Working Outside

It was such  a nice day that we decided we all needed to take advantage of it and go for a nice walk this morning.  We try to work outside whenever we can in the summer.  We often bring out science experiments, art projects or even just our school books and enjoy the fresh air and sunshine while learning something fun together.

We left our yard and went for a hike in the woods.  We saw birds, examined a spider web, talked about deer, scat, deer ticks and the diseases ticks carry, as well as some unusual fungi.  They hemmed and hawed about taking a walk, especially when I warned them that I wanted to do some sort of walking outside everyday but ultimately we had a good time.

It's amazing to me that we always seem to find something different on each walk we take; even if we walk in the same places often!

This bird was hopping and appeared
unable to fly

A tree had fallen over and we inspected the trunk to figure out why

scat tracks through the woods

fungi

Once home for our walk, the boys wanted to play on the swings and Ian wanted to show me what he had been working on in the sand all morning while I was cleaning.  I let them play and told them I'd set up a blanket inside the fort we had built and bring Harry Potter out to them.

Ian's new work site 

We read another chapter in our book while sitting in the fort or on the rock near our fort.  The boys were thrilled when our cat come over to join us too.

Since we were enjoying being outside so much, I offered to bring their schoolwork out to them and set up a blanket in the shade.  Ian wanted to read the book Big Night for Salamanders and work on a page in his math book.  He read quietly to himself and then summarized the story for me.  He chose to work on a page about rounding and adding sums of money.  He, once again, needed a quick refresher on rounding and then had his work done in no time.

While working outside on his math, Evan once again was doing more math than his work required.  The first page he worked on was counting by 2's.  But he went on to tell me many more math facts that he knew.  His second page was working with counting by 5's; something he hasn't had nearly the same amount of practice with.  He figured it was counting by fives though and so once he finished writing all the numbers we then counted beyond the  page up to 100 by fives together.  He also completed another two pages in his phonics book; the letters F & G.

He was getting antsy so I sent him off to play and told him we'd read together in a little bit. 
   
Alec had headed inside to try and finish up, yet another, Greek mythology book he had started reading Monday night but came outside after a bit to work on his math with us in the shade.  He chose two different pages that worked on adding two digit numbers (some with regrouping and some not).  

After lunch the boys wanted to head to the family cottage across the lake.  Evan and I sat together and quickly read What If?  It's a cute little book with only about 5 words and a very repetitive story line about two seals playing ball on the beach.  He read most of the story by himself to him needed help with one or two sight words that he had not yet been introduced to.

Once we were done reading it was decided that Alec would bike to the cottage while the other two boys swam there.  I kayaked alongside them in case they needed any help and ended up towing Evan half- way across the lake. 

The boys played with their cousins and some of their cousins' cousins for the afternoon.  They kayaked, swam, jumped, paddle boated, fished, and had a great time soaking up the sun. 

boats, boats, boats

Evan found a heart shaped rock (that we had to keep)