There’s something about apple season that makes it especially easy to bring learning to life. Maybe it’s a trip to a local orchard, a basket of new varieties to taste, or simply the smell of something apple-y baking in the kitchen. Apples are also a fantastic jumping-off point for learning! With just a few apples…
Fall is a wonderful time for nature study, especially when you add creative nature walks, simple activities, and a few good living books. Fruits and nuts are abundant in autumn, making them an easy and interesting focus for a nature walk. You don’t need to travel anywhere special, either. A backyard, neighborhood, park, or hiking…
Pumpkins are more than just decorations for the autumn season. They’re fascinating fruits with an incredible story! In this podcast episode, kids will enjoy a pumpkin nature study to discover why some plants produce tiny fruits while others grow giants, like the record-breaking pumpkins that can weigh over a thousand pounds. Along the way, we’ll…
Free nature study printable for your homeschool this autumn!
While we love simple nature walks around our home, we also love taking the time once a month (sometimes more often) to go somewhere interesting for nature study. This post highlights our autumn walk through the wetland trails of Cove Springs in Frankfort, KY. What a beautiful afternoon! We were blessed to have my parents…
It’s autumn and time to have a little leaf fun with your preschoolers and kindergarteners! The Colors of Autumn in Play Dough After observing the changing colored leaves on trees, let your little ones create their own autumn trees from play dough or clay. You might even use some autumn scented play dough. Perimeter with…
Early Fall Nature Studies are FUN! Early autumn is such a wonderful time of the year for nature studies! The crispness in the air keeps walks comfortable, while the scenery abounds with exciting treasures to find. Believe it or not, the photos in all of the collages were taken during only one short woodland walk! …
I told you I’ve been slacking on my posts! Four botany study posts in four days doesn’t mean we’ve been studying botany in such depth every day. In fact, each topic took us at least a week to cover. Today’s post is about one of the lessons spent learning about fungi. After some activities from…
Caleb (and Eli) and I have been so loving our study of botany! This post highlights one of our activities as we learned about gymnosperms, particularly conifers. Gymnosperms are plants with “naked seeds” that aren’t housed inside a fruit. Conifers (cone-bearing plants) are an example of a gymnosperm. During this lesson, we had collected various…
In continuing our middle school botany study, we’ve been studying trees. A lot. Most of the activities we’ve done have come from the Delightful Deciduous Trees NaturExplorers study. One super-interesting nature walk activity was finding the tap root (main root that grows straight down), lateral roots (large roots that grow outward or laterally) and fibrous…
Does the thought of a spider nature walk give you chills? It shouldn’t! Spiders are pretty incredible, and you don’t have to get all that close to observe them in nature. This post contains affiliate links. Autumn is a great time to find spiders and spider webs. Here, there…spiders everywhere! Are you afraid? The garden…
Not every nature walk has to be serious! Let your children take the lead during nature study often. It might not be just the thing you would’ve planned, but it will be exciting and worthy nonetheless.