This month has been a long, distracted buzz!
But . . . in my last post, I mentioned that we’ve been working on “book projects” for summer break.
Very simply—we’re working through some longer books over the course of a week. Then we come up with hands-on projects related to each day’s reading session.
For the first week of summer break, we worked on an art project based on cave paintings.
This week’s project focused on volcanoes–and what happens when a volcano creates a new island.
For this project, we read Life on Surtsey: Iceland’s Upstart Island by Loree Griffen Burns. This book is from the Scientists in the Field series, one of my favorite science series for older kids.
This chapter book explains how scientists have studied a new(ish) volcanic island off the coast of Iceland. The island formed in 1963. Since then, new plants and birds have steadily appeared on the island. They’ve migrating from other nearby islands or were carried in by wind and waves.
Scientists use Surtsey as an island laboratory. On Surtsey, they can see how long it takes for new species to arrive. They can also study how well those species thrive on the rocky island.
Life on Surtsey is a fun exploration of both science and nature. And yes, we built our own volcano as one of our book projects!
For our volcano, we started with the science-fair special–vinegar and baking soda. Then we experimented with adding either yeast or dish soap, based on this recipe for Elephant Toothpaste. The extra ingredient created a foamier eruption, which the kids enjoyed.
This week’s book, though, mainly focused on the plant and animal life growing on Surtsey. So, our main project for this book was a bug survey . . .
For this survey, we picked three smaller areas of our yard. (This matched the scientist’s survey plots on Surtsey.) We picked plots in our garden, a patch of clover, and a shady spot in the backyard.
Then we spent 10 minutes in each plot, counting all the insects we spotted during before our timer beeped.
Sure, we’re not going to change science with our observations. We did learn, though, that the clover in our front yard was full of bees. The shady backyard, on the other hand, was full of box elder bugs.
We found that bees are most visible since they fly above the grass. When we pulled the grass apart and looked closer, we found spiders, harvestmen, mites, leafhoppers, and ants.
We had planned to do a second survey and compare the two results, but ended up skipping that step.
If you do attempt a second survey, try these different variations to see how the insect population changes in different scenarios:
- Same time of day, two or threes weeks later.
- Same time of day, different weather.
- Same day, different times.
If we did this project again, I would probably change the plots to a sit-spot. Each of us would pick one spot and count all the bugs we can see from that spot.
Our plots were smaller than the scientists’ plots, but they were still a bit large for my kids. Using smaller sit-spots would make it easier for kids to focus and look through layers of grass.
Also, we learned that ten minutes is too long for younger kids!
Preschoolers do better with 1-2 minutes of observation, while older kids can focus for longer.
Want to try a bug survey that helps scientists? Check out the Lost Ladybug Project and start photographing and recording ladybugs where ever you go!
And if you are interested in more geology projects, be sure to check out this list of kids’ activities for learning about rocks.
