Amy's Wandering

Wandering through life one season at a time

How Do I Teach Nature Study? Day 5: Nature Fun Friday

By: amyswanderingcomment

nature study

Since we often have to go out and find our nature, I have a set time each week for nature study. It is part of our Theme of the Day schedule and we call it Nature Fun Friday.

We go on a nature walk or scavenger hunt if the weather is nice. On the days we stay home, the kids will usually do a nature page and a craft.

I try to tailor the activities to a current interest. For example, my kids were fascinated with cicadas and loved to collect the empty skins off the trees. In other parts of the country it was time for the 17-year Cicada, so we looked up news reports and watched a couple of videos. They added a cicada coloring page to their nature notebooks, and we finished out the morning by making singing cicadas.

We keep a basket of nature guides sitting out to encourage curiosity. Many a time a child has run in the door and grabbed a book to find out the name of the bug or lizard they just caught. A few of our nature guides are from PaperBackSwap, but I have purchased most of them at library book sales.

nature books

nature fun friday

{ See all of the days in this series }

Follow me on Facebook or Pinterest for more FREE resources!

How Do I Teach … 5 Day Blog Series is brought to you by the following blogs:

Enchanted Homeschooling Mom ~ Homeschool Gameschool ~ Are We There Yet? ~ Life with Moore Babies ~ No Doubt Learning ~ Mrs. Redd’s Classroom Blog ~ Proverbial Homemaker ~ My Joy Filled Life ~ Preschool Powol Packets ~ Adventures in Mommydom ~ Vicki Arnold ~ Only Passionate Curiosity ~ Living Life and Learning ~ Farm Fresh Adventures ~ 3 Dinosaurs ~ For This Season

How Do I Teach Nature Study? Day 4: Make It Easy

By: amyswanderingcomment

nature study

In our early years of homeschooling, I got caught up in trying to make everything an educational experience. Our attempts at nature study usually ended in one of two ways:

1- I squashed the fun out of our explorations by trying to turn everything into a project.
OR
2- We never got around to nature study because my plans were too elaborate to carry out.

All of you tired and stretched-too-thin homeschool Mommas, relax and slow down. You know what your kids are going to remember about nature study? Two things –> God’s creation is amazingly beautiful, and YOU spent time with THEM admiring it.

Don’t worry about whether Charlotte Mason would approve of your activities, or whether your nature journals are worthy of being displayed on the coffee table. Just pick somewhere to start and have fun!!

I am a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants gal. I thrive on having a weekly routine in place, but please oh please don’t make me decide now what we might want to explore three months from now. Or even next week! Nature study is one area where we can pick and choose according to what we are interested in at the moment.

Having our nature notebook printables ready to go is the key to making our Nature Fun Fridays run smoothly. I can create lists of activities, and pages of printables, but those are useless if they just stay on my computer. I keep a binder filled with pages that we might want to use during the current school year. It is super quick and easy to flip through and find something to do each week.

nature binder

My Nature Notebooking Binder is divided into five sections:
{I am linking to a few examples of what I have in each section.}

Do you have a nature table to show us, or maybe a Nature Study Pinterest board? Get those links ready because tomorrow we will have a Nature Fun Friday linky!

{ See all of the days in this series }

Follow me on Facebook or Pinterest for more FREE resources!

How Do I Teach … 5 Day Blog Series is brought to you by the following blogs:

Enchanted Homeschooling Mom ~ Homeschool Gameschool ~ Are We There Yet? ~ Life with Moore Babies ~ No Doubt Learning ~ Mrs. Redd’s Classroom Blog ~ Proverbial Homemaker ~ My Joy Filled Life ~ Preschool Powol Packets ~ Adventures in Mommydom ~ Vicki Arnold ~ Only Passionate Curiosity ~ Living Life and Learning ~ Farm Fresh Adventures ~ 3 Dinosaurs ~ For This Season

How Do I Teach Nature Study? Day 3: Nature Notebooks

By: amyswandering2 Comments

nature study

Everyone has different ideas about notebooking. Some stick strictly to traditional notebooking pages. My definition? If it fits in a notebook, it is a notebooking page!

Every week we do something for Nature Fun Friday. We try to add a page to our nature notebooks each week. The kids might sketch something they saw on a nature walk, color a detailed page, or complete an activity sheet. On rainy days we do a nature craft, or read from a nature story ebook.

Nature notebook pages are not limited to only the animals in your area. Pick a chapter from the Handbook of Nature Study and learn about whatever you want! Choose coordinating activity pages and you can open up a whole new world for your child.

I have been working hard to create a Nature Notebook Master List to provide you with pages of FREE resources for your nature study! I will be continually adding new activities, so be sure to Pin or bookmark!

nature notebook master list

—> VIEW THE NATURE NOTEBOOK MASTER LIST <—

~*~ Do YOU utilize notebooking in your nature study ? ~*~

Join me tomorrow to see how I organize our notebooking resources!

{ See all of the days in this series }

Follow me on Facebook or Pinterest for more FREE resources!

How Do I Teach … 5 Day Blog Series is brought to you by the following blogs:

Enchanted Homeschooling Mom ~ Homeschool Gameschool ~ Are We There Yet? ~ Life with Moore Babies ~ No Doubt Learning ~ Mrs. Redd’s Classroom Blog ~ Proverbial Homemaker ~ My Joy Filled Life ~ Preschool Powol Packets ~ Adventures in Mommydom ~ Vicki Arnold ~ Only Passionate Curiosity ~ Living Life and Learning ~ Farm Fresh Adventures ~ 3 Dinosaurs ~ For This Season

How Do I Teach Nature Study Without Moving to the Country?

By: amyswandering1 Comment

I am joining up with some of your favorite homeschool bloggers this week to bring you the How Do I Teach…? series. I am so excited and know you are just going to love all of the helpful topics!

My struggle with nature study started with a case of blog envy. I would scroll through pictures of kids frollicking in the woods and wading through streams, and read about all of the delightful creatures they discovered along the way. Then I would look out my suburban window and sigh at the blandness of it all.

A wonderful thing happened though, when we decided to get outside and make the best of it. We discovered that God’s amazing creation is everywhere. Sometimes you just have to look a little bit harder!

nature study

I will be sharing all of my tips and tricks this week on discovering nature in your own backyard. Some things we will explore:

  • Attracting Nature
  • Using All Your Senses
  • Encouraging Exploration
  • Nature Crafts
  • Notebooking and Organization

Stay tuned for some Nature Study Fun!!

~~~~~

How Do I Teach … 5 Day Blog Series is brought to you by the following blogs:

Enchanted Homeschooling Mom ~ Homeschool Gameschool ~ Are We There Yet? ~ Life with Moore Babies ~ No Doubt Learning ~ Mrs. Redd’s Classroom Blog ~ Proverbial Homemaker ~ My Joy Filled Life ~ Preschool Powol Packets ~ Adventures in Mommydom ~ Vicki Arnold ~ Only Passionate Curiosity ~ Living Life and Learning ~ Farm Fresh Adventures ~ 3 Dinosaurs ~ For This Season

nature notebook master list

© Amy's Wandering, 2006-2021. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and owner is strictly prohibited. Links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Amy's Wandering at amyswandering.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
June 2025
S M T W T F S
1234567
891011121314
15161718192021
22232425262728
2930  

HSSeasonsFBnew

Follow Amy T @ Are We There Yet?'s board Homeschool - Organize on Pinterest.
Facebook