In Which We Discuss Nebulae and the Life of Stars

We're not following a set curriculum for science this year. I might like to next year, but for this year, we're going it alone. And that's been fun. 

There's so much rich, free information in print and online, that I can't believe schools use textbooks. They're dry, boring, dull, monotonous, 

Oh. I digress.

We're rounding out the month of January by focusing on stars. Have you looked at pictures of the birth of stars? The birth of a star is so much prettier than the birth of a human. 

It's true. 

Look here. And here. 

And if you want to watch a really great video series on the Life and Death of Stars, I recommend this series (here is part one of five. They are all on YouTube): 

If you love They Might Be Giants like we do (What? They sing catchy songs!), you should watch this video. Three times. And then spend the rest of the day randomly blurting out a few bars. 

Since we're rather crafty in a no rules, do it our way only, kind of way, we decided to craft our own nebulae.

 Yes, I got in on the action, too. We blew through straws, added glitter and sequins. It was great fun. 

And now, we're going to go make whoopee pies, just for fun. I love homeschool being school-free. 

Engrossed in Space: Delight-Directed Science

Tuna playing a game at NASA's site. She played after watching a lovely video tour of the International Space Station. 

I love this chalkboard that I scored for FREE at an elementary school that was switching to white boards. Tuna's recording her data here. 

Organizing data into a lapbook. She's enjoying this much more than I thought she would. The lapbook was a freebie I found here. 

A recent acquisition: planets poster with tons of data. 

Her Space Encyclopedia, which she devours daily, provides plenty of data for her project. 

In her own words: "It was fun because I noticed the facts all over my poster. I got to do a project. We got to listen to that solar system song. Yeah, it was really fun today." I guess fun is the word of the day.