wow. This was a super neat book. Do you know what a citizen scientist is? In the past we have been part of bird counts, but this book opened my eyes to other opportunities you can do still from home. Broken into four seasons of ideas you can help scientific research by tracking butterflies (did you know they actually put stickers ON butterflies?), identifying bugs and more!
The photographs in this book are wonderful! And my kids were excited to see how other kids have done the bird count.
Do you mix poetry and science? With Step Gently Out by Helen Frost and Rick Lieder, I was very impressed.
Beautiful closeup photographs follow a wonderful poem.
Step gently out. be still and watch a single blade of grass....
the creatures shine with stardust...
in song and dance and stillness, they share the world with you. (just a portion of this poem)
I'm inspired to take more close ups of our trips into nature.
Mushroom pickers foolproof field guide gave me delight! I see mushrooms when we go on nature hikes, but am never sure if we could pick them and eat them. Now I know! I'm sad to say that we found (or rather the kids did) some large edible mushrooms late this summer. Because I didn't have this book yet, I wasn't saddened when the kids (and the other homeschooling kids we were with) destroyed them all. They were soccer ball sized and called giant puff-balls. They would have been great for dinner had I known....
One Small Square series of books are very helpful for those interested in nature. We are currently enjoying one on astronomy, but the ones on pond and woods continue to enjoyed here.
Science in your backyard as been a read aloud in our family for several years. It's a trusty book to complete what we've found here in this great backyard of ours. I bought it used, but have found it so filled with great helps. Weather poems to memorize such as "red sky at morning, sailors take warning; red sky at night, sailors delight". Because we live NOWHERE near the sea, we enjoy discovering what us landlocked people can learn from red sky!
We've classified bugs with this book, learned how to make an astrolabe (yes go ahead and look that up!), completed backyard physics and considered winter twigs most recently.
And now that the weather is turning and we've begun to consistently fill up the bird feeders (both in the front and back of the house), we are again reading Birds Through the Year by Gilmore. This out of print treasure gives us a treasure trove of facts about what we can expect to see and discover as we keep our eyes to the skies. Last week we were traveling and saw the largest flock of black birds EVER. What a joy for the kids to see the birds and for mom to pull this book out and fill in the gaps of what we didn't know about migration of these birds.
(go ahead click the link...it's a free B&N nook edition from the original 1923 book! you are welcome!)
Have you found any nature books recently that you'd like to share?
