy doing together several times each season. There’s just something about the roar of the crowds and cheering for your favorite players together that you can’t recreate in front of a TV!

With the cheering goes the eating. We personally prefer the refillable monster tubs of popcorn – we can munch through the whole game, and if our little hands spill a little, we can always request more! (And at ballpark prices, you can teach some great economics lessons right there.)

I somehow doubt that all of these people turned out just for the game, though. Watching the actual players was not exactly my favorite thing when we first started going, either. I preferred …

the giant sumo matches held between the innings.

My Little Man’s personal favorite is watching the team mascot, Wool E. Bull, race around the field in his little blue sports car.

Celebrating home runs and winning scores with the Bull is always fun!

If none of these float your boat, I suppose you could always get a haircut!

The Durham Bulls do an exceptional job of making a trip to their field fun for the whole family, and it really is educational, too.

Have you spent a day at the ballpark learning??

Field Work Friday – Dance

July 18, 2014 by Amy

Today we visited a Christi’s Dance Center to learn what dance is all about.

We started out by learning about the different types of dance that Christi teaches and the kinds of shoes worn for each one.

Christi, the studio owner, taught our class. She had everyone begin basic stretches …

of many different kinds.

The kids loved these!

After getting really warmed up, Christi taught the children about the basic positions of classical ballet. The children enjoyed trying to copy Christi’s feet and arms!

Christi also showed the children a variety of ways to move across the floor based on different styles of dance.

My son had never been exposed to formal dance or exercise before. He loved trying to follow the moves and did well until the need to run won out. We’ll definitely be doing more specific exercises around here, though, and if you’ve never checked out a dance studio … find one near you and check it out!

Do your kids take dance??

Field Work Friday – The Conservators’ Center

July 18, 2014 by Amy

Yesterday our group visited The Conservators’ Center, a non-profit rescue organization that helps animals in need. They are located in outside Mebane, North Carolina, and have an absolutely wonderful website.

Upon arrival, head animal keeper Janine began our tour.

First we saw servals. These cats are originally from the African grasslands and were fascinating to watch.

I must admit, I can’t remember the name of this cat. She just kept pacing and pacing throughout part of her cage as we stood, watching, and learning about her. I felt so bad for making her nervous that I missed hearing anything else!

I’ve never heard of a binturong before. These Asian animals are banana crazy and imperative for keeping the rainforest alive and well. This one in particular showed off for us by climbing all over his habitat, including showing us how to climb down a tree head first!

Everyone seemed fascinated with the wolves, and this arctic-timber wolf in particular stayed right near us for quite some time.

We didn’t faze this tiger. He just hung out in the corner of his pen and watched us all. He was one cool cucumber!

Some of the lions and tigers were born around the same time and have been raised together. There was something awesome about watching these two species of cats play together.

They rested atop this towering play structure in their area, too. I’d love to know what they’re thinking!

My most favorite animal, however, was Arthur, the white tiger. He may be part snow tiger, or his coloring may be due to the abuse he suffered as a baby; but either way, his stripes are very faint and are most prominent on his tail.

We didn’t seem to bother Arthur, either, and were able to catch him playing hide-and-seek with his friend …

and then, amazingly, he went seeking while we were still there! I’ve only seen these types of animals in the zoo, before, when the most action you can hope for is a lazy tail flick as they sleep. To see such strong and mighty animals roughhousing only a few feet away was incredible.

The kids took their own kiddie cameras along and took hundreds of pictures – literally – so we’ll be editing those tomorrow. They were both fascinated with the animals, but also with the new friends that they’ve made today. Isn’t it funny how experiencing something amazing with someone else draws you together?

After a picnic lunch in the Conservators’ Center’s new pavilion, we headed home, full of stories of lions and tigers and … bobcats and lemurs and wolves and all sorts of wonderful animals.

If you’ve never been to The Conservators’ Center and you live in the area, be sure to check it out. It’s definitely worth a visit. If you live far away, be sure to check out what kind of animal resources are in your backyard. You won’t be sorry.