Nature Study!

I have had great intentions of starting nature journals with the kids, but winter in the north west is very wet, so it hasn't happened. Buster has been begging me ever since he heard of nature journals, so I bought these off of ebay like a month ago. My Nature Journal Of course you could use any old sketch book, but I wanted a little direction. Not to mention I found them for 5 dollars each. Anyways yesterday happened to be a gorgeous day, and when my husband came home he suggested we take the kids for a walk at the duck pond nature trail. What a perfect opportunity to bring our journals. I grabbed them right out of our Friday bucket, because by Friday the weather could be terrible, and off we went. The trail provided many great learning opportunities. You can follow our walk in pictures.

Here I am explaining the journals to my very attentive pupils. ;)

I bought Buttercup a little sketch pad, so she wouldn't feel left out.

Buster was delighted to find some fungus.

Some lovely green moss. We found quite a few things to teach us about decomposition.

Buddy taking in the sites.

An animal hole we found. Not sure what lives in it, but Sweetpea was sure it was menacing.

Buttercup dancing along.

Love this pic. My husband takes great pictures.

He found the trail quite relaxing.

Buster discovered an ant hill.

Playing Pooh sticks.

Buster's sketch for the day. Sweetpea decided to run off at the end of the trail, so she was in the van with daddy while we sketched.

He drew toadstools, water, log, grass, and a duck. The duck has three legs. Buster was thinking four legs, but I stopped him at 3.

Some links for you about nature journaling.

http://homemade.truepath.com/nature2.htm

http://handbookofnaturestudy.blogspot.com/2009/10/outdoor-hour-challenge-autumn-series_09.html

http://www.connecting-with-nature.net/journal.html