That Agape Family

Live. Love. Learn.

Tag: engineering

Home Depot Workshops

March Break for homeschoolers traditionally means that we try our darnedest to hide away, while our usual hot spots (the Science Centre, swimming pools, and museums) become flooded with children enjoying their time off. This March Break, we decided to try out the Home Depot workshops, which Home Depot offers on the second Saturday of every month, and every day during March Break. Verdict: AMAZING! Now we can tick off “shop class” from our curriculum! Here is Little Miss working on her fully functional periscope:

We also worked on a fire station bank, with 2 compartments, one for “save” and the other for “give”.

You also get these nifty aprons, that I assure you are essential to the experience. After washing  Little Miss’ dress, after our first workshop, I asked her how she managed to get so much nail polish on her dress. It wasn’t nail polish… Pro Tip: Wear old clothes! And be sure to take advantage of those free aprons! You also get a spiffy pin for every project you finish. One girl had to have had over 25! It was pretty impressive.

The project for April is a window birdhouse. Sign up online through your local Home Depot to reserve your spot. This is a nation wide program, so it should be available where you are, as long you’ve got a Home Depot in your area. The recommended age is 5-12, but I have found that they are lenient with the age requirements, as long as you support your child as needed. We had a blast, and I’m sure you will, too.

Blessings!

Liz

Look Up, Way Up

I love and adore experiential learning (learning through experience). You will notice that most of our meaningful learning happens in a casual fashion, through curiosity. So, I am always looking out for situations that occur in our day to day lives, where we can observe, and learn, about the world around us.

A couple of weeks ago, we noticed that the construction site by my parent’s home was active on a Saturday (a rare occurrence). They were removing a large crane that they had built the condo around, and therefore had to remove in a strategic way. It was fascinating to watch the construction workers disassemble the crane piece by piece, and lower the pieces onto large flatbeds like this:

We watched as they precisely lowered the pieces, using hydraulics, onto the trucks, then secured them into place. We discussed physics and engineering in a meaningful context. When have you experienced experiential learning?

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