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Homeschool Den / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Earth Science Unit / Science: Natural Disasters Unit and Activities
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published February 2, 2015 · Last modified March 21, 2021
Last week I explained how we made an Earthquake Shake Table and shared a quick video on how we made ours. We first tested it with marshmallow structures. A couple days later, we made “brick” structures out of sugar cubes and peanut butter. We put on the documentary, Deadliest Earthquakes, and set to work. We all built our structures and then brought out our shake table to test them out! The most exciting...
Must Read / Science / Science: Earth Science Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published January 26, 2015 · Last modified February 17, 2018
The next part of our Earth Science unit was earthquakes. Today’s post I’ll explain how we made our shake table, but before I do that I want to talk a minute about of some of the activities we did leading up to that. We used a lot of the activities from Engineering Adventures. The kids’ first activity was building towers. Their first project was to build a tower of index cards...
Homeschool Den / Science: Earth Science Unit / Science: Natural Disasters Unit and Activities
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published January 23, 2015 · Last modified August 23, 2018
We have two hands-on volcano activities to share with you today; the gelatin activity was especially cool once we realized our mistake! Both of them help demonstrate how the release of pressure causes lava to flow. We had already spent a lot of time learning about plate tectonics. Earth’s volcanoes are generally found where Earth’s plates are expanding or converging. We looked closely at the parts of the volcano and...
Arts and Crafts / Science / Science: Earth Science Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published January 20, 2015 · Last modified August 22, 2018
I am SO excited to start sharing some of our hands-on Earth Science activities again! We did three or four different volcano activities and several fun Earthquake activities that we’ll share with you over the next week or two. And, of course, the long-awaited Earth science packet is just about ready to share as well. This first volcano craft is an idea I first saw over at Our Worldwide Classroom. We...
Engineering - STEM Activities / Engineering Challenges / Science: Earth Science Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published January 5, 2015 · Last modified March 30, 2015
In this post, I’m going to talk first about some engineering activities my kids did over the break… and then in the second part of this post I’m going to share an amazing free engineering resource for kids. So, first the activities! As many of you know, I found out that I would have to move our blog from our Parents.com location to this new website. That was an enormous...
Ages 2-6: Preschool (Age 4) / Ages 2-6: Preschool for ED - Fall 2011 (age 3 1/2) / Ages 2-6: Toddler/Preschool Activities / Science / Science Experiments
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published November 28, 2014 · Last modified December 30, 2014
Now that Thanksgiving is over, I have a fun activity for your with your Indian corn. We did this ‘science’ activity with Indian corn a couple of years ago. Soak your Indian corn cobs in a bit of water to see what will happen. We had a large tray with a paper towel and about 1/4 inch of water. We also pour water over the cob every 2 or 3...
Science: Earth Science Unit / Trips We've Taken
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published November 26, 2014 · Last modified April 29, 2017
We’ve been studying Earth Science and this trip to Ringing Rocks fit in perfectly!! Ringing Rocks State Park in Upper Black Eddy, Pennsylvania is a seven acre boulder field… a paradise of climbing for my kids!! What is especially neat is that if you take a rock or hammer and tap on the boulders, they ring! Different rocks make different tones, so we were all enthralled with making “rock music”!! Approximately...
Homeschool Den / Must Read / Science / Science Experiments / Science: Earth Science Unit / Science: Natural Disasters Unit and Activities
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published November 18, 2014 · Last modified March 21, 2021
We just love hands-on activities! We’ve been studying Earth Science this fall. This post shares some pictures of some of the Earth Science activities we added into our unit. Back several weeks ago, we explained how we started this unit… with an overview of our solar system, then a closer look at Earth’s geologic timeline talking about the age of the Earth (4.6 billion years) and the appearance of various...
Holiday: Halloween / Homeschool Den / Science Experiments
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 27, 2014 · Last modified June 25, 2015
A couple of years ago, we did some spooky science with dry ice. We’re going to do some of these activities again this week, but I thought I’d share some of the things we did then in case you want to try these activities with your kids. I went out and bought some dry ice and we did a number of experiments. You can see suggestions from Steve Spangler science and a...
If you live on the East Coast of the USA you should step outside this evening (6:45pm) to see the Antares Rocket being launched. This is a private rocket built by the commercial space flight company, Orbital Sciences. The launch is a commercial resupply mission for NASA. It will be bringing supplies to the International Space Station. It will launch from the Mid-Atlantic spaceport pad at Wallops Island (off the...
History: Geologic Timeline (Montessori) / Homeschool Den / Science / Science: Earth Science Unit / Science: Rocks and Minerals
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 21, 2014 · Last modified July 19, 2018
We spent about a week learning about Earth’s four eons and most recent eras. Today I wanted to share several of the activities we did to go along with this part of our unit. As you may recall, we reviewed the planets in the Solar System, talked about the age of the Earth (4.6 Billion years) and did an impressionistic activity to show how short human history actually is compared to...
History: Geography Activities / Homeschool Den / Science: Earth Science Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 13, 2014 · Last modified July 19, 2018
A few days ago, I shared the hands-on activity we did to learn about the layers of the Earth. We’ve also been learning about how we show and locate the exact positions of the land and water. I explained that most maps and globes are marked with lines that help us pinpoint an exact location on the Earth. These lines form an imaginary grid. The equator is just one of...
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 12, 2014 · Last modified September 6, 2018
Layers of the Atmosphere (Now Updated!) Worksheets, Notebook Pages and Hands-On Activities! Our Layers of the Atmosphere Packet introduced the kids to some of the basics about Earth’s atmosphere. We started with a review of Earth’s systems: the geosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere and atmosphere and then spent quite a bit of time talking about the different layers of the atmosphere (the troposphere, stratosphere, mesosphere, thermosphere and exosphere). Our Layers of the...
Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Homeschool: Random Thoughts / Science: Astronomy Unit
by Liesl - Homeschool Den · Published October 10, 2014
Did you wake your kids up to see the total lunar eclipse the other day? Hubby (my hero!) drove the kids to an open area to see the eclipse. (We live down in the woods and are completely surrounded by trees). The kids were absolutely amazed! They thought it was spectacular! On the other hand, doing something amazing like well before 5am wasn’t without its consequences… tired kids… And then...
Do you believe education can be exciting, inspiring, and full of joy? We do too!
I love the quote by William Butler Yeats, "Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire." It's about getting the kids involved, engaged, and fired up about learning (while juggling the rest of life too!)
A bit about me: I have my Master's from Brown University. I have more than 20 years of teaching experience. I was a high school teacher for many years both in the U.S. and internationally and also taught for the University of Maryland before leaving to homeschool my 3 wonderful kids.
To read more about us CLICK HERE.
Click on the image to find out more about the units and packets we have available.
This post has links to dozens of posts and resources both for new and veteran homeschoolers for everything from finding homeschool curriculum to general homeschool advice and encouragement.
Click on the image above to see the History Units we covered in our homeschool.
What science topics could I teach my 5-7 year old - Homeschool Science Curriculum
Click on the image above to see the Science Units we covered in our homeschool from elementary through middle school (and beyond!).
A list of the books we've used most in history, science, math, language arts, etc.
Click the image to check out our packets on Earth Science, Rocks and Minerals, the Atmosphere, Weather, Energy and More!
Units are also sold separately.
This is one of our most popular units. It covers the Layers of the Earth, Plate Tectonics, Earthquakes, Volcanoes and More! It is included in the Earth Science Bundle (see the picture/link above).
Click the image to see our Biology Units on Animal and Plant Cells; the Biology Unit on Biomes, Food Chains, Symbiosis; Scientific Classification & Taxonomy (Domain/Kingdom/Phylum/Class, etc.); Botany - Plant Kingdom and Oceans and Oceanography.
Click on the image to see our Animal Bundle - including the Animal Unit, Life Cycles, the Rainforest, Winter (Polar Animals) & Hibernation, Chameleons, Wolves, Cicadas and more!
The Human Body Systems, Skeletal, Digestive, Circulatory, Muscular, Nervous, Endocrine Systems and More (with lots of hands-on activity ideas)! We usually study a different body system each year.
Click on the image to see our units on the States of matter, Properties of Matter, Electricity & Circuits, and the Chemistry Unit (Get to know the Periodic Table in a fun way!)
This is a free checklist I put together of the various science units I hope to cover in the elementary and middle school years.
Do your kids know the 4 largest countries? Which countries have the most people? The longest river? This packet covers basic world and U.S. facts and also covers geographic features and land forms.
Click on the image to check out our 100-page unit on World War I.
We have used AAS for 6 years! AAS is an affiliate link.
Dozens of posts about how to create a homeschool writing workshop.
Click on the image to check out all of our fun K-2 Math Packets.
This is one of the best values we have... more than 20 PDFs with games, activities and worksheets to learn/practice the multiplication facts ($7.00).
Click on the image to discover some of the pages, posts and homeschool resources within our blog that might be the most useful for you including a long list of our freebies!
Click on the image to check out our 100+page Rocks and Minerals Unit.
This is a fun, hands-on unit for early elementary students!
How the body is organized from cells to tissues... organs to body systems
Click on the image to check out some of the Spanish worksheet bundles we have available!
Click on the image above to check out our German worksheets.
Click on the image to find out more about our units and packets.
