Homecoming

Today we released The Doctor back to his original home.  The water level in the creek was lower than when we first found him as a tadpole, but the water quality was so much better today.  We wish The Doctor well on his journey to adulthood.

This was taken a few days ago. Doctor still had quite a long tail.

Sitting on a rock this morning

he liked to sit on his food

Limnodynastes peroni, aka Striped Marsh Frog

This was taken in the car on the way to his creek.

a contemplative pose. Can he hear the calls of his fellow frogs?

home at last at Damper Creek.

Goodbye Doctor! 

Another project that we just finished off yesterday was our batik making.

H's finished batik

R's batik

with the left over dyes I painted my homage to The Doctor

Term 1 wrap up

The end of first term is nigh, so before we leave on our very well deserved holiday to Heron Island, here's a record of what the girls have been up to.


Sport - Ballet, Gymnastics, Kids Cardio, Circus classes.

Music - Choir, Piano lessons, attending concert band rehearsals, concerts and citizenship ceremonies.

Personal Development - Girl Guides.

LOTE - Latin, learning phrases and words relating to the countries studied in our Around the World unit.

Art - Artist Trading Card swap with fellow homeschoolers, batik making.

History - Brief histories of the countries studied in our Around the World unit; Indigenous study (tool making, edible plants, culture and music); Horrible Histories books/DVD; French Revolution video from Khan Academy.

Geography - Around the World unit; preparation for our trip to Heron Island, Qld.

Science - Crystal growing; Tadpole watch; Saturday Science sessions; Rockpool study; marine life study; growing pumpkins; dog, rabbit and guinea pig care; "Hands in the Dirt" excursion involving planting seeds, grasses, analysing compost, identifying animals under a microscope.

English - Shakespeare (H); Headsprout (R); library days; H is writing her own Mr. Men story; writing and performing original plays; atttending a performance of Hamlet; research skills for Around the World project.

Maths - Smartkiddies website; Cool maths games; math workbooks; Pi Day; selling raffle tickets at band concert.

*Around the World countries studied were South Korea, Mexico, Canada and Mauritius.

...and all done in our pajamas! (well, most of it anyway).

a bucketful of egg cases(?) need help identifying these!

investigating at Rickett's Point

snail trail

common sea star

crab shell lineup

Stage 1 of batik making using flour paste instead of wax. Instructions here.

 

Crystal making using Borax, food colouring and boiling water:

 

Torn paper craft:

Hands in the Dirt excursion:

planting Lomandra

Circus time.  R is working towards her Level 1 certificate:

The Doctor is changing daily now.  One day he sprouted a front leg.  The next day the second one popped out:

We will most likely release him back to the creek where we found him at the end of this week.

The Doctor has legs

Metamorphosis

Our observation of The Doctor continues and now, six weeks on, he has some lovely rear legs.  The markings on his back are becoming evident now too.  He is very large and strong and his tail is still long but getting thicker at the base.

Around the World - Mauritius

It was P's turn to choose a country this time and he chose Mauritius in honour of our good Mauritian friend Hemmy who, incidentally, runs probably the best pizza parlour in Melbourne. Well, that's just our opinion but really his pizzas are so good that we go there every Sunday night.  It's called Belle Rose in Chadstone if you want to try them out sometime.

H started the ball rolling by finding us the best airline ticket prices and somewhere to stay.  We ended up flying Emirates and staying in the north west of the island at Grand Baie Suites Hotel on Royal Rd, Grand Baie.  The price for 7 nights was an absolute bargain, making us think that we really should go there in real life sometime.

We explored the many cultures that make up Mauritius today - French, Chinese, Indian, Portugese and African. We also learned about their religions (most are Hindu) and we enjoyed watching a Food Safari episode on Mauritian food which in influenced by all the cultures listed above.
The girls were interested and sad to read about the Dodo bird, native to Mauritius and now extinct due to hunting and a naturally slow reproduction rate.   Did you know that Mauritius is tiny?  It has about 140km of coastline but it has 700 different native plant species.  Apparently Charles Darwin had a great time there!

The thing we didn't get to do during our time in Mauritius was to go to a Mauritian restaurant. One that we want to try is on the other side of the city, so perhaps the next time we are out that way we may drop in for a tasty treat.

Facing fears

Our holiday to Heron Island is drawing nearer! We are all very excited but the girls both have great fears of sharks and are quite worried about encountering some when we are there.  In an effort to help them past their fear, we took a trip to the Australian Sharks and Rays Centre not far from here.  Here we found a huge number of Fiddler Rays, Estuary Rays, Black Rays, Southern Eagle Rays, White Spotted sharks and Nurse sharks.

All suited up and ready to go. The sticks are used to feed the rays and sharks.

 A Black Ray

 Fiddler Rays

White Spotted shark aka gummy shark

After three hours feeding and patting these beautiful animals, we all agreed that our favourites were the sharks.
The girls say they're not afraid anymore and were both very proud of themselves for facing their fears.

Lately H has been absorbed in books. R lamented that H was "becoming just like mum and dad - always with your nose in a book!"  I told her that in a few years time when reading wouldn't be hard anymore she'll be just the same, but by the end of that sentence R had already run out of the room. Sigh.
Anyway, H has discovered Shakespeare and is loving reading his plays.  Well, when I say reading his plays I don't mean his actual plays, but a series of Shakespeare's play rewritten for kids.  They are written by Andrew Matthews and have wonderful illustrations by Tony Ross. So far she's read The Taming of the Shrew, Hamlet, Much Ado About Nothing and The Tempest.  And by sheer coincidence her uncle P is performing in Hamlet soon, so we'll definitely take the girls to see that.