Google the Galaxy

There may not be internet service out in space yet, but at least you can Google the galaxy.

In honor of the 4oth anniversary of the first moon walk Google is taking us out from the Earth, into the Galaxy, and onto the moon. With Google Earth on your computer you can go right in and check out the moon stuff. Otherwise, you can view the promotional Moon in Google earth video and see what it's all about.

Another couple of things to check out:

• Mythbusters debunk the moon conspiracy theory myth.
• Buzz Aldrin didn't just hit a conspiracy theorist with words, he packed a punch and was taken to court. I'm not one to condone violence, but where do these conspiracy theorists get their crazy ideas and the nerve to pursue them?

Did you do something yesterday to commemorate the moon landing? Got some more links to recommend? Please share.

* Growing Green

Find this article in it's new home at Loving Nature's Garden.

* A Gentle Way of Gardening

Please visit this article at Loving Nature's Garden.

Learning Links

I'm not sure what you'll learn, but it's gotta be something! For your enjoyment and perusal today:

• Cool for cats, Cat Trail Tunnels. I'm sure Big Cat and Princess Kitty would love these instead of the emu feather toy I've bought them for Christmas. Whatever will they think of next? Ummm, apparently a pink, kitty purse! Princess Kitty might be a princess but she'd rather have 10 minutes of attention!
  
• Are you a Christmas movie buff. Apparently I'm not. Try the Can You Name That Christmas Movie challenge at Hooked on Houses. Boy, that little stone-built house is so appealing to me. That's what comes of growing up in a country littered with old, crumbling, stone houses.
  
• Got kids? They might want to write a letter to our new President and have it delivered on National Handwriting Day. Details at Handwriting Without Tears (thank you to Sara of RainSolace for bringing this to my attention).
• Need some reading about living wisely? Check out Mother Earth News. One of their articles is on planting edible ground cover. Need some irreverent commentary and inspiration on being kind to the Earth? Try Crunchy Chicken. Is bamboo really Earth friendly -the New York Times on bamboo.
• Bloggers are giving back instead of giving away at Bloggers Give Back.
• What do new moms do all day? The RookieMoms blog brings stuff for new moms to do each day. Cool, it's like homeschooling from Day 1!
• Looking for a new blog design? Smitten Blog Designs has a variety of nice looking, free blog templates and some nifty limited edition designs for a surprisingly great price. Are you putting a new blog design on your holiday wishlist?
• What Christmas ornament are you? Go on, nip over there and find out!
  

There are lots more learning links where these came from, but they'll have to wait for now :-)

Brought to you by GreatFunbooks.com - with Christmas titles from Usborne and Christmas sets from Usborne

Homeschooling Science Online with CyberEd

This year for science my family chose CyberEd science online, available through the Homeschool Buyers Co-op. Now the news has been released that CyberEd are closing their business doors. This product is available only until December 3rd at 1pm Eastern, and only, I believe, through Homeschool Buyers Co-op. Subscriptions run for one calendar year and will be honored; sign up now and you can cover science needs until December 2009. Given that I've found a science curriculum supplier we are extremely pleased with, I am left wondering what to do.

Game Boy has been using the CyberEd Physical Science course, which is just the right level for a middle schooler. He hasn't complained at all about this course, which is a big endorsement around our house. In fact he is self-motivated; he works on it every school day without prompting from me. Of course he might rather be playing a video game, but he likes the interaction of this course. I've every reason to believe that while using CyberEd Physical Science he is tying together a lot of knowledge gained from years of TV science programs, and masses of science books he's read over and over. The only thing it is lacking is related hands-on experiments, which I can easily cover from a few of the Usborne science books I have on my bookshelves. Since Game Boy is a good way through the Physical Science course, I'm seriously contemplating signing up for the Life Science and Earth Science courses - I think he could get to the end of all 3 by December 2009.

Artist Girl, who is working at high school level, is using CyberEd Biology. What she likes about this course is that it is to the point and does not cover any excess unnecessary stuff. In fact CyberEd Biology is described as Introductory to AP Biology. I'd say that is pretty accurate. For Artist Girl it's a pretty big assignment to get through this course in one year. She knows a lot of Biology already from previous homeschool studying; it's the terminology/vocabulary that makes it challenging. With a motivated student who has a good background knowledge you can get through the course in one year. You don't have to do the whole course though. One thing you get with the course is an extremely comprehensive guide to how CyberEd Biology fits with your state standards. Let's say that guide is not for the faint hearted. What it conveyed to me however was that once Artist Girl finishes CyberEd Biology she will have covered almost all of the Kansas state requirements for Biology, a good number of the requirements for Chemistry, and even some of the Physics requirements. I had every intention of us using CyberEd Chemistry next year, but I know we can't get through the remainder of Biology and start Chemistry now and get through Chemistry by December of 2009. So much for finding a course format we like; unless Homeschool Buyers Co-op pull off some kind of alternative agreement, we'll be searching for something else.

OK, well if you like the sound of CyberEd science courses, hot-foot it over there to Homeschool Buyers Co-op and get signed up before the December 3rd deadline. I can thoroughly recommend the Physical Science, Earth Science, and Life Science courses for your independent middle schooler who likes computer based learning. The high school courses I think are wonderful, but not for everyone.

Blogging in association with Amazon.com - home of the Kindle.

Homeschooling Thankfulness

I am very thankful for all the wonderful things in my life: my health; my family; friends both near and far; the opportunity to homeschool my children; my adopted country and the country of my birth; this wonderful Earth we live on; good food and clean water; heat and light; books and learning; a comfortable bed to snuggle in at night; safe soil to grow food in; trees to shade me from the summer sun... you get the picture.

Whatever I may feel is lacking in my life, or myself, today I push that aside and realize all the wonderful things I have to be thankful for. Thank you for reading.

Lessons I Learned From My Goldfish

Fish School at Amazon.com
Children can learn a lot from pets; in fact we all can if we stop and think about it. Most of the lessons seem simple, but perhaps they are actually profound.

The very first pet I ever part-owned was a goldfish, won at a carnival, and proudly carried home in a plastic bag. I was very, very excited about having a pet. After we got home Goldie was temporarily housed in a bucket until we could get to a pet store to secure an appropriate glass globe bowl for him. Once safely installed in his bowl, Goldie was overfed and under-cared-for to a dramatic extent. It's a testament to the toughness of goldfish that he lived for what seems to me like a long time (most likely several months), rather than a mere matter of hours. So what exactly can I thank Goldie, and the string of pet goldfish who followed, for?

1. There's stuff around us that we can't see. Somehow Goldie's bowl if left uncleaned would start to grow green algae. It was a great mystery to me how algae could appear apparently from nowhere. My parents' explanation that algae could come out of thin air seemed like magic, yet it taught me that there are great mysteries all around us and we can't always believe our eyes.
   
2. It takes energy to maintain a steady state. Goldie's bowl did not stay clean without effort on the part of my parents. I'm ashamed to say that when I was a child the way we cleaned out a goldfish bowl was as follows: on a weekly basis goldfish and water were tipped into our dishwashing bowl; the bowl was cleaned out with a cloth or sponge; fresh tapwater was put into Goldie's bowl; Goldie was caught in a jar or mug and emptied back into his nice, clean bowl. You'd have thought he'd be happy at that point.
   
3. Living things need clean water that is not polluted with chemicals. Abrupt change leads to shock. Since we'd paid no attention to getting rid of the chlorine in tap water or to getting the water up to room temperature Goldie was rather shocked on return to his bowl.
4. Alcohol makes you go kind of crazy. If Goldie's shock on return to his bowl looked like it was too much for him, the usual remedy was to add a few drops of brandy to his water. I kid you not! At that point he would zoom around his bowl at hyperspeed and either recover, or deteriorate quickly and be destined for flushing down the toilet.
5. We feel better if we take deliberate action, no matter if it is inappropriate and futile, rather than watching something go wrong while we fail to act. I'm sure that the brandy did not help Goldie one bit, but I hated to stand and watch him wobble around the bowl in his "nice, fresh, water" and felt that I should be doing something to help. Pleading with my parents caused them to bring out the brandy. At that point I felt I'd done my best to help him (or subsequent goldfish) whatever the outcome.

Apparently I could even have learned about operant conditioning by training Goldie. As it is, today while thinking about the Earth and our finite resources I was reminded of Goldie and his life in the goldfish bowl. I'm satisfied that goldfish toys would have been an unimportant distraction from the important things in life.

Thank you Goldie for some very important lessons and I'm sorry that I did not take better care of you :-(

* Green Cooking

This article can be found at Loving Nature's Garden.

Homeschoolers Guide to the Galaxy - lesson plans on the galaxy

Got kids who are curious about space and the galaxy? DON'T PANIC! I've gathered educational debris from the corners of space and time and squeezed it together here for you in the form of lesson plan links. I can also recommend several books with great information, including the Usborne First Encylopedia of Space which gives you access to over 40 great pre-selected websites. One of the links takes you to a kid site at the European Space Agency.

I think the Earth, space, the planets and all that stuff are amazing, but I've put off sharing on this because it's not an area of expertise for me. If you're an astronomer, or something similar, professional or amateur, and have some input I'd love to hear from you. I've focused on picking out legitimate sources.

• For elementary level or beginning astronomy try the kids site at Astronomy magazine where you can learn about the solar system, constellations, navigation using the stars, and the craters of the moon.
• The makers of Starlab portable planetarium systems have a free newsletter you can sign up for. You don't need to own a Starlab to learn from their newsletters.
• Astronomy is a pretty complex field with lots of jargon to learn. Read about Charles Messier, a leading early French astronomer who compiled a list of 100 astronomical objects. His Messier Catalog became well known as a collection of the most beautiful objects in the sky including nebulae, star clusters, and galaxies. Your little, or big, astronomer can read about spiral, lenticular and elliptical galaxies and see photos here.
• I'd recommend visiting your local planetarium (read the next sentence). Meet some enthusiastic experts or amateurs if you can. Sky and Telescope has a pretty nice site with pages on this week's sky, a place to search for local observatories and clubs, stargazing basics and projects which include building a sundial.
• Discovery School has a selection of teacher resources related to the galaxy for grades 6-12.
• Kids excited about space and want a longer study? I recommend you take a look at the Usborne Ten Terrific Weeks Upper Elementary Adventures in Space program. It comes with 4 books, including the Internet Linked Book of Astronomy and Space, and a guide. See an overview here.
  

If you've a teen at home who loves science fiction can you do an exploration of the galaxy without a copy of the Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy? It's the mostly harmless classic that inspired the title of my blog. I must admit to being inordinately fond of the original BBC series in preference to the more recent movie. The BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) has many pages on the web that relate - see a list. I've picked out a few favorites - a summary of the story, memories from the original radio series, and Vogon poetry. Here's a pdf study guide to the book - handy for me because Game Boy just finished reading it! Check out this inordinately irritating quiz - get one question wrong and it sends you back to start over!

I'm done wandering the galaxy for now, though I'm sure I'll be traveling again later because there are so many places to go!

Catching up on September

Monarch Magic at Amazon.com
Sometimes weeks go by and I wonder what on Earth I've been doing with my time. I find that writing is a great way to review what is going on in my life and to realize that I really have actually achieved something. With that in mind, her's an update on items I've blogged about in the last month or so:

Monarch, Mini and Tiny, our monarch caterpillars, successfully transformed into beautiful butterflies. We had the amazing pleasure of watching them fly off to a new life. I'll never tire of raising monarchs!

Four weeks after planting, my fall vegetables have given us our first green salad. I wasn't sure what to expect with this gardening adventure. Germination was faster than I expected, then the weather cooled and everything seemed to grow very little. The weather warmed back up and now the greens are at least six inches tall. I picked a salad while thinning them out a couple of days back. That was 4 weeks from planting to yield the first food - not bad!

My green improvements have not gone anywhere to date - they exist only in my head.

The spikey trees are still standing, but Handyman Hubby has studied and so have I. He has a plan and is ready to go as soon as he has some time to get out there. Everything we've read and everyone we've spoken to says that herbicide is the way to go when removing trees for prairie restoration. I don't like to spray, but I reluctantly agree that in this situation that carefully targeted herbicide is the best approach. OK, send me the hate mail now for using herbicide if you must! Humans have created this problem of trees invading the grassland and we need to be responsible and clear it up.

I'm on my own so far as I know with the Green Laundry Challenge (no readers told me they joined in yet). I've successfully cut my use of the tumble drier down to practically zero. Initially I planned to just air dry when I felt like it, but soon I began to do this for more and more laundry. To date I've air dried 18 loads of laundry - some of them were very full loads too. I've even started making crunchy towels; I discovered that if I really want softer towels 10 minutes of no-heat tumbling in the drier will soften them up reasonably. This is nice because that uses a LOT less electricity.

I'm happy with our homeschool choices for this year. It's the first year I've been able to say that. I'm particularly happy with Rosetta Stone. It's totally awesome to hear Japanese and German coming from the other side of the room; it feels like my kids have been replaced with strange counterparts! I'm proud of how we are doing with homeschooling this year. It does look like we need to make a change on how we're doing social studies; the one subject we have been doing as a family seems to need a change, which I suppose is not terribly surprising given that we have a 3 year age gap and two kids who take dramatically different approaches to learning.There are many things I'd like to have done this last month, but I think I've done the things that are most important to me and to my family and that feels good :-)

* Rocket Stove - cooking with just a few sticks

This article can now be found at Loving Nature's Garden.

* I Admire You Because...

This article can be found at Loving Nature's Garden.

Blog Roundup #1

I've found so many great blogs in the last week that I just can't keep up with writing articles that touch on each topic so that I can showcase them. I have so many tabs open on Firefox that I'll likely have to reboot soon. It's time to have a clear-up and share what I've found. In the order I found them, here goes:

• Random Jottings - taking a fresh look at life from San Francisco
• Homemakers Guide to the Galaxy - homeschooling while loving henna
• Fireflies, Frogs and Mosquitos - Oh My! - adventures with the Condie family (I like the title)
• Eco-savvy Kid - a 10 year old school kid who cares about our planet
• A Spot of Sun - writing by a mom of five
• Biking for Breast Cancer - two lads cycling from John O' Groats to Lands End - follow their adventure
• Vinderama - a personal tour of the Olympics
• Bitterroot and Bergamot - a log of pristine places
• B J Parady - Fiber art and other things of note from along the Mississippi River
• Adora's Blog - from a 10 year old writer in Redmond, WA
• Armadillo's Book Blog - book reviews and rants (mostly book reviews) from a homeschooling family
• Help! My Kids are Smarter than Me - I know the feeling - from a homeschooling mom of two
• Guy Steven Mountain Leader - photo rich commentary from a guy who hikes the mountains of Scotland and beyond
• Basado En Una Historia Irreal - I've no idea what it means (I just speak English) but the photos paint a thousand words - very nice photography!
• Planeto Postal - again I've no clue about the writing, but the photos are intriguing

Well, that got rid of a few tabs I had open! I hope you found something worth browsing in that list. Let me know what you think :-)