Asphalt Project

There are SO many different reasons I love homeschooling, but one of them is FOR SURE this... I want my kids to learn to be LEARNERS. All of their life I want them to keep on learning. I love to turn everyday things into lessons because I want them to be the kind of people who see lessons EVERYWHERE.

Yesterday we got a new driveway!  If you want to read about it in proper order do it like this:

The Hill

A great day to wake up

Driveway

It was such an exciting experience for our family and on Friday morning I decided to turn it into a project... [we're still in the midst of that... final versions expected some time next week] Our project is CHOCK full of lessons, subjects, and experiences. By the time we are done, it will have included scientific hypotheses, creative writing, careful observation, photography, English, research, picture selection, caption writing and portfolio assembly. This project is the definition of AWESOME!  

We started around the kitchen table. We discussed our hypotheses of what we would see, hear, smell and touch during this project. [We discussed the fact that while taste is our fifth sense, we wouldn't really taste anything in this project.... yet STILL at the end of the day the kids BEGGED me to let them taste the driveway... NO! I didn't let them! I'm not THAT crazy!]

When we finished our conjectures we waited for the men. Every time a truck came down our road the kids RAN to the window. The excitement was so thick you could feel it. The kids wrote their blogs about what this driveway would mean for our family as they waited. 

When they arrived the kids ran outside clipboards in hand to begin checking off the items on their lists of things they would hear, see, smell and touch.

We took turns taking pictures of the event.

After at least a good hour of observation, we headed inside where we started writing out our observations. What we heard, smelled, and felt. We took time later in the day to go and FEEL the driveway, which ended with them barrel rolling down the driveway as the landlord arrived to check it out.

Today we are finishing up our writing, choosing pictures, sending them to be printed, and then starts the portfolio assembly. We plan to send one completed portfolio to our landlord so he can take part in the fun too!

And here's the best part.... the kids hardly realize that I snuck in grammar, science, creative writing, photography, and a myriad of other lessons! woohoo! That's what I call a homeschooling victory!