The Stream

Emma's geology lesson today was studying the parts of a river. My initial plans were to read the Usborne Encyclopedia of the World page on rivers and create a notebook page by drawing a river and labeling it's parts. However Spring Fever has hit. We have been spending more time outside and less time doing actual written schoolwork (we are on half days now with just math, science, and reading). I decided this lesson would be better suited for hands on learning. We headed over to the Woodpecker Trail to find the little stream that has a waterfall right near the crossing bridge. It was a fun hike there but the trail was wet and muddy, but as Emma so eloquently put it, "We are adventurers, so a little mud just adds to the fun". A neat find was a whole side of the inlet bank was still snow covered...Emma begged to walk all over it (she cannot stand to see snow without foot prints), but it was not an easy place to get to and someone had to stay focused...this was a school trip for the study of rivers not snow.

We finally found the stream...it was not at the place I thought but twice as far. I decided we would hike up the stream and find a nice secluded spot to read and study the parts of the stream (which is a small river). It was a messy hike. The mud would suck our boots in and make a sucking sound when we pulled them out. Giggling and splashing we finally came to a fallen tree which made a perfect sitting spot to study our book. Now the hard part, keeping Emma focused on the lesson and not playing in the water. A few times I had to call her back to focus on the page and not the mud under her boots.

With the lesson finished we now wandered around the stream bed finding all the different parts we studied. We were able to find several curves in the stream which showed the water cutting into the bank on the outer side and depositing sand/mud on the inner side. Several little tributaries. Rocks that diverted the water or where the water was deeper on one side and shallow on the other. We dammed up a small tributary and watched it pool behind it. Found large ice sheets still there where the water disappeared under it and emerged a few yards down. We had fun floating leaved and watching them pop out on the other side of the ice shelf. As we played we used our new vocabulary as we chatted. It was fun watching Emma explore the stream where her play was intermingled with learning about the properties of water as well as how streams/rivers work.

We made our way back down the stream slowly because Emma had to keep stopping to play with rocks or mud and because I had to watch my steps, very slippery and if I wasn't careful I would be sucked into mud knee deep (it is extremely hard to pull your boot out of sucking mud when it was just covering the top of my boot, deeper mud needed me to use my hands to pull along with my leg). I think Emma is part water sprite or some wood fairy because she just fluttered on down the stream, never getting stuck in the mud. At one point I whispered for her to stop and turn very slowly around. There, on the bank, was a very large deer just watching us play. It did not seem concerned but watched and as it slowly walked along the bank. Every now and then nibbling on new growth. It was beautiful.

Before leaving the stream we stopped at the little waterfall (just about 3 feet in it's fall)to try and clean off the sticky mud. My poor boots were caked with the stuff. Emma continued to play and wander down stream....somehow she managed to stay clean and dry. The water was cold and was just coming out from an ice shelf here, but the sun was bright and it felt good. Emma explored the ice shelf and we saw neat flow patterns or area we could not figure out haw it got sculpted....an extremely cool column of ice with a hole through the top. The we made ice flows with broken off chunks and we watched them float down the stream. So much fun alongside learning. This was definitely better then creating a notebook page. There are some science topics that are better studied hands on and in the field.Our next topic of study is seashores. Wonder where we can go for that?