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The Children’s Garden 9.15.2014

Childrens Garden 9.15.2014
Rory Meyers Children's Garden

In mid September I took the girls to the Rory Meyers Children’s Adventure Garden at the Dallas Arboretum. We had never taken Dani and I knew she would love to be able to explore, but I didn’t want to go in the heat of the summer. The place was basically deserted when we arrived. We saw one school group and a lot of toddler aged kids. Nadia had a lot more fun this time around because she took the time to read a lot of the informational signs.

Childrens Garden 9.15.2014Childrens Garden 9.15.2014

Nadia holding the fur of a warm weather fox. Amelie holding the fur of a cold weather fox. This was a part of a Camouflage Lab we attended.

Childrens Garden 9.15.2014
Even Dani tried the climbing wall

Childrens Garden 9.15.2014

Childrens Garden 9.15.2014

While the girls were pretending to make rain and hail it started to sprinkle on us.

Childrens Garden 9.15.2014
Secret Garden music time
Childrens Garden 9.15.2014
Sweet Nectar Lab

We had the entire lab to ourselves and the girls enjoyed all the special attention during the experiments.

Childrens Garden 9.15.2014
Childrens Garden 9.15.2014

Dani watched her sisters do this one time and then tried every step herself. It was really cute to watch her trying so hard to be just like them. It was a great day and we saw a lot of things that we missed the last time so that was very fun.

Childrens Garden 9.15.2014

To end our day, Dani took her first bath with her big sisters and had a blast!

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Whale Unit Study

The finished lapbook
Whale Unit Study (click to see album)

Next up on our unit study list was “Whale Tales” which we got from the Amanda Bennett site. This was a really interesting one and the first time that Dani wanted to be in the mix for everything. She spent a lot of time on my lap and never wanted to miss any of the videos. While Nadia was doing a lot of reading and writing she would go off and play with toys, but she always kept an eye on me to make sure she wasn’t missing anything. The cutest part was when she would mimic the whale sounds – I should have made a video of her because it was so cute.

Nadia "working hard"
Nadia said, "Take a picture of me making this face. Pretend I am thinking really hard."
Whale Unit Study
The world map rug from Costco comes in handy.
Whale Unit Study
All three girls coloring whales from a coloring book I ordered off Amazon.
Whale Unit Study
One morning Nadia woke up and made whales for everyone in the house.
Whale Unit Study
Dani coloring more whales.

The unit was broken down into five days.

Day 1: What is a Whale?

Day 2: Getting to know Whales.

Day 3: Where are Whales?

Day 4: The Science of Whales

Day 5: Cool things about Whales

Nadia declared the beluga whale her favorite and Amelie liked the blue whale the best. I agreed with Amelie because I think it’s amazing that the blue whale is the largest and loudest animal ever in the history of the world. We checked out a lot of really wonderful books from the library with great photos of whales in action.

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Expedition China Unit Study

China Unit Study 2014
Do-A-Dots make learning fun! (click to see album)

*A catching up blog post*

As we were preparing to leave for our trip to China in February to meet Dani, I did a Chinese New Year unit with Amelie and a more in depth China Unit study with Nadia. I thought it would be fun to study because our house was filled with endless discussions about China already. We used one of the Amanda Bennett studies again because they are so convenient and easy to use.

China Unit Study 2014

China Unit Study 2014

China Unit Study 2014

On each of the 5 days of study we learned about a place in China, a Chinese animal, a Chinese invention and a missionary to China. It was very informative and we watched quite a few interesting and beautifully filmed videos.

China Unit Study 2014

As always Nadia loves putting together her lapbook at the end. It gives us a chance to review everything we have learned and talk about our favorite parts of the study.

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Horse Unit Study

Horse Unit Study
Inside of her completed lapbook (click to see album)

Nadia and I did a Horse Unit study this month and it was very interesting and we learned lots of neat facts about horses. She liked the Arabians most followed by the Clydesdale’s (which we learned were from Scotland). This was the first unit study for Dani to be exposed to and she enjoyed watching the videos while sitting in her TARDIS spica chair. We laughed a lot when we were listening to recordings of horses and Dani tried to mimic the sounds.

Horse Unit Study

Here is how the unit study was set up.

Day 1: What is a horse?

Day 2: Getting to know horses.

Day 3: Where are the horses?

Day 4: The Science of horses.

Day 5: Cool Things about horses.

Horse Unit Study

Horse Unit Study

We watched videos and read a book about the wild ponies of Assateague Island and it reminded me that we have a friend who lives on the neighboring island. She sent all 3 girls postcards from her daughter Emi and Nadia wanted hers on the cover of the lapbook. Amelie saw hers and said, “HEY! We saw these ponies on the computer!” We enjoyed this unit study as much as the others we have done from UnitStudy.com.