Today we had a total of 18 kids (and 6 moms) ranging in age from 10 months to 14 years for a fun-filled day of owl pellet dissection.
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| I had no idea so many kids could fit at my table! |
A little background: Owls eat rodents and they eat them whole. They can't digest the fur and bones, so they "yarp" up a pellet instead of eliminating the undigestables out the other end. Ever since IJ read
The Guardians of Ga'Hoole, he has been very interested in owls.
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| Owl Pellet |
I offered to host a Science Day for our new little homeschool group and bought a bunch of these nasty-looking pellets for the kids to dissect. It was fun! MESSY, but fun. I seriously do NOT recommend doing this kind of project at home if you have any pet hair or rodent or messy things issues. Now, why on earth would I be willing to do something like this? Because I like science, I like the kids, and I like the idea of us coming together and helping each other out. I can't possibly do a project like this on my own because I just don't have enough hands for my five kids. It is so strange that bringing in 15 extra kids makes my job easier! When F asked for water, I sent her to her special mom-buddy.
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| Time for Lunch! |
After everyone washed their hands, WITH SOAP, dispensed by me, we had lunch. Lunchtime is always fun.
Everyone brought a sack lunch and we had a picnic on the floor. When the boys got crazy, we sent them out for recess and never saw them again. That was when the moms drank coffee and laughed and had fun too! But all fun comes to an end and when the friends went home, my kids had to finish their lab!
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| Finishing the Lab |
Every writing kid was given a lab sheet with a place to write out a hypothesis, a place to describe what the pellet looked like, how they dissected the pellet and what tools they used, what they found, and whether or not their hypothesis was correct. I also set up my stereomicroscope so we could get a close look at the bones!
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| "I found one of those bones!" |
E doesn't write, so she just matched her bones to the bones in the picture. IJ sorted his bones by type and estimated how many different rodents were in his pellets. S and IJ both tried to recreate the skeleton.
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| IJs Bones |
Although we were very organized and neat, some bones got away from us and ended up on the floor. Eventually, walking through the school room sounded like walking through the kitchen after D has been given cereal: Crunch, crunch!
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| Smile for the Camera! |
