A Week of Mummies!

For the month of October we decided to pick a spooky for each week leading up to Halloween.  This past week we studied mummies!  It was amazing!  We had a BLAST!

We started our week as we usually do, going to the library and checking out TONS of books (fiction and non-fiction) on our topic.  Then the fun really begins.  We spent the week reading our books and discussing a little bit about ancient Egypt (just so we could get some background as to why we even have mummies), the mummification process, and all the gross stuff boys like about mummies.  Let me tell ya, the boys think it is AWESOME that they pulled the brains out through the nose with a hook!  The BEST book we read was "You Wouldn't Want to be an Egyptian Mummy! Disgusting Things You'd Rather Now Know" by David Stewart.  There is a whole series of these books and they are GREAT!  They are simple, lots of pictures, fun facts, and not too daunting for a kid while also not being too simple for an adult.  You should definitely check them out.  

We also spent a day at the Houston Museum of Natural Science.  The boys had their monthly classes and during our classroom breaks we checked out their AMAZING Egypt exhibit!  We could have spent an entire day in there, but with baby sister in tow, that wasn't possible.  The boys got to see real mummies, touch papyrus, look at hieroglyphs and see lots of artifacts.  

We used learning packets that I found at a website called 3 Dinosaurs (I picked through and only printed what I wanted) and also a packet that I found at Royal Baloo.  These were amazing assets to our learning unit.  I think we could have spent a whole month (or maybe even a year) on Egypt.  We ALL loved it.  

We also decided to conduct our first REAL science experiment.  We got the idea from a blog I follow and we carried out our own experiment.  We mummified apples!  It was REALLY REALLY cool!  The boys spent time drawing up observations and creating a hypothesis.  At the end of the week we unwrapped all of our apples and the results were pretty gross! (Perfect for boys)  Who would have known that vinegar was that good of a preservative!  

Preparing our experiment

The apples were ready to be stored

In their "tomb" for the week (guest room closet)

Time to unwrap!

Our Results

Control Group

Vinegar Group

Baking Soda Group (EWWWW!)

Salt Group

Sugar Group

Proud little scientists

The final write-up

Alex also had to write his very first book report this week!  He chose a book from the library, read it (we did some of it together because it was a bit daunting, but he handled it really well) and did a small write-up about the book and presented it to the family.  He did an amazing job.  The book he chose was "The Curse of King Tut's Mummy" by Kathleen Weidner Zoehfeld.  I will definitely be looking for more of these books too.

We had a great time together and I really felt like we were learning alongside each other this week.  I know not all weeks can be this cool (I just don't have the energy for it) but I am grateful for the time we have together to have amazing weeks.   We all learned a ton this week, and I would say that this week was a total success.