September 8, 2011 - Science Co-Op

The co-op continues to go well. The high school students worked on Module #3 in Apologia's Exploring Creation Through Biology. Lego-Man seems to be doing well with the class - keeping up - completing his assignments - and learning. That's all I can hope for right now.

The younger kids and I had a blast. I just wish I had brought my camera. I was a bit frazzled when I first arrived as I had forgotten to bring the teacher guide for CGC. I had my lesson plan typed up so I decided to just use that as a base. It worked.

We reviewed what we had learned the previous week. The kids did a great job sharing so I know they are listening! We had a rip-roaring Bible drill. They seem to enjoy this but one young man obviously knows his Bible and wins more than the rest. He suggested that those that win sit out a round so that offered up a chance for others to snag the verse. I'm actually surprised how much they like this part!

One verse we discussed a bit more than others was Job 38:7 which says....(I'm sharing Job 38:1-7 for context):

The the LORD spoke to Job out of the storm. He said:

"Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge? 

Brace yourself like a man; I will question you, and you shall answer me.

Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? Tell me, if you understand.

Who marked off its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line across it?

On what were its footings set, or who laid its cornerstone - 

while the morning stars sang together and all the angels shouted for joy?

The CGC book shares how scientists have "discovered" that stars emit sounds. I just found a neat BBC video that actually shares this with actual sound footage from a star.




The we created a fun notebook page from CGC. It was a model of the solar system made in to a notebook page. It did mean a lot of cutting and pasting, but most finished it by the time we took a snack break.

After snack we headed outside to create a model of the solar system. What fun! I found a neat site called "Jump to Jupiter" that had a model I felt we could construct outside. I was just thankful the rain had stopped long enough to create this.

For our sun we used a softball. Most of our planets were represented by pepper flakes and poppy seeds while the giants were represented by marbles. The original plan was to do so many "jumps" before placing the next planet.  For example - it was 600 jumps from the sun to Pluto! However, we quickly ran out of room! Instead we had the children do a "toe-to-heel" step which fit much better. We still used about 500 yards of space. It definitely put things in perspective!


Day #12/175 Days