A Relaxed Week: Swimming Creatures

After the Heart Retreat I really didn't have the energy or feel the need to rush back into our daily plan. We also had a homeschool ski trip booked, which God had other plans for - no snow, no sunshine. So at the start of the week I picked up the Swimming Creatures book we put aside at the start of the year and we have meandered through the chapters.

• Monday: We started with Chapter one looking at the types of swimming creatures, the currents in the oceans, tides. After lunch we started on Whales, using several of the lapbook templates from Homeschool Share lapbooking. Lots of paper and fun.
  
  
• Tuesday we finished off Whales and moved onto Seals and Sea Cows. Again the Homeschool share lapbook has a unit on Manatees and we used several of their materials.
  
  
• Wednesday we moved onto the aquatic reptiles and amphibians, again expanding our time with a lapbook project on Sea Turtles.
  
  
• Thursday we looked at prehistoric sea creatures, I had thought this would be a quick session that we worked through quickly and moved on from, it wasn't. There was an interesting exercise at the end of the study using Venn diagrams to consider what the Leviathan of the bible might be. It seemed like a useful project in getting them to use this tool to evaluate ideas and options.
  
  
• Originally our ski day this will give us a chance to look at fish. I would like to finish sharks are well, but I don't think we will make it that far.
  

As a gap week it's been more refreshing than our usual non school weeks. I've caught up on some rest and am back up to my daughter in Latin. I'm glad we took it off. Now to manage what we do next week.