Nature Study - Outdoor Challenge #1

I've been wanting to use nature study as our science and decided to give it a try this year. It sure wasn't hard to convince the boys. We went out for our nature study walk to a nearby park and found a shelter that was next to a creek. (you know how water is just fascinating for boys :) We found all sorts of things - salamander, crayfish, mushrooms, animal bones and took lots of pictures. Here are a few:

this guy kind of blends in:



We're not sure what left this print but J would like to find out.... (i think he'll be disappointed if it's "just" a dog)
my guess is raccoon for this one...


We're not sure what this is either but we want to find out - poison ivy perhaps? We didn't touch it just to be on the safe side.

Here are the treasures we brought home: The leaves and queen anne's lace are in a book so we can study them and put them in our notebook. The poofy round thing (which came from a tree) and cicada shell are going on our nature shelf.


But this was our best find and, truth be told, it was one of the reasons we went out:

And, of course, Munchie came home with us but more on him in a separate post.

It was a great day to get out and enjoy the outdoors and the boys ask everyday if we can do nature study. Now if they would only ask everyday to do their language arts.....