Back on New Year's Day Kaelyn asked us what a resolution is. She then decided that she wanted to learn more about nature this year. When we got back from Wisconsin we made a list of different nature topics she was interested in. We decided to start with the moon since a lot of the list was seasonal and we could study the moon any time.
She started by making a little book about the moon phases. Her favorite is the crescent moon. She's also been charting the moon phases all month on a calendar. We've read
The Moon Book by Gail Gibbons,
Full Moon Rising (a book of moon poems) and she explored the moon and a few other planets on our iPad app Skywalk.
Last Friday when I heard about a special full moon event at Carter Hill
Orchard I got really excited and knew it would be the perfect way to
wrap up our study of the moon. We learned about the moon from an expert
from the
McAuliffe-Shepard Discovery Center.
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| Thanks to a reporter/photographer from The Concord Monitor this is the only picture of her from the night. |
The sky was clear when we got there and we could see a ton of stars. But when we went outside after the presentation to check out the moon through the telescope clouds had come in and covered most of the sky. I was super disappointed for Kaelyn. But we hung around and got a glimpse of Jupiter through a break in the clouds. I was ready to call it a night and head home after that but Kaelyn really wanted to go on the moonlit hike. And I'm so glad we decided to go. She loved it. All the adults were impressed with what a trooper she was.
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| Unfortunately this is the best picture I could get |
Then we came to a clearing by the pond toward the end of our hike and saw that all the clouds had disappeared and we could see a beautiful (almost) full moon and plenty of stars. So we rushed back over to the telescopes and got to see the moon up close and
Betelgeuse (the red star) before we headed home for a late bed time.
To top the night off, our little star made her
second appearance in the local paper. Which was helpful since I didn't get any good pictures even when we were indoors. And I thank the photographer for blurring me out in the background.
Here are the things she wrote in her notebook that she's learned about the moon:
- Phases
- Eclise (Eclipse)
- Telescopes help you see better
- Alan Shepard landed on the moon
- He is from New Hampshire
On to the next adventure!
