Educating Risa

Over the past few weeks, the boys and I have been popping into Michael’s with our 40% off coupon whenever we’ve been running errands nearby, to pick up some good, non-drying, modelling clay. Daegan has been busy creating dinosaurs (no surprise there!). Here’s a few of his creations. I am finding it interesting that his models are becoming more species-specific and detailed. Hover your mouse over the pic for more info.

Seems that Gareth has the same gene, but expresses it in a different medium. I nearly stepped on this Duplo creation in the basement:

One of the things I have learned from the boys’ obsession with dinos is that ANY topic can be learned through this interest. Science and math (obviously), geography (where did certain dinos live? where have certain fossils been found?), art, writing (dino stories! dino plays! dino reports!), computer skills (Daegan spends hours googling for dino games), reading (in addition to non-fiction, Dinosaur Cove has proven to be a favourite fiction series), phys ed (nature hikes for fossils), fine motor skills (digging out bones), etc. The one exception was history—other than geological history of the earth, I didn’t see how to get to history through dinosaurs. But then this conversation took place:

Daegan: Mom, what’s a U-Boat?

Me: I think it’s a boat the Germans used in the world wars. Why?

Daegan: Oh, ‘cause one of the best fossil finds from Alberta, in 1915 (or 1916?) got sunk by a German U-Boat on its way back to the British Museum of Natural History. It’s never been found.

Me: That would have been during World War I.

Daegan: Oh….What was World War I? Who fought in it? Why did they fight?….

We’re planning on a trip to the local Military Museum soon. And we’ve since touched on the topic of the Great Depression as well, as we learned in a documentary that Roy Chapman Andrews had a hard time raising funds to continue his digs in Mongolia after the Great Depression hit.