martinzoo

Election day at the Martinzoo began with voting. I was expecting lines out the door, but much to my surprise, we were in and out in less than ten minutes. Clearly, they were expecting huge lines and so they had a well-oiled machine that flowed beautifully.

Once we reached home we began preparation for this evening’s festivities. My good buddy in Texas, Dana, had some great ideas on her blog that I decided to borrow….LOL!

Here, GB cuts out a pop-up White House complete with little Obama and McCain figures.

Now he’s gluing the White House to the grass/sky sheet.

Isn’t that cool looking? We think McCain looks very dapper and Obama looks very approachable.

This was the command center at the Martinzoo tonight. We have the electoral college map that we colored as states were called. And we have a chart that we filled in with the electoral votes.

It is 10:00 p.m. EST, and it’s pretty much a done deal. So I’m sending GB off to bed. But not before he made this funny little video. It’s a spoof of one of his video games, Super Smash Bros. But he’s calling this Super Smash Presidents.

Hilarious!

GB didn’t feel so great this morning when he woke up. I think he’s coming down with a cold. Bummers!

And after the last couple of weeks, I didn’t want to begin a traditional week with our usual suspects of curriculum choices. I wanted GB to be engaged in what we were doing.

So I spontaneously decided to do a lapbook study of the current election. It’s coming up pretty soon. And GB has really been fascinated by it all. So I downloaded the above file from Hands of a Child this morning and we got to work.

When we got to the explanation of the electoral college, I felt like GB needed a better explanation. It’s kind of a complicated concept. So I printed off a blank map of the U.S. and we used pennies to represent votes for each state. With this visual aid he was able to see how a candidate could win with just a few key states.

He also enjoyed using the interactive map at this site.

Today was a complete success. And even though he was feeling pretty puny, I was able to keep his attention ALL day and we worked until 4:30! That is a long day for us. But everytime I tried to stop he wanted to keep going. So I think I’ll just keep with this subject until it’s covered, or it becomes boring to him.

Then we’ll go back to the curriculum……… maybe.

Module 6

Looking through our last module, I realized it was just a review of all the other modules we’d done so far. So rather than read from the preformatted script, which was kind of dry and boring, GB and I perused this incredible site from The University of Utah’s Genetic Science Learning Center.

Mouse Party showed us the effect that different drugs have on mouse brains.

And we loved this great visual page. I really think that this, along with all we’ve learned in the past two weeks, has helped GB so much to know what he would be getting into if he decided to try any of this.

Module 5

In this module we did two experiments to observe the unhealthy residue that cigarette smoking leaves in the lungs and other parts of the respiratory system.

Things we learned about tobacco:

1. Tobacco is VERY potent.
2. It contains more than 4000 chemicals, many of which are released into the air during smoking.
3. Tar and Carbon Monoxide are two particularly dangerous chemicals in cigarette smoke.
4. Tar causes lung cancer, emphysema, and bronchial diseases.
5. Carbon Monoxide can cause heart problems.
6. Other serious health problems linked to smoking include digestive cancers, gastric ulcers, and cancers of the throat, lip, esophagus, and pancreas.
7. The leaves of the tobacco plant contain a drug called nicotine. Nicotine is found in all tobacco products: cigarettes, cigars, pipe tobacco, chewing tobacco, and snuff. It causes an increase in blood pressure, heart rate, and respiration. It is VERY addictive.
8. Nicotine enters the body very quickly. After the smoke is inhaled, it only takes EIGHT seconds to reach the brain. Within 40 minutes, half the effect of of nicotine is lost. This is the reason people feel the need to smoke another cigarette.
9. There are 1.1 BILLION smokers in the world!
10. They smoke 6 TRILLION cigarettes each year!!!
11. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 430,000 people die each year from tobacco use. Because people do have control over whether they begin to smoke, smoking can be viewed as the most preventable cause of death in the United States.

The first experiment we did was to give us a better understanding of what effect tar and nicotine have on the body. The lungs, for example, become blackened from excessive smoking.

We began with three glasses of water. We put cigarette leaves in  the first glass, a tree leaf in the second glass and nothing in the third glass (this was our control).

This experiment is supposed to be observed over the next few days, which we will do.

BUT, after only 15 minutes we could already see some results. Stay tuned for an update on this experiment next week.

We also did the following experiment to go along with this module. Again, it was to show how dangerous smoking can be.

**** Note: in order to minimize the harmful effects of this experiment, you may want to do it outside, like we did.

After the experiment was over, I did a very controversial thing. I let GB take a puff on the cigarette.  He didn’t really want to. But both my husband and I had had similar experiences when we were around his age. I had an aunt who smoked, and I thought she looked really cool when she was smoking. One day, she just handed me the cigarette and asked me if I wanted to try. Well, I wanted to look cool too. So, of course, I did try it. And she laughed so hard at my gasping, coughing, wheezing fit that she had tears in her eyes. The experience was so horrible for me that I never wanted to try them again. My husband had a similar experience with his Uncle Junior. In fact, when we are in restaurants, we can barely tolerate it when people around us smoke. And our older children have the same reactions. So maybe it’s just biological. Maybe we just have an extreme intolerance to cigarette smoke.

Anyhoo……… GB tried the cigarette and had the exact same reaction that I did. And kept trying to get me to admit, hours later, that it could still be affecting him. I doubt it, but that’s what he kept exclaiming.

Module 4

This module just goes to show that you never know what will spark interest in your child. As I write, GB is over at the kitchen table grilling my husband on the info and riddles that he learned from this module. I thought it would be boring to GB because there was no fancy activity. But he liked the one we did just fine.

First, we had to learn the basic differences between all the different kinds of drugs out there. We read the reading material included and learned about them. We researched some of them online. And then we made a venn diagram on our white board; which included Good drugs, Bad drugs, and drugs that could be either. We also went to our drug cabinet to examine our own stash of drugs.

The cards that were included in this module had riddles on them. And GB enjoyed figuring them out. Not hard at all, but he did like the format of them. It’s funny because he usually doesn’t like riddles much. But he’s been getting more into riddles and jokes lately. He wants us to think he’s funny. But he gets annoyed when we say he’s funnier when he’s NOT trying to be funny.

Here are the riddles:

• I am made from just a little bit of the same germs that can make a person sick. I help the body fight off those same bad germs. Children all over the world are safe from diseases like measles and mumps because of me.         Answer: Immunizations 
• I am produced by bacteria and molds. I can help a sick person fight germs and get better. Penicillin is a very common type of me.         Answer: Antibiotics
• I come from the oily liquid substance in tobacco leaves. I make the heart, brain, and other parts of the body work faster. I can raise blood pressure, make a person not want to eat, and even make a person sick to the stomach. I am a very addictive drug. I’m usually smoked, but can be chewed or inhaled.              Answer: Nicotine
• I come from many places. Sometimes I am made in labs, and other times I come from plants in nature. I change the way the body and brain work. People who use me might not be able to stop taking me, even if the become very, very sick. This is because I am addictive. There are laws against using me. I am very harmful to people! There are lots of different kinds of me, like marijuana and cocaine.               Answer: Illegal Drugs
• You can buy me in a pharmacy. I am a pill or powder that makes headaches and fevers disappear.          Answer: Aspirin and Tylenol.
• I am found in nature. I can be a gas like air, or a liquid like water. I make children’s teeth strong! I am in toothpaste, mouthwash, and even in the water supply.            Answer: Fluoride.
• I am a clear liquid with a burning taste.  I have been around for thousands of years. I’m possibly the world’s oldest known drug! The blood carries me all over the body. I can mess up parts of the brain that help people move, think, talk, and feel. I am very harmful to children’s growing brains.              Answer: Alcohol
• I come from the parts of some plants, like the coffee bean, tea leaf, kola nut, and the cacao pod. I make the heart and brain work faster. I also can make a person feel more awake. I am a drug found in coffee, tea, cocoa, and most soft drinks. I am also added to some medicines.              Answer: Caffeine.

Module 3

In this module we simulated the process of neurotransmission: how information gets to and from the brain. Messages, in the form of electrical impulses, constantly travel back and forth between the brain and other parts of the body. A special cell called a neuron is responsible for carrying these messages. There are about 100 billion neurons in the human brain!

A neuron has three main parts.

1. The cell body, which directs all activities of the neuron.
2. Dendrites, which extend out from the body of the cell and receive messages from other nerve cells.
3. Axon, which is the long single fiber that transmits messages from the cell body to the dendrites of other neurons or to other body tissues, such as muscles.

A protective covering called the myelin sheath, covers most neurons. myelin insulates the axon and helps nerve signals travel faster and farther.
Since our class is so small, just me and GB, we had to call into duty our faithful doggies.

The simulation starts with GB realizing that he has a sore foot…..OUCH!

His foot sends a signal out through neurons.

Peatsy represents the neuron, and passes the message about the sore foot along.

Murphy plays the neurotransmitter. He receives the message from the neuron and passes the message to other neurons, which pass to other neurotransmitters, which pass to other neurons (and so on, and so on) in less than a blink of the eye. What’s really interesting about neurotransmission is that each neurotransmitter can bind only to a very specific matching receptor. A neurotransmitter binds to a receptor much the same way as a key fits into a lock. After the transmission has occurred, the neurotransmitter is either broken down by an enzyme or is reabsorbed into the neuron that released it. The reabsorbed neurotransmitters can re reused at a later time. See? even our bodies have gotten the hang of recycling!

This is the brain…. of course!………LOL! *takes a bow*

The brain says, “Sit down you hurt your foot on a tack!”

That message is sent to the neurons…….

via the neurotransmitters………

…….. all the way to the sore foot, which now realizes that he needs to sit down to relieve the pain.

No feet were actually harmed in the process of this simulation.

Here are some other kinds of messages that travel through your body to think about with your kids:

• What am I touching?
• What is that sound?
• Is the water hot or cold?

I have created a page over on the sidebar, which will  document all stages of this unit as we go through it. That way it will all be saved in one place and you guys won’t have to hop all over my blog to find the different modules.

Module 2

In this module we were learning about the different areas of our brains and their functions. We tried to create a three dimensional model of the brain made from Play-doh. I knew this was going to be an iffy subject for GB because he has such a hard time getting past the grossness of the insides of our bodies. And I was hoping the play-doh would be a simple enough visual without being too gross. Luckily, he seemed to get a lot out of it, and didn’t seem grossed out at all.

The first portion of the brain we learned about was the cerebral cortex. We learned that it has a right and a left hemisphere (”Hemispheres? Just like the globe?”). The hemispheres are represented by the green play-doh.

The Left Hemisphere:

• controls the right side of the body
• mostly responsible for analytical thinking, such as solving problems and comparing information
• it is also the brain’s language center

The Right Hemisphere:

• controls the left side of the body
• mostly responsible for artistic expression and spacial relationships
• can communicate messages back and forth between the two hemispheres

In the center of the cerebral cortex is the Lymbic System:

• mainly responsible for learning and memory
• plays an important part in our emotional behavior
• is greatly affected by drugs, alcohol, and tobacco

The limbic system is represented by the red play-doh.

The Cerebellum (orange play-doh):

• controls posture, movement, and balance
• activities such as playing ball, picking up things, and playing musical instruments fall under it’s domain

The Brain Stem (white play-doh) consists of two parts:

1. The pons

• links the cerebral cortex with the cerebellum and the spinal cord
• controls sleep, awakening and dream impulses

2. The medulla

• controls heart rate, respiration, and blood pressure
• responsible for body temperature control, simple reflexes (like coughing and sneezing), and digestion

This fuzzy picture shows our completed brain system.

Instead of displaying GB’s work from the Colonial Unit in a lapbook, we have been displaying it for friends and family on an empty wall near GB’s bedroom. It works out well because everybody has to go by the wall in order for me to cut their hair. Here is a picture of how it is looking:

From the top left side, going clockwise, we have the wampum necklace, then his rope bed and straw mattress. Then we have the woven blanket, his colonial cookbook, the box he stenciled, the ‘Bees’ fan, a sheet on colonial archaeological finds, the homemade candles, his pine needle sachet, pictures from the wattle and daub house, the tarred and feathered loyalist, things you’d find in a colonial barn, his colonial pop-up houses, John Smith’s life, crops from a plantation, a map of the thirteen colonies.

And in the center, at the bottom, you’ll see our latest addition to the wall; GB’s silouhette. I love this! When I was a kid my grandparents had some of these on display of my dad and his sister from when they were small. So I enjoyed making this one of GB. It brought back nice memories.