April/May

I've been very slack at recording what we've been up to lately so here's a recap.

Our remaining guinea pig Cuddlepie is doing very well and is enjoying living inside with us. She gets regular cuddles and has even started speaking again after a very very long silence. I think she stopped because her nieces both talked constantly and Cuddles didn't see the need for another loud squeaky voice. A very sensible animal indeed.

Both girls took part in the ANZAC Day parade with their respective Girl Guide Units. Here they are proudly wearing their great-grandfather's and great-great grandfather's medals. They are holding little explanations of the medals but they didn't come out so well in the pictures.

Here are the details magnificently hand drawn by P. Names have been removed for security purposes ;)

Some scenes from the parade:

Our latest Saturday Science Session was Pond Dipping. We visited two local ponds to check out the huge variety of aquatic animal life and to assess the health of the ponds.  The first pond was beautifully filled with healthy water lilies, fish and ducks.  Unbelievably we didn't find any tiny creatures in the water!

looking, looking...

still looking, looking....

 We then moved onto another area where the water was smelly, dark and boggy.  Large rushes grew on the edges of the water and frogs were heard calling melodically.  We hit the jackpot here!  We found freshwater snails, water mites, backswimmers, mosquito larva and most exciting of all, some sort of water nymph - possibly a dragonfly but we're not convinced. Some more research is needed to identify it.

recording the findings

spot the macroinvertebrate

lovely little nymph

All these Pond Dipping photos are courtesy of Mr L who always brings his camera.  Thanks!

Work time!  We are continuing our study of Taxonomy with the Plant Kingdom.

This is our new best friend - the whiteboard.  Learning about plants is so much more fun with a whiteboard!
Moomintroll especially enjoys using it together with her other new love - the calculator.  Most mornings now the board is covered with sums that she has made up. Anyway, back to the plant kingdom.
Our first experiment was to recreate flowers opening up their petals. The girls cut out flower shapes, folded them up to simulate a closed flower, then put them in a dish of water. The capillary action forces the petals open, much like it does in a real flower. We timed different sizes of flowers. The smaller the flower, the quicker it opened.

The next experiment was to observe the way water moves through the xylem in plants. We used celery sticks and coloured water.

before..

 after

The Snork Maiden has been tackling Life of Fred with renewed zeal. She is now onto the fifth book and is loving it. The other day she spent a quiet hour at her desk doing her maths. What I love about Fred is that it not only teaches maths but other important things too, like time management, literature, astronomy and whether or not to trust a large talking duck.
 Moomintroll is taking a little break from Fred but is more than happy with her Distance Ed maths work and a calculator.

Other things we've been doing include creative writing, making movies about dinosaurs, Indonesian, art, hula hoop and juggling practice, piano, visiting the zoo and our new favourite subject Bike Ed. With the weather so mild we've been taking our bikes out and about and practicing riding on the roads.

So now we're all up to date at last. Until next time,

Moominmamma
x