Today we utilised our ‘Ticket of Leave’ to visit Port Arthur with Babcia. She has wanted to go there every time she has visited with us, So today was her lucky day!
Tag Archive for 'Geography'
Today we received two wonderful cards. One from China it was of the Giant Panda’s. WangLi explained on the back of the card how to write ‘Giant Panda’ in Chinese characters, which was really cool! Today I want to try and encourage the children to write it themselves in the Chinese characters – Maybe if they see me trying they will attempt it themselves! – If they do I shall be sure to add their attempts here…
This card travelled 8,616 Kilometres over 11 days to land in our mail box!
Giant Panda's - China
The second postcard we received was from Cindy in Taiwan. It shows the ‘Cave of the eight immortals’. This is a very interesting place and yet information was not easy to find for us.
We did however learn the following after reading on the following website – www.taiwan.com.au
Basiandong is located in the north of Huatung Mountain by the coast of Changbin Township. “Basian”, or the Eight Immortals, are famous Chinese deities. Fogs drift perpetually around the caves and the interior is damp and misty. As the environment resembles that in the folklore when the eight deities cross the ocean, the caves were named Basian. In the caves, Taiwan’s first prehistoric site was discovered. As the earth’s crusts elevated, the mountains were constantly eroded by the sea and 16 caves of different sizes were formed along the cliff as high as 100 meters
For more information about this interesting place please visit www.taiwan.com.au
Cave of the Eight Immortals - Taiwan
Well today has been a day at home. Which seem to be few and far between at the moment. We have done some more learning about Egypt watching a Discovery Atlas presentation called ‘Egypt Revealed’. It was an amazing look inside Egypt today and how is is still shaped by many old traditions and customs. The children found it amazing to learn that some children as young as Seven are sent off into Cairo from outlaying town to work and earn money for their families to survive.
Equally they were amazed to learn of women who must ask permission from their husbands before even leaving their home. The children also were amazed at also learning that women have to wear traditional clothing that covers their whole body when out in public. No part of their body or even their face can be seen.
Our learning about the world around us and different countries, cultures and traditions is proving to be such a wonderful experience for us all. The children definitely seem to be a lot more mindful of others and their beliefs, actions, traditions and customs. Which is great!
Flag of Egypt
I thought that I would start to share some of the ‘Missions’ that we are embarking on as part of our geography learning for our home education.
Here is our first mission, lets hope it is lots of fun and very informative and stay tuned for our next mission…
So where in the world have your groceries travelled from?
Briefing:
We all eat a variety of foods each day, but how often do you actually think about how far that food has travelled to get to your plate or where it has come from. When you are next at the supermarket buying your groceries, take the time to look at the products you purchase and see what countries they come from. Become aware of the food you eat and how much travelling it does to get to you.
Your Mission:
Mark on a world map the countries where the items you purchase in your weekly shopping originate from
Questions to answer:
- List the countries where your groceries have come from
- Then use this information to create a diagram showing which countries your shopping items came from. You may choose to use a graph, pie chart or similar. The choice is yours.
- What country do your groceries mainly come from? What percentage?
- Why do you think these foods are imported mainly from this country?
- Do your fresh foods come from local growers or are they also imported from overseas?
- How do you feel about your groceries coming from all over the world to get on your plate?
Extension Activities:
Pick one of the grocery items from your shopping and learn about the country where it is produced.
Research a meal that you could make using your chosen product. Ensure that the meal is usually made and eaten in the country that it has come from. Create the meal at home and share it with your family.
Explore whether or not this grocery item could have been grown / made closer to home. What are your findings?
Interested in joining us on this mission? Please let us know by emailing us at info@golab.info.
We will post our findings on here once we have finished the mission!
Well as part of our home schooling we have started to look at the world around us and the subject of geography more in depth. This means that we will be working on a series of ‘missions’ that the children will have to undertake.
As things progress we will share these missions with you and the interesting facts and figures we find along the way.
The world and all it has to offer will be one of our themes for the next 12 months. We will be starting out with learning about the continents and progressing from that to the individual countries within them. So much fun and learning to be had!
