Kind of Creepy

The other day when cleaning out our hermit crab tank we found out that one of the ones we had gotten was dead.  Sometimes that happens. 

So, we couldn't leave Grandma Jenny alone.  We needed to get her a new playmate.

The one we chose was a decent sized little guy and was so friendly.  Sideways Bill had on a shell that was kind of funny as it was sideways when he walked around.  We thought it was fun to watch.

Well, today we caught Sideways Bill naked!

I could hear scratching and looked over to see him digging around.  It was kind of creepy looking.  He looked like a spider and I hate spiders.  They give me shivers.

I could see the white part behind him and thought it was his funny little sideways shell until he started digging his way out...

...then I figured out it was that he was missing a shell!

I gathered my boys and we all watched with fascination (and a little bit of grossed out on my part...because it is really creepy gross) as he crawled over to another slightly larger shell and put it on!

Gross but oh so fascinating!

Seriously they are amazing creatures. 

I am so excited that we have had this chance to study and observe them. 

My boys have looked up many things on these little creatures and watched a few videos.  We are now almost hermit crab experts!

Cheers

Growing Gunk

A few months ago I ordered a kit for science. 

I wanted to teach my boys about bacteria and all the kinds of stuff that is microscopic on stuff we touch (or live in) everyday.

I knew that my Mom wanted to teach it for me anyway!  She is a lab tech and know stuff like this, so I figured she wanted to do it for me.  Turns out I was right!  :)

So, my kit came in the mail.

It contained everything we needed to do a really basic room temperature bacteria growth experiment.

We prepared our dishes by warming up the agar and pouring it in a thin layer on the bottom of each dish.

But, because I didn't know any better, my first batch had some lumps in it...this is not something you want.

We had 20 petri dishes when we were done.

We divided them so my boys each got 5, and my Mom and I got 2 each.

We labeled them with names (or nicknames) and where we were swabbing, making sure to choose places that were room temperature.  (ex.  armpit is out, but arms are in...rim of nostril is in, inside the nostril is out)

We also made sure that we kept the swabs fairly sterile, opening from the stick end, and only bringing it out to swab. 

(Didn't get a photo of this step)

Using a gentle zig zag motion, swipe all the way across and down the surface of the agar, and close with the lid.

Make sure that you have a control (just in case you math geniuses caught that above, that is where the missing one is)

This may grow things (ours did) but at least you know what to rule out as your "air" bacteria or other contaminants from just making them.

We divided ours into three places to try growing, on top of the fridge (for the warmth), in a box (to keep it dark) and just out in the open.  Not having swabbed all the same things and having 3 controls, this was just something for us to play around with...not a "true" experiment.

Having a control was very useful though because it gave us ideas as to what the contaminants were in the agar, petri dishes, and air.  What we grew there, we knew was not from our swabs.

We then swabbed a tiny bit of "gunk" and smeared it onto our slides.  I just had disposable slides as this whole thing creeps me out.  Germs are not my forte, I do not like knowing what germs grow on my stuff.  :)

We just have a simple little microscope, but we were able to find some fun things on our slides.

Here are a couple views of the fun stuff we saw.

If you get a chance to do this, it was really fun for us to try out. 

We grew some nasty stuff, learned what was germy that didn't necessarily know.  (like my boys really didn't know how dirty the dishcloth was, it spreads the germs each time you use it too.)  We now know how to be more clean.  We also know what kills those germs.  Try it out.  We loved finding out about the stuff that lives on our bodies.

Cheers

Book Talk Tuesday - "No Backbone" Series

While at the library each week, my baby is required to pick 3 books.  Just 3.  This is usually done for a very long time because he really doesn't enjoy reading.  He likes to have ME read to HIM, but he doesn't like to sit down and read a book on his own.  Until these...

We found three on our library's "new books" stand and he grabbed them asking if he could get them too.  (duh, I did say yes!)  Then we went looking for more.  We found a total of 11 of them in our library.  He wanted all of them!

I am in love with these little books.

They have beautiful photos of the bug/organism discussed in the book...

They have repeating themes.  My son now knows what "molting" is because everything that has and "exoskeleton" (another new word for him) molts.  He also knows that most of the insects that hatch are called "Nymphs" and spiders are "Spiderlings".  He knows what an "egg sack" is and what it looks like.  He also knows some really fun facts on eating, hiding and hunting for each thing we have read about.

He also can tell you a few related things for each...

I love that he is sitting and looking through these books, sounding out the words to learn things on his own so that when we sit together to read them, he already has a basic knowledge and he is excited to learn.

I am so glad we found these at our library.  They have been a joy to read, wonderful repeating themes and words, and beautiful photography.

If you can find them in your library (or want to buy some excellent simple books for younger children) these are so worth it.

Cheers

Field Trip: Spark - Calgary, Alberta

Ok.  This is rather photo heavy, sorry (sort of).  :)

When we were in Calgary last weekend, we did the zoo one day, then we did the science center the next day.  We love science centers.  The one in Edmonton is amazing so we thought this one would probably be pretty cool too.

It was.

Here are a few of our favorite exhibits:

We made craters in these really cool little sandbox type places.  The sand shook to simulate the earth's moving...only much faster than it does in real life.

We viewed a simulated Northern lights display that was 360 degrees above our heads.

We viewed some phenomena that happen in the universe.  Things we could only see by infrared, UV and more.  It was all touch screen and very cool.

 There was a huge display in front of a window of many jars.  Each jar had a tag that described what each person remembered about the sky in their area. 

 There were many places with water displays.  You could polish a rock with water and sandpaper, you could play drums with the dripping water, you could make dams and waterfalls. 

There was a huge section that taught you about gears and our moving/mechanical world.

This display was pretty cool.  Each of those silver disks had a solar panel on them.  As you aimed a light (the things that my boys are pointing) each one played a different note.  There were 3 lights and when they were all played together you created a symphony.

We learned about wind.  We made our own windmills and saw how more blades were better, and curved blades caught the wind better than flat ones.  We also saw that lighter things were easier to blow with the giant wind tunnels than heavier things.  Tissue paper is lighter than a card.

 These ribbon things were awesome.  Because we don't have a TV, my boys didn't realize that men use them in the Olympics in rhythmic gymnastics.  Obviously something I have to rectify.  (gotta find some on youtube or something)

There was a room full of really cool building supplies.  These were two of my favorite.  We could have sat at each table for hours building with them.  Some we had seen, others we hadn't.

This was well worth the trip.  I would go when it was not busy though.  Because it had just opened, it was pretty busy with school groups and random families.  It was well worth the trip.  (and fighting the crowds)

Cheers

Owl Pellets

We are on a dissecting role this month I guess!  (sheep eyes)
We did owl pellets.  In case you don't know what an owl pellet is, it is all the indigestible things that an owl eats.  It all gathers into a special little place in the owl and then when that is full, the owl spits it out.  (like puke, or a hair ball)  Then we take them apart!  :)
I gotta tell you, I remember doing this in grade school and loved it. 

My boys loved it.

My Mom loved it.  (she was here to help my littlest)

But the girl that joins us for science...not so much.  She was pretty disgusted actually.

I guess dissection is not for everyone.  :)

Here are a few photos of our adventure.

The pellets we got were pretty big.  (and looked like little logs of poo...)

We pulled them all apart.

I gave them little egg cartons to sort like bones into.  But, some of them preferred to lay them all out...

Some of the pellets were pretty complete skeletons, some had HUGE bones that we knew were not mice, mine (and G's) had FOUR heads in it...all of them were pretty cool. 

We had quite an adventure pulling the owls puke apart.  :)

Science RULES!

Cheers

Sheep Eyes

Just for the faint in heart...

....some of the photos in this post are "gross".  :)







We did a sheep eye dissection today.  It was so super cool!

There are some pretty amazing groady things in the eyeball.  :)

This is a photo heavy post so if you are not willing to read more, then stop now...

I got a kick out of the "alien" quality the safety equipment lent to each of my boys!  It gives them a bit of anonymity as well.  You can't even tell this is my M. 

Each boy (only the two oldest did it as we were working with sharp scissors and scalples) got a kit of stuff to use, some tweezer type things, a skewer, a scalpel, a pair of scissors.  (the rest we didn't use)  Plus their goggles, gloves and mask.  (it was surprisingly not stinky)

Everything was taken out and explained the use of. 

Then each boy had an eye to poke first, gotta drain the liquid out, then cut in half.

The eye had some jelly like substance in the middle. 

This is the eye all the way opened up. 

K was really into it and he took all the parts out.  He placed them all in his pan and checked them all out under the magnifying glass.  G loved cutting.  He cut all his things up and really loved seeing all the insides of everything under the magnifying glass.

This is a super close up of the grossness of the jelly stuff inside.

We got a kick out of seeing each part of the eye.  We really enjoyed cutting them out and apart.  It was fun to see all the workings of the eye.  I am really looking forward to the rest of our discussion tomorrow. 

I showed the photos of this "event" to a friend of ours and he mentioned how he didn't know that homeschooling afforded the same opportunities of public school.  I was thrilled to be able to show him and explain to him about the opportunities we CAN do for homeschooling.  We get to do some pretty cool things.

Here are a couple places you can buy specimens if you want to try it at home:

Wards
ChristianBook

These are the ones that ship to Canada, but they both have US sites.  I found that getting specimens in Canada is really hard, but just searching out dissecting specimens gets you many different sites in the US. 

If you are not in Canada or the US, the link for Wards has a link for International.  I am not sure where they ship, but I know they have a few overseas places.  Have fun!

Cheers

Favorite Things

I broke down and bought one of these...

What are some of your favorite things to view through a microscope?