August 2012 - Educating Laytons

Heading Out West

August 31, 2012 By Stef

It’s time to get going - we’re heading out west!

We’re heading to Salt Lake City to pick up three very special people in my life and then taking the whole family (5 kids 2 adults … I’m 1 of the 2 adults) to Yellowstone National Park!

I am so thankful and grateful to Master Books for sending me Your Guide to Yellowstone and Gran Teton National Parks.

You should check out Master Books – they offer a variety of useful, faith based quality books!

Can’t wait to share pictures while we’re there! I’ve never been before, so be sure to follow me on Instagram!

Once we drop off our nieces and nephew after Labor Day we’re boarding a train for Yosemite National Park. Yes- planes, trains, and automobiles.

Please pray for us and the recent outbreak of Hantavirus! (I’m trusting God while trying desperately not to freak out but I’m a mom – and I don’t want rodent dropping to do us in).

Our great adventure doesn’t stop there – what fun would that be?!

Heading Out West

We continue on to San Francisco, Pebble Beach, and then back home in 2 weeks! 10 years ago hubs and I honeymooned in San Francisco – we can’t wait to drive across the Golden Gate Bridge with our sons and show them the giant red woods!

We’ve enjoyed some great homeschool field trips: Niagara Falls, Washington DC … but we’re overly excited for National Parks out west.

We have our new books, our new camera, our new hiking boots & clothes! And of course FIELD GUIDES!

We’re ready and looking forward to seeing God’s glory! You can follow my tweets #LaytonsOutWest when / if I’ll be able to tweet from there!

au revoir

Filed Under: Wrap Up

Preschool Science Fun

August 30, 2012 By Stef

This year I am trying to make Preschool Science Fun!

I have realized – even though I am terrified to teach science … my kids keep on loving it. I know some great science lovers like The Homeschool Scientist and Raising LifeLong Learners, but I’m still a little nervous when it comes to science.

So how does a nervous home educator take on an eager preschooler? She cheats of course! I got a Science Set!

I want to make Science fun for my preschooler, so I purchased the Primary Science Set!

This is a GREAT kid friendly science set we use and love (requires few household items for experiments).

I want you to have one too!

I am offering a one-day-only giveaway (we’re heading out of town but I want to do this before we leave since so many friends are starting back to school)!

Make Your Preschool Science Fun & enter to win a Primary Science Set!

Science kit
Real science for little hands
Includes 10 double sided activity cards
Includes beaker, magnifying glass, funnel, eyedropper, flask, tweezers, goodles, large 6″ test tube and stand, 2 small test tubes
Activity guide included
Recommended ages: 4-7yrs
value $29.99

Enter to win now giveaway closes noon Friday! One winner will be chosen (Rafflecopter) and contacted via email. I will announce the winner on my Facebook page Friday evening! USA shipping only – thanks!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Filed Under: Extra

Tactile Tuesday: Kitchen Homeschooling Science

August 27, 2012 By Stef

We’re taking Tactile Tuesday into the kitchen! Kitchen Homeschooling Science. The kitchen is a great place to teach science (and math). You can enhance lessons with a few every day household items!

This past week we went to the beach and took our Apologia book to learn about tides and ocean zones. But how do you teach ocean zones to a tactile kid? Make them!

We took a plastic container, taped construction paper to the outside, and labelled each zone.

Then we filled it with water and added “stuff” to the container for discussion. Oil was a great example to use for plankton. It hangs out on the top (phytoplankton) and also proves to be a “benthic organism” because you can swirl up the water and the oil / plankton float along with the current.

We dumped some mini chocolate morsels that sunk – so they represented our angler fish and midnight zone dwellers. Most spices float – majority of ocean animals are found in the sunlit zone so our parsley and basil represented fish.

The boy wanted to add a few ice cubes from our ice maker – which were the perfect shape to represent dolphins (they float and are curved like a dolphin’s back).

Kitchen Homeschooling Science is fun!

I had no plans. I had no expectations. I was prepared to clean up a gross mess with joy all for the sake of education. It ended up being great fun together as we created a wonderful hands-on ocean activity to drive home some key points from the curriculum! I didn’t create anything “new” (filled up a quality time love language)!

Have you tried Kitchen Homeschooling Science before?

Not interested in making ocean zones – how about an ocean animals word hunt to add to a lesson? (I also created a letter O preschool hunt for little ones).