It’s been a hot minute since I’ve written anything homeschool related! And I definitely found inspiration in the latest little project the kids and I got ourselves into. A friend on Facebook posted a link about a free educational program that Texas Parks and Wildlife hosts and long story short, I managed to sign us up! And what we received exceeded my expectations so much that I felt obligated to share. 😁

FedEx delivered the first of two large trunks that we would receive this “semester” to our front porch containing what I thought would be a few native animals skulls, animal track molds and something to do with skat (haha). Upon opening it, we discovered it was FULL of goodies!

In a very organized manner, FIFTEEN different native Texas species were packed in represented by a skull, foot print mold and skat mold for each animal. A stack of books in a variety of non fiction and children’s stories came with and to top it all off; a 4 inch thick binder full of curriculum and activities to do with the items! And I wanted to do IT ALL in the 2 weeks time frame we were allotted for this trunk. Haha

Our first activity was learning about wildlife biologists by watching a YouTube video the curriculum provided a link to and then performing our own wildlife survey with a provide worksheet and instructions. The kids were able to emulate how a biologist takes random “head counts” and formulated the average number for the area. So we even did some math! 😉 After they assessed the bunny population on the worksheet, they examined a cottontail rabbit skull.

The next day was a big endeavor! I started out by putting all the skulls on the table with no identification. The kids then went around trying to match the picture/name card with skull. They got pretty close! There was heated discussion between which animal the raccoon and possum skulls belonged too and in the end Weston against Ashlyn and Archer had it right. We left the skulls on the table and our friends that were over for a later play date were able to check them out.

We kept it simple with our foot print activity and the kids were able to use the provided molds and make play dough forms with them.

A few days later, we got into the poop! 😆 Ashlyn read one of the story books to the boys while I scattered the scat all over the floor. Using one of the provided reference books, they took best guesses at which animal the pooped belonged. It definitely wasn’t as easy for them as the skulls and they were rather repulsed by the authentic appearance. Once everything was identified, for “shits and giggles”, I had them claim they’re favorite terd and take a picture with it. 😜 No such thing as too much fun.

Our time with that trunk came to an end and as easily as it arrived, it went back! We simply packed it back up, changed the shipping label and put it on the porch the day my email told me to. Fed-Ex came again and we anxiously awaited our 2nd trunk!

Unfortunately when I scheduled the 2nd trunk a few months ago, I was not aware how much we were going to be traveling to Houston during that 2 week period. Fortunately! This trunk didn’t have as much interactive curriculum that required the items in it. So we spent the few days we had with the new set of skulls, tracks, books and pelts and I scanned some of the worksheets and activity directions for use in the upcoming weeks. The kids are most looking forward to homemade turkey calls. Haha

The 2nd trunk’s curriculum guided us through a scripted discussion as we explored each animals’ items. The examples provided helped us understand how and why each animal has adapted to an environment as either prey or predator. There were so many, I split them up over 2 days. I learned a lot right along with the kids on this trunk! They loved the Horned Toad the most. Did y’all know it will shoot BLOOD from a gland near its eyes as an evasive maneuver from predators?! We thoroughly enjoyed feeling the different pelts and variety this trunk had from the first. Even though we were studying some of the same animals!

The program allows 2 trunks/semester, so that is all for this year. Y’all better believe I will be jumping online for our spring semester sign up and can’t wait to share what we receive in those trunks.

-Lindsay