Week in Review - Week 4

Last week was a short week for us as we were out of town on Thursday and Friday at Sauder Village and the Toledo Zoo. Our little trip was the first field trip of the school year for us and it was treasured by all, particularly my husband and I, who loved the time away.

The first three days of the week were filled with the children's regular independent work. We also made progress on our American Revolution unit study. We primarily focused on events leading up to the American Revolution so we studied the Intolerable Acts, Boston Massacre, and Boston Tea Party. We studied two important patriots as well - Patrick Henry and Benjamin Franklin. My daughter has decided that Benjamin Franklin is her favorite person from that time period. We read an excellent picture book biography about Benjamin Franklin that I would recommend, The Amazing Life of Benjamin Franklin.

We left very early Thursday morning to attend Sauder Village for the day. We enjoyed an absolutely lovely day of living history. My husband and I, in particular, love living history museums. We headed first to the "Natives and Newcomers" area where we toured Native American homes and learned a bit about their way of life in the Black Swamp area of Ohio. Most amazing to us was the "large" house that would typically hold 12-16 people. I reflected quite a bit on how my expectations for privacy would be so different if I lived in such close quarters with so many others.

This house was considered a small dwelling and would be used for 6-8 people. Outside the house was a corn grinding station. My little one truly enjoyed beating the big stick in the corn! We spent quite a bit of time in the trading post. Our visit to the trading post fit in perfectly with our studies as we had talked a lot about the fur trade between the Native Americans and the Europeans and the impact of the fur trade on the French and Indian War. The living history trading post person was full of knowledge and was eager to share it with our family. She asked the children lots of questions - some of which they could answer! We learned that the beaver pelt was the base of the currency exchange. The trading post was filled with furs and also lots and lots of items that would be desirable to the Native Americans for trade.Children and pumpkins - I couldn't resist taking a picture. All things autumnal are my weakness! My daughter's favorite shop was the Printer's Shop. We asked the living history printer which printer was like the one that Benjamin Franklin used. He showed us this one and even demonstrated how it would work. The living history printer was a retired newspaper man and was absolutely full of knowledge about the printing industry. When he told Kevin and I that newspapers didn't start using computers for printing until the 70s - WE felt like living history. A visit to the quaint little ice cream shop was much appreciated by all. The generous servings of ice cream for $1.00 each was much appreciated by Kevin!After a full day of living history, we were ready to relax in our hotel. We stayed on-site at the Sauder Village Inn. We were so impressed by this absolutely lovely hotel. The hallways were filled with beautiful quilts and rich woodwork was everywhere I looked.
By far, though, my very favorite part of the hotel was the lovely courtyard which was accessible by walking out the back door of our hotel room to the patio. I sat out there as much as possible in the evening! The sound of the falling water was so relaxing.

And, of course, they had a beautiful pool that the children enjoyed!

We spent the next day at the Toledo Zoo. I was most impressed by how close we could get to so many of the animals. My favorite animal there was the meerkat. We so enjoyed watching the meerkat that was so clearly guarding his group's territory. We were so close we could hear the little noises that he was making. The meerkat must have been used to having people stand and watch him because he didn't seem to perceive us a threat of any kind.

The polar bear exhibit was fantastic. We were able to get so close to the polar bears since they were behind a clear enclosure. We watched a polar bear play in the water - he seemed so very BIG! The display of a polar bear on his hind legs really helped to reinforce the bigness of this animal.

The aviary was incredible. I could have spent hours just in there watching the birds. The birds were free to fly around in each room. This lovely bird landed within inches of me and seemed to demand that I take its picture.

My husband and I were impressed that the wolves had deer carcasses to eat. We were so close to the wolf that we could hear the crunching of bone.

The Toledo Zoo has a fabulous hippo exhibit where visitors can get really close and watch the hippos playing in the water. Sadly, most of the hippos were inside and the one hippo that was outside seemed quite content to simply stay in the mud.

For me, an educational away-from-home field trip is just the thing to prevent homeschool burn-out. Every time I take one of these lovely trips with my family I am fully reminded of why I chose to start out on this homeschool journey.

If you would like to see what other homeschoolers did this week, check out the Weekly Wrap-Up at Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.