For those of you who follow Charlotte Mason Philosophy

[Kimmiepie]

I am so confused.

I have this great resource for CM material (www.amblesideonline.org) and I've already made up the first weeks schedule for both of my children. I am pretty organized and confident about it.

However, I am lost on the Nature Study. What do I do for it? I am going to make them each a Nature Study journal (binder) but I don't even know where to start. For example...let's say for a few months we're going to study mammals for our nature study. We can't really walk around and find a bunch of animals in our neighborhood. What do we put in the journals? I plan on doing nature study twice a week and I have no idea what to do.

Please help! :

[joandsarah77]

Studying mammals is great, but not what CM meant by nature study. Nature study is simply going outside preferably to a wooded/wild type area (although a decent back yard or park will do) and taking in nature such as finding a bug and looking at it closely. Then in the nature book they would attempt to draw the bug. Depending on their ages they might label the bug and write a few lines about it. That's my take on it anyway.

[Kimmiepie]

That's what I thought at first.

But when using ambleside it shows their list of things to cover in nature study each year/term and it was mammals for the first one. Here is the link:

http://www.amblesideonline.org/NatureSch.shtml

[Kimmiepie]

Okay I just did a google search and found quite a bit.

But I am still interested in what other people do for theirs. How do you arrange your notebook? What kinds of things do the kids add to it?

[3momkmb]

Well, my first thought was dogs and cats are mammals as are hamsters. So are squirrels and chipmunks.....racoons too. If there aren't any of those in the neighborhood could you visit a pet store? They will probably have mice, rats, gerbils, hamsters, rabbits and the ones around here usually have a nursing litter of rats or mice. Is there a farm near by? Could you observe dairy cows? Horse farms usually have a foal or two in the spring.

I don't do Charlotte Mason though so I'm not sure how often you are supposed to do this.

[melissel]

Can you go to a zoo? A woodsy park? A farm? We have a huge park here that has a small "zoo" in it (deer, a fox, goats, etc.)--maybe something like that? I think even if you just drove to a woodsy place where you could take a hike or nature walk, you'd see some animals.

[Kimmiepie]

Okay, thanks for the replies. I think I am figuring it out more. I guess I should have researched more before I posted the thread.

But I will still welcome any ideas, or things that you do!

[melissel]

There are a few Charlotte Mason Yahoo groups that you might consider joining for inspiration as well:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AmbleS...guid=189414368
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CM4ear...guid=189414368
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Secula...guid=189414368 (this one is secular discussion only)

HTH!

[PJsmomma]

Here is a link to "nature study" from a blog I enjoy.
http://higherupandfurtherin.blogspot...q=nature+study

*you have to scroll a bit because anywhere nature study was mentioned it came up There seems to be some good posts though

I purchased a spiral bound art book at Hobby Lobby.

We just draw things we observe, things growing in the garden, a rainbow we saw.

Once we did a leaf rubbing. We added a photo of our sunflowers.

I don't think that the journal has to correspond to your actual lesson plans. If it works out that is great, if not, I'd still journal the things you're seeing whether or not it's the same as your lesson plan.

Here's a link to my blog post about a nature journal page
http://malissasmerrygoround.blogspot...e-journal.html

[Linda on the move]

The Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Comstock is often used by people doing CM style nature study. This is a huge book (nearly 900 pages) with ideas for studying many aspects of nature. For example, in the mammals chapter, there is a section on cats and dogs with observation questions such as:

1. Why are the legs of the dog compared with tose of the cat long and strong in proportion to the body?

2.Compare the feet of the cat with those of the dog and note which has the heavier pads. Why is this of use to each?

3. Which has the stronger and heavier claws? Can the dog retract his claws so that they are not visable as does the cat? Are the front feet just like the hind feet? How many toe impressions show in the track of the dog?

and so on.

This is a super fun book that has helped my kids learn to really look and to then think about what they are looking at.

[Kimmiepie]

AHA so that mammals area was from a BOOK.

Okay so I can study the book on the lesson plan and then do our own nature journals. That makes much more sense.

Thanks for the links, I can't wait to look at them.