Saturday, April 4, 2009

Mycology - Mushrooms!





The magic of mushrooms has touched us at Syrendell this year. Mycology is utterly fascinating...are they plants, animals, neither? So many varieties, colors, shapes....fabulous fungi.
Our own backyard is filled with different mushrooms throughout the year. This week, we noticed that with the warmer, drier weather, the mushrooms are beginning to curl up and disappear.

We dissected a mushroom, observed a curled-up-dried mushroom, made a mushroom spore print, did a mushroom form drawing, read books on mycology, and did block crayon drawings. Two of our cousins came over and joined us in creating beautiful, crayoned fungi! We also read an adorable book that features a sprite who lives under a mushroom is Naming Renick by Mamaroots (which you can purchase in her Etsy shop).

11 comments:

Linda said...

This is such a wonderful study, we love mushrooms here in South Africa at our home too!

Have a great week....

dongdong said...

I like how you tie everything together. Love the form drawing!

Tammy said...

What pretty drawings. And how clever on the mushroom form drawing, lol. I love learning days like this. :)

Mama Rose said...

What beautiful drawings! I agree with dongdong, "I like how you tie everything together". We're def going to have to check out that book- too cute!

RunninL8 said...

We alweays look so foward to fall when it's mushroom time! I LOVE that gorgeous (crayon)picture of the mushroom!

Anonymous said...

You probably already know this book but if not I love mentioning Katya's Book of Mushrooms by Katya Arnold. The woodcut illustrations and information are wonderful.

Love that chalk board.

Tan Family said...

Hi Katya! Yes, that's the book that we used...Katya's Book of Mushrooms. We found it at the library and loved it so much, I've ordered a copy through Amazon. A definite must-have book for homeschooling!

tortugafeliz said...

Hello, I have been following your blog and I love the flow that you have with your homeschool family life, do u use any curriculum, if not I may say you came up with wonderful ideas, I am starting with my LO of almost 2 years establishing circle time and nature table, learning a lot from u guys and encouraging us families to continue.
Thanks,

Anonymous said...

I am sure you can guess that I adore mushrooms! Thanks so much for featuring Mr Renick- he adores them also!

Tan Family said...

Hi tortugafeliz! We don't use one set curriculum. We are inspired by Waldorf philosophy and we include much of what we already love and know how to do in our weekly rhythms (my husband and I are artists and musicians, he has an MD and I have an MA in education administration). If you send me an email at thetanfamily@msn.com, I can give you more specifics about some resources that we highly recommend. And thank you, everyone for the nice comments.

tortugafeliz said...

thanks for the response, my email is johanacastillo@msn.com. Many Blessings.