ECC Weeks 29-30 - Russia & Arctic Tundra (And Minister's Convention)

We have taken three weeks to complete our Russia and Tundra studies due to the holiday, appointments and a minister's convention but we are finally finished.

Speaking of the minister's convention, my husband is now an officially ordained minister with the Assemblies of God organization.  We are very proud of him for accomplishing this goal in his life.  I am very proud!  He didn't think he was ever going to get there.  Now his goal is to be in ministry full time.  :)

Presentation of the Ordination Certificate

Our family after the Ordination Service

Getting back to our school studies. 


Here are pictures of our permafrost experiment.  This experiment demonstrates how the earth stays frozen year round in the Arctic.  I used orange jello to represent the frozen earth, or permafrost layer and topped it with chocolate chip cookies (instead of dirt that the book called for) to represent the thin layer of thawed dirt.  The kids covered the 'dirt' with a layer of crushed ice or 'snow'.  I didn't think to take a picture of the ice until it was already melting.

Melting "Snow"

Mud and slush created by the 'permafrost',
thawed dirt and melted snow. 

Permafrost is the layer of ground that stays frozen even in summer.

We also did both experiments in our Properties of Ecosystems science book listed on page 75.

Our first experiment was the 'Two Layers of Fur' experiment.  The purpose was to demonstrate how two layers of fur protects the Arctic animals from the cold.  One hand was covered with two layers of gloves and the other hand was gloveless.  They stuck both hands in a bowl of ice. Their gloveless hand didn't stay in for long!  Beau said that his double gloved hand could have stayed in for hours.

Our two layers of 'fur'

Beau with his hands in the ice

Roo with her hands in the ice

Our second experiment from page 75 of POE was the 'Animals Changing Colors' experiment.  The purpose of this experiment was to appreciate how white fur or feathers provide protection for tundra animals.
 
The kids each decorated a box with cotton balls and added pictures of animals with white fur or feathers.  Sort of a diorama.  When the project was complete they stepped back to see how the animals blended in with their surroundings.  They really enjoyed this project.

Beau's Box

Roo's Box

 Our favorite books while studying  the Arctic Tundra:

Our art for Russia included jeweled eggs and paper Matryushka (nesting) dolls.

After reading about the first Faberge' or jeweled eggs the kids each created their own jeweled egg.  They used Crayola Model Magic for the eggs.  They then decorated the eggs with sequins, plastic jewels and rick rack.

Beau & Roo's eggs

We enjoyed reading the following while our jeweled eggs were drying:

We also enjoyed the following books about Maytryushka Dolls:

After enjoying stories about the Matryushka Dolls the kids made paper Matryushka dolls.  Beau didn't want to color his dolls whereas Roo took two days to color and assemble hers.  Both sets came out really cute.

Beau & Roo's Matryushka Families

The printouts for the paper Matryushka dolls can be found here:

http://www.mssscrafts.com/crafts/matryushka/

Another favorite book we enjoyed while studying Russia:

We also enjoyed the following DVD.  It wasn't directly related to the arctic, though.  It did briefly mention Polar Bears.  :)

We finished our studies by assembling our Russia lapbooks.  The components came from homeschoolshare.com.  Most came from the Russia Lapbook.  Part also came from the Polar Animals lapbook.  The stickers were from a couple of little Dover sticker books called Polar Animals .

Beau's lapbook is on the top
Roo's is on the bottom
Her's has some of the flaps opened

I will share our Australia and Coral Reef studies soon.