Up close and personal with a spider

 One of our favorite subjects is Nature Study, which has been very easy to accomplish this year in the RV.  Basically, we take our drawing paper attached to clipboards, one for Truman, one for Henry.  I have a nice leather bound journal, because I am not likely to drop it in a creek or forget it up a tree, like Truman has.  We take our North American Wildlife reference book, our regional guide, pencils, and then we go hiking.  When we see something interesting, we draw it.  I aim for one drawing per nature walk, although we study and look up all kinds of things such as trees, bugs, flowers.  I have the Handbook of Nature Study, but it is too big to take out.  I usually read the chapters about something we are likely to encounter so that I have a lot of information at the front of my mind.  I also write down the guidance questions to help Truman (and Henry, he must participate) think about what we are looking at.  Sometimes we sit quietly and just watch things, sometimes we climb trees and throw  rocks.  Always we bring things home.  Our rock collection is massive, and not the most appropriate collection if you live in an RV.   Some of the things we have studied lately include Geese (they poop every 12 minutes-we have tried to time this), Opossums, Western Trillium, Christmas Tree ferns, Redwoods, Chipping Sparrows, stream ecology-(bug adaptations for living in a stream-very wet study), Staghorn Sumac, Maple Trees and syprup making (delicious), Catkins, Leeches, Dog families, our own dogs.  I wish that we could study according to AO schedule, but we have to take what is available in our current location.  The idea behind nature study is to teach my young’uns to appreciate the natural world, be knowledgeable about their environment, and to care deeply about the taking care of it.  Charlotte Mason’s list of attainments for a 6 year old  includes being able to identify at least 6 trees, and Truman is on his way.   I also have Hands-on Nature, a book about exploring nature with kids.  It has a lot of little plays in it, and we have made some of the bug and bird puppets, and acted out the plays with them.  It is hilarious and informative, and usually repeted more than once. I fhave been reading the Burgess Bid book to T and H online, and I finally got my hands on a beautiful antique copy of the book from Ebay, the drawings are gorgeous!  I also have the Burgess Animal book for next year, can’t wait!  Even my 6 year old appreciates the beauty of these books.  And the mmmmm….old smell of good literature.

The significant principle at stake in nature study is observation and forming a relationshipwith what you are observing-AO.  We do not have to cover everything about the life cycle or habits of the animal in question. We are observing, so what we want to focus on is this: what is this creature doing right now, and why? If you are watching squirrels . . . are they eating? playing? nest-building? What exactly are they doing? Pay attention to the way they react to each other, as well as other things in their environment (like you). As well as looking at their behavior, teach your children to notice the shape of their bodies, tails, paws, ears, and mouths. Consider why they are made the way are. AO  We also watch documentaries on Netflix about the creatures we study, or sometimes you can find high quality videos on YouTube.    Nature Study is a scheduled hike each week with notebooks, but usually we are out every day looking at things.  With our science program we have spent weeks studying different habitats including desert, woods, seashore-using One Small Square books and Pocket Nature.  These involved marking off a square  and studying the same area over a week or more, notetaking (drawing), lots of experiments, and lots of books.  We have also studied weather, made a weather station,  investigated invertebrates, flowers, plants and trees. We read about James Audubon and studied birds, including the Burgess Bird book for tales.  This has been our scheduled Noeo science program, but it has obviously overlapped with our Nature Study.   I don’t know how they incorporate Nature study in the Public schools, or if they even do, but it doesn’t get any more enjoyable than this.