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Middle School Hands-on Science : Extreme Winds + Free Minibook

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Today, in sharing middle school hands-on science: extreme winds, I wanted to kick off our unit study with an easy hands-on activity and to use materials I already had in the house. Also, look at my page homeschool middle school for more fun tips.

You know I told you we were using a free middle school earth science book.

Too, since I like to always flesh out what Tiny is studying about, I add in enrichment, which of course are our lapbooks or notebooking pages and add in some of my own hands-on activities too.

Wanting to expand more on Tiny’s study of the earth’s structures, we honed in on studying about extreme winds.

Middle School Hands-on Science : Extreme Winds + Free Minibook

Look at this short list of supplies that you probably have around the house too that gives an easy visual about weird weather or extreme winds.

  • shoe box
  • plastic wrap
  • scissors
  • tape
  • 2 short candles if you have a regular shoebox or 2 taller candles if you have a taller shoe box like I had.
  • matches
  • sharp knife (to be used by mom or dad only)

Extreme Winds: Hands-on Activity

Start by gathering the supplies above.

Extreme Winds 1Extreme Winds 2

I had a bigger shoe box, but a smaller shoe box works just as good.  Depending on what kid of shoe box you have, either cut off the front or take off the lid.

If you have a normal size shoe box, turn it long way with the opening facing toward you.

Then cut 3 holes in it.

One hole is on the top (No. 1 on the right picture above) and one hole is on the inside bottom (No. 2 on the right picture above) and you cut them about 1/4 of the way over from the right edge and cut them about 2 inches wide.

You want them big enough for your candle to fit through.

Then cut a hole on the left side (No. 3 on the right picture above) about halfway about and about 2 inches wide as well.

Extreme Winds 3Extreme Winds 4

Next, cover and seal the opening with plastic wrap.

Be sure to tape it real well so no air can escape, but be sure to not cover any of the holes.

Then light one candle and place the box hole on the bottom gently over the top of the lit candle.

*Be sure the flame does not touch anything.

Extreme Winds 5Extreme Winds 6

Light the other candle and move it slowly over to the left side where the hole is.

Get the candle as close as you can to the hole without the flame touching the box.

Middle School Homeschool Science

Look at the picture above right where the flame on the left is already being pulled toward the right or toward the heat that was building up inside the box.

Middle school hands-on science: extreme winds science activity, I wanted to kick off our unit study with an easy hands-on activity and to use materials I already had in the house. We’re using a free middle school earth science book. Add this to the Free Earth Structure Lapbook. #middleschoolhomeschoolscience

What causes the air to move and the wind to blow? The point is to notice the second candle. When it’s lit, the flame is straight up.  But as you place it near the hole, it will move toward the hole.

When the first candle was lit, it heated up the inside. As the air was heated, it rose and of course became light.

When you blow out the second candle, the smoke moves in toward the hole, across the box and out the top. I didn’t put a picture of it because it was harder to capture the smoke, but be sure you watch which way the smoke goes after the candle is out on the left side.

So cooler air is also pulled in.  Just like the sun’s rays heats the earth and water.

Warmer air starts to rise. Because some of the earth’s surface is more heated than others, like over a desert, then some of the air rises faster.

The Santa Ana, shamal and sirocca winds all form over deserts.

Also, look at this mini weather station.

Middle School Science Activities

Look at these various winds and their easy definitions:

  • The Santa Ana winds in southern California are strong, hot winds that blow from the desert to Santa Ana Pass and out into San Pedro Channel beyond Los Angeles.
  • The Shamal winds are summer winds that blow over Iraq and the Persian Gulf.
  • The Sirocco winds are warm winds that blow over the Mediterranean Sea from the Sahara Desert.
  • The Gregale wind is a strong and cold wind that blows from the northeast in the western and central Mediterranean area mostly in winter.
  • Haboob is a strong wind that occurs primarily along the southern edges of the Sahara in Sudan and is associated with large sandstorms and dust storms.
  • Matanuska is a strong, gusty, northeast wind which occasionally occurs during the winter in the vicinity of Palmer, Alaska.

Grab my free minibook on our newest unit study on the earth’s structure.

Middle School Hands-on Science : Extreme Winds + Free Minibook

You’ll love these other posts

Middle School Hands-on Science : Extreme Winds + Free Minibook

Minibooks/Topics in the Earth Science Lapbook

  • Why Are Beaches Sandy
  • Summer Beaches Versus Winter Beaches
  • What is a Natural Hazard
  • Energy Sources for Natural Hazards
  • Features of Rivers & Streams
  • Plate Tectonics trifold book
  • Earth Structure Lapbook Cover
  • What is a Volcano
  • Earth Layers Book
  • Extreme Winds

How to Get the Free Earth Structures Lapbook

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Middle School Science Hands-on Science Extreme Winds @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus-1

Middle School Homeschool Science 50 Free Spring Activities

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I’ve collected middle school homeschool science 50 free spring activities. Also, look at my page homeschool middle school for more fun tips.

Instead of starting on our next unit study, we have been waffling about whether or not we want to do a spring unit.  We have the itch to make a switch.

So today, I gathered middle school homeschool science 50 free spring activities to give Tiny a round up to choose from.

Middle School Homeschool Science 50 Free Spring Activities

Some of the ideas are free printables, some are hands-on activities and others serve as a springboard (ha ha, I know, corny pun) to do your own spring unit study.

I even love the free quality coloring book on wildflowers even though Tiny wasn’t a bit interested in coloring wildflowers.

The funny thing is that he is my kid that loves to color the most and especially at the middle school age.  I know, I know, it’s because they’re flowers but I couldn’t convince him that flowers are for manly men too.

Oh well there are still plenty of other ideas to choose from.

50 Free Spring Activities for Middle School.

50 Free Spring Activities

Springtime fun is not just for your young kids. Keep your
middle school kids having fun by doing one or more of these springtime
activities.

You’ll love some of these fun activities too:

Spangler Science

Enjoy and Happy (almost) Spring!

Middle School Homeschool Science 50 Free Spring Activities

Check out these other posts for middle school:

Hugs and love ya,

From Textbook to Homeschool Unit Study Starter

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In my post Homeschool Unit Study Textbook Tips – Uh? I wanted to encourage you to take a no holes barred attitude toward unit studies by even using textbooks.  Creativity in planning can be nurtured by anything and a textbook is no exception.

Today, I want to show you how to bring to life a unit study using a textbook by going from textbook to homeschool unit study starter.

Remember, normally at the beginning of a topic is where you decide if you are just going to do child-led interest on one topic as enrichment or if you are going to do a full-blown unit study.

Right now though for the sake of showing you an example, I am going to use a textbook page below and we are not going to worry about making that call right now.

Too, I took this page of a chapter because it is a great example of information that can be extracted to start your own study.

The copy is from a page about the French Revolution and actually when planning my unit study for the French Revolution, I gave it a glance.

Right away on Number 1, it gives you an idea of a time period to cover.

Textbooks cover broad strokes and this page is no exception because it gives you a longer time period to study about than just the French Revolution.It also includes the life of Napoleon Bonaparte.

For my unit study needs, I preferred a more narrow time period so I chose only the period of the French Revolution, which was from 1789 to 1799.

Here you have several choices for your own unit study and questions I would ask myself when planning are: What interests my children? What topics have we not covered? What topics can I connect to previous unit studies?

All of these questions help me to narrow my topic to just the French Revolution so that I could focus on that significant event in world history.

How to Create a Unit Study Outline in 10 Minutes

Another way to grow this page into a unit study is if you wanted to do a unit study based on a historical figure like Napoleon Bonaparte.

Then you could zero in on the years of Bonaparte’s lifetime and use the events on this page of the French Revolution as significant events in his life.

Overlapping events is a strong point in unit studies.

To keep from being overwhelmed with events and information, focus on ONE main topic either the French Revolution or Napoleon Bonaparte and then use the other one you did not choose as a sub-topic.  Both of these topics are connected and you want to introduce them to your children.

The difference in a unit study is that you will work your way from the inside (or main topic) to connect it the outside (sub-topics) and sub-topics will normally have less focus or information.

Key is deciding which main topic is important to your family so that not all information gets the same of time and attention.

Number 2 or Key Events gives a starting point as to what sub-topics to include under the topic of French Revolution.

To use my choice of focusing only on the French Revolution as an example, I could use only the first two events as sub-topics to read more about or to learn about because they pertain to just the French Revolution.

When I research about those two sub-topics, other sub-topic will emerge.  But using two of the points under this sections gives me a point to begin.

Number 3 or The Impact Today gives you a starting point to making a connection today. It is not always necessary to make a connection to present time. This is a feature of a textbook because it gives you a lot of information to gulp.

You will want to decide with each other unit study whether or not it is necessary to make information connect to present day.  You may think that making a connection to present day is always a good idea but I have not found that to be so when teaching a unit study.

Because I kept my unit study of the French Revolution on a middle school level, I didn’t want Tiny to have to make a connection to present day.

Our French Revolution was his first introduction to it and I wanted Tiny to lounge in the time period for a while.  I created a board game so that he could become familiar with that time as well.

In other words, I am giving you ideas as to what goes on in my mind as I look at resources and weigh them against my objectives or goals.

There was no need for me to push Tiny to weigh all the political issues because this will be presented again in high school and at that time we will look at a connection to present day.

Too, if I was doing this unit study with my highschooler, I may grab one of the points to assign a persuasive writing paragraph or two to my highschooler.

The topics under this area are a natural fit for writing why my highschooler may agree or might not agree with one of the ideas.  In addition, if you decided to make a connection to present day, you could still use one of these ideas for a language arts assignment.

Number 4 or the timeline I would eyeball as making a helpful printable to remember some of the key events for my middleschooler.

Too, the events on the timeline could also be used as sub-topics to cover or if one of them interested my children, we could take our time reading about one of the events or key persons.

In addition, the timeline is helpful when deciding what topics to choose to write about.

How to Kill Boring Homeschool Unit Studies

From the timeline, I created a board game so that Tiny became more familiar with the events of the French Revolution.

Also, creating cards for memorizing these events, making a visual timeline, writing about the life of King Louis XVI, making French bread, making a French pastry, studying French fashion are also a few more ways to bring these events alive for this time period.

All of these ideas can be a springboard from this timeline.

Even the picture of the globe or Number 5 could be helpful here.

Taking out our atlas, we could look up this area and label the countries to get our geography bearings about where this significant event in world history took place at.

Creating a salt dough map (always a favorite of ours) can be another hands-on activity.  Also because geography includes modern day issues a country may be facing, we did make a quick connection to modern day France by highlighting one of their issues about energy by creating a solar oven.

Too, the solar oven craft would also be part of a science related topic for this unit study.

When looking at how to include geography remember that geography is not just about labeling maps.

Geography involves the culture, religion, food, present day problems and issues a country may be facing and products made by that country.

If you find a list of products made by a country, past or present, the list could be used to give you ideas for relative crafts and hands-on meals.  For example, when we studied Africa, we made a meal.

When studying about the country of France, this unit study could be extended to make a French crepe, study wine making or making a French meal.

To cover art, focus on famous French artists from that time period or architect designed during that time period.

As you can see, a textbook page just starts the ideas flowing for a unit study and your creativity is the only thing that will handcuff you in any unit study.

Once you start the creative juices flowing with a unit study, it becomes easier to do the next one.  Like anything, every day use of the lesson planning muscles strengthens with use.

Using something you have like a textbook not only lessens the lesson planning stress, but it is a frugal idea when you are a beginner at unit studies.

Planning unit studies from living books is always a great start but not having one should not hold you back from trying a unit study or two.

How about you? Have you tried making a unit study come to life through resources you already have?

Hugs and love ya,

Tina 2015 Signature

 

 

Marco Polo Unit Study – Salt Dough Map + Free Printable Map Flags

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I have a Marco Polo Unit Study salt dough map activity today. Also, check out my Free Marco Polo Unit Study, Lapbook, and Hands-on Ideas.

Tiny never tires of salt dough maps.  It is one of his favorite go to geography projects.

Our Marco Polo unit study is not only an awesome unit study for a salt dough map, but the map is a project he can mostly do by himself now.

We gathered our supplies and yes we are finally starting to add to our school supplies here in Ecuador. Thank goodness they have Pizza Hut delivery here so we have a box for our project.

This is the basic recipe I am always sharing in case you don’t have it already.

Hands-on Geography

Too, when we left the states, I made sure our suitcases had plenty of room for our much loved atlases.

We made it here to South America with our atlases in great shape and now that books in English are almost non-existent here, we take care real good care of what we do have.

No running to drool over books at Barnes & Noble here.

Back to our project.After mixing the dough, we just drew by free hand on the box with a pencil and then traced back over with a permanent marker.

Not only did we add some of the places visited by Marco Polo, but Tiny wanted to label some of the areas around it, so we did.

Also, look at some of these books to add to your study.

Marco Polo Books for Kids

10 Marco Polo Books & Resources for Kids Who Love Reading and Being Read To

Add some of these fun books about Marco Polo to your home library or use them in your unit studies.

More Activities to Go With the Salt Dough Map

Marco Polo Unit Study – Salt Dough Map + Free Printable Map Flags

Too, I made some printable flags to put on the salt dough map.

A few places, I added in the name that would have been used back in the time of Marco Polo and then put the name of the modern day city to help Tiny make a connection.

Names are boring to learn about unless they make sense today.

Remember, before the salt dough dries, stick a toothpick in the dough so when it dries, the hole is there already for the flag pennant.

There is just something a lot more engaging for Tiny to add the pennants on some of the places Marco Polo traveled instead of labeling a printed out map, which would have been a lot more easier for me.

Then again, he remembers geography a lot better this way.

At the last minute, he decided he wanted to paint the trail of Marco Polo’s travels white because it would be easier for him to remember.

Don’t you love it when your kids come up with their own ways of remembering information?

I love it because Tiny was so ultimately satisfied with his work.

Too, though hands-on ideas sometimes are time consuming or in our case we plod along over a few days working on them, you don’t have to do much more review because they retain so much information in the beginning.

How to Download the DIY Printable Map Flags

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When you sign up to follow me, you get access to this freebie AND you’re now a follower of me by getting emails in your inbox.

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3) Last, look for my emails in your inbox as a follower. Glad to have you.

Marco Polo Unit Study, Lapbook, and Hands-on Ideas

100+ Best and Free Tropical Amazon Rainforest Educators Resources

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

Updated 2021

Tropical Rainforest Amazon Educators Resources

The tropical rain forest Amazon was a huge unit study and co-op for us when we studied it a while back. I will be doing it again with Tiny because he was real young when we studied it the first time around.

Too, we might have a chance to visit the rain forest while we are living here in Ecuador. Update: Oh yes we trekked the Amazon Rain Forest while living in Ecuador.

Part of Ecuador borders the rain forest. So either by visiting Brazil or traveling here in Ecuador, I want to be sure we get by to see it because that will be one way to bring the study of the Amazon Rain Forest alive.

Because I didn’t get to share too many tropical rainforest Amazon free resources when I shared my unit study (I already had three pages here on my blog) I thought I would gather a few of them here and then well – – I kept adding and adding.

100 Tropical Rainforest Amazon Free Resources for Educators

I have over 100 free rain forest resources listed below.

Amazon Rainforest Free Educator Resources

Here are my three pages and then scoot down and grab more below.

Rainforest Amazon

Rainforest Animals

Rainforest Co-op Pictures

Free Tropical Rain Forest Amazon Teacher Guides

Free Tropical Rain Forest Amazon Lesson Plans

Free Tropical Rain Forest Amazon Coloring Pages

Tropical Rain Forest Amazon Lapbooks

The Basement Workshop Store

Tropical Rain Forest Crafts and Activities

Free Rain Forest Printables

Rainforest Facts – Infographics

Degradation of the Brazilian Rain Forest

Rain Forest Infographic

Rain Forest Media Resources

If you want to do a literature unit study with fun weather themed book for your young ones, you’ll love these online self-paced literature workshops for your kids.

Look at the course the book Raindrop Plop.

Check out ALL the online self-paced courses for your kids. They have classes for K to 12.

Best Rain Forest Books for Kids

You’ll love my Ultimate Unit Study Planner with my eye for detail! You can grab it below or see more pictures in my shop and check out the Unit Study Enhancer for Temperate Rain Forests.

100 Tropical Rainforest Amazon Free Resources for Educators

You’ll love these other resources:

Hugs and love ya,

Over 70 Free Amazon Rain Forest Resources! Great for a homeschool unit study or just learning about the Amazon Rain Forest. Click here to grab these AWESOME resources!