Free Garden Lapbook

I don't know if you are like me and start seeds every year as part of a science lesson and then end up putting these seedlings into a backyard garden, but the process is always exciting in our household.  I logged onto email yesterday and was delighted to find a link to a free gardening lapbook.  I then went searching to see how I could share this link with you, and this is what I found:

Free Gardening Lapbook

Flower File Folder Game

More Garden Lapbooks

More Lapbooks from Currclick

This year, we have started our seedlings and they have been rapidly growing inside our house by the window.  Yes, we need to get them into the outside garden.  However, our weather has been so strange that the motivation just isn't there.

We never really had a winter to speak of.  Many people were excited about this, but I remain concerned that we will pay for the mild winter with extra bugs, mosquitoes and hot humid summer days.  Then again, I prefer it a bit chilly and should probably just go ahead and move up north to make everyone around me a bit happier.

When spring sprung early despite the ground hog's predictions (I guess that's what happens when a sleepy rodent is allowed to become meteorologist for the day) it suddenly became hot.  We had 90 degree days, or close to it, in April and May.  This did nothing for my motivation to go outside and weed a garden.

This week has been resort weather - Perfect temps and low humidity, but it was also my son's birthday and Mother's Day weekend coming with plans to celebrate with  my mom and sisters.  So, once again weeding and preparing the garden for planting got pushed down on the list.

Don't worry!  It's o.k. with me if we don't actually get much of a crop out of what we planted, though it is mighty fun to pick a pepper from a plant we started.  It was a fun science endeavor as is.  Though, as I type and glance over at our greenery bending toward the morning sunshine pouring into the window I feel a twinge of motivation to get these plants in the ground.

Dandelions: Weed or Seed for Teaching Science and Childhood Wonder

If you are a gardener or tend the lawn to any degree, you see this as a weed and even the sight of a child blowing the seeds into the air may cause a bit of uncomfortable panic.

She sees it as a source of wonder, a chance to make a wish for a dream to come true, or at least for a moment of pretend fun.  She relishes God's amazing creation of this plant that is a weed to some, but to others it is a source of medicine, food and even a physical representation of the moon, sun and stars.

To a homeschooling parent, this is just another opportunity to learn!

Perhaps a lesson from Bright Hub on the lifecycle of a plant is up your alley.

Or, some dandelion fun facts from the Nature Watch - Dandelion watch.

Or, some interesting and fun facts about dandelions from "My Dandelion is a Flower".

  

Use it as a chance to teach science or a moment to sit back and relish your child's childhood wonder.  To me, the joy she expresses when blowing the white puffy seeds from a dandelion is worth the work of future weeding.

Early Spring, Gardening, Science... And - Oh Yeah - My Thoughts on Denialism and Science

I intended this blog post to be a happy little journal about our planting seeds.  As I type, however, the thoughts of an article (blog entry) I read elsewhere keeps coming to mind and gnawing at me.  So, I feel this burning need to speak up.  The blog was offensive to homeschoolers.  I would link to it, but I don't even want to give it merit enough to even mention it's name.

In the irritating blog post, the author equated homeschoolers (namely quiverful homeschoolers) with, what he called, a denialist (or following after denialism).  He called for strict regulations on homeschools, blasted presidential candidate Rick Santorum, and proceeded to go off on those who follow after the quiverful ideals, calling them Americans who are hindering their daughter's civil rights in the name of religious freedom.

I want to be clear that I have been a homeschooler for many years now, and only recently have I heard the term quiverful.  While, with only three children to my name, I don't think we qualify.  Because I am unfamiliar with their entire belief system, I cannot comment on their rights.  I can, however, comment on homeschooling.

It maddens me to hear critics claim that homeschoolers are nothing more than a bunch of closed-minded, frightened people who want to over shelter their children.  While I'm on my soapbox, I will also say that it maddens me that anyone even calls someone hateful or phobic based upon their heart-felt spiritual beliefs.  Why can I not believe something is wrong without being called names like these?  Is there no longer right and wrong?  I'm not the one posting mean-spirited pictures and comments about our president (though, I do not embrace his ideals).  I am not the one posting mean-spirited articles about alternative lifestyles.  Yet, I am the one who receives criticism from those who disagree with certain decisions my family has made.

Statistics have shown that most homeschoolers do above the average of their public-schooled peers on standardized testing.  Is this because they are protected from socialization?  How can a group of children outperform another and then be criticized by the under-performing group that their way of education is inferior?  I may understand trigonometry and know how to teach it, but I will never understand how this line of reasoning makes any sense.

If that makes me among those who live in denialism, then so be it.  To me, all science points to the one I believe created it (I'm not talking about Darwin), and faith is lived out in love.  However, this does not mean black and white turns to shades of gray.  Somewhere within all of this, there has to still be some amount of right and wrong.  And, those who are trying to live their life in a manner to filter out what that means should not be put under a microscope or criticized.

I will now step down off my soap box and talk about our happy day of gardening.  Thank you for allowing me to vent.

Since it has been unseasonably (and, in the opinion of my children too) warm this early spring, we decided to head outside and get some seeds and flowers started.  Since it is technically still winter (spring begins March 20), we did not put any seeds in the ground yet because of the chance that there will still be a frost.

The kids and I had a fun time planting the starter seeds, and I took over on the begonias which will hang from our shed which we snapped into place right before winter.  Well, right before winter was supposed to arrive anyway.  It's been incredibly mild this year.

As always, every event becomes a learning experience.  So, the planting of the seeds involved science learning.

Parts of a plant (roots, stem, leaves)
What a seed needs to grow (soil, sunlight, water)
What vegetables and plants work well together
Organic gardening (We do not use pesticides in our gardening.  We prefer to eat our home-grown food as close to its original design (without added chemicals) as possible.)
We even tend to bring a bit of our faith into every lesson.  Life and Death and spiritual matters (the seed has to go into the ground as dead like Christ did, but will sprout life).

The kid's Recycled Organic Back Yard Garden in a 30 Second Video

We've actually got the seedlings into the ground in the garden and have been watering every day! Here's a 30 second video of our progress:

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

We had a good week in regard to progress on the backyard garden. But, also had our first disappointment. After getting everything in the ground, and watering for a few days, we went out today to find two tomato plants broken off. We have not yet determined if it was due to over zealous children watering them or from a bird or squirrel or such. But, we hope the remaining plants grow.

We used an online program where you can click and drag plants onto a virtual garden to help plan it, along with a book called Good Companions, about what to plant side by side to prevent common pests and help specific vegetables grow. Now, all we need is advice on a lemon tree as that's what my son wants.

In our effort to stay organic and recycle, we used the sides of a plastic milk jug to write the plant names - And, as strange as it sounds, they turned out really cute. I cut the circle section of the sides and then formed a tear drop shape to stake it into the ground.

Once again:

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.