Willows in our autumn landscape are a colorful accent, lining the river’s edge and adding a rich reddish orange as you look off into the distance. There are still a few leaves left on the willows and the limbs and branches are a yellow color.
As part of our autumn study, we picked a willow to use as our subject for a year-long willow study. We tied a piece of twine on a branch to help us remember which willow we are observing.
We have done this activity before with a birch tree. Having a piece of twine on a branch really helped us focus on watching for changes from season to season. I invite you to read this entry for the specific instructions for this kind of tree study: Twigs.
If you would like to start a yearlong study of willows, you’re welcome to click over to read the challenge from last week. It’s not too late to get outside looking for willows, learning about willows, and beginning a valuable nature study of willows.
Please note there is an Autumn Willow notebooking page in the Ultimate and Journey level membership libraries. You can print it and use it for your nature journal.
Welcome to the brand new nature study featuring the willow! I’m excited to look more closely at my own autumn willows as the season changes. This should be an easy study as you look at the color changes and the dropping of leaves in your willow.
Start Here: Willow Nature Study – Handbook of Nature Study Lesson 179 (pages 651-655)
The link above takes you to a summer study of the willow using the Handbook of Nature Study. Pay particular attention to suggestions #8 and #9 in Lesson 179 for specific autumn willow study ideas.
In Addition: Year Long Tree Study in the Handbook of Nature Study Lesson 172 (pages 623-624) My favorite suggestions are to watercolor the shape of a tree with its autumn foliage and to carefully compare leaves found on your tree for any variation.
Activity: Tie a string on a twig attached to your willow. Observe and record in your nature journal the twig’s changes for a few months. We’re going to be doing this on a willow behind our house along the river.
Both Ultimate and Journey level members here on the Handbook of Nature Study have access to a new autumn willow notebooking page for recording your autumn observations. Look for it in your printable library.
This Outdoor Hour Challenge is part of the 2018-2019 Plan here on the Handbook of Nature Study. We’ll be using the Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Botsford Comstock to discover new things about the world around us. Join us each Friday for a different nature study topic. Make sure to subscribe to this blog to receive the weekly challenge right in your email box.
If you want to become a member here on the Handbook of Nature Study, you can click the Join Us button for more details. Benefits include those shown above including access to ebooks, notebooking pages, archived newsletters, and new ebooks and printables published during your membership.
Now available in the Ultimate and Journey level memberships:
Under the Fallen Leaves and Autumn Willow notebooking pages!
I created a few more autumn themed notebooking pages for you to use with your family.
Under the Fallen Leaves notebooking page: Take a few minutes to look under the leaves in your yard or a near-by park. What do you see there? Create a sketch and describe what you saw, felt, and smelled during your outdoor time.
Autumn Willow Tree notebooking page: Use this page to record your autumn willow observations. This can be the start of a year long/four seasons study of willows for your family. I will be reminding you each season to make some notes about your willow tree.
Note: If you have any subjects you would like me to create nature notebook pages for, please let me know in a comment here on the blog or in an email: harmonyfinearts@yahoo.com
Print a complete list of printables available in the Ultimate and Journey level memberships by clicking the button above.
FYI: There will no longer be a monthly printable planning page. Please note that members have access to the complete year’s plan in the Ultimate and Journey level memberships. Non-members can follow along by subscribing to this blog and each Friday the Outdoor Hour Challenge will come into your email inbox.
Oaks have a fragrance when the leaves are warm that conjures up memories of all the summers spent living in California. It’s an earthy smell that reminds me of hiking along trails beneath the oak forest canopy.
Walking with my son – 2012
Oaks can create a wonderful protective archway and I love to stand underneath and peek up through the leaves to the sky. Along a familiar trail, the oaks create an arching leafy roof that filters the sunlight and I remember watching my boys run ahead of me on this trail, blond heads disappearing around the corner.
This week we camped under the oaks at a friend’s house in California. I relished the time to wander the property to see his magnificent oak trees.
The crunching of dried oak leaves was a familiar trail sound as we walk along looking for acorns, none to be found this day. Perhaps it’s early in the season or maybe this year won’t be a “good” year for an acorn crop. Hint: If you dig around in the leaf litter under the tree, you may find a few of last year’s acorns not gathered by the squirrels or scrub jays.
We compared two different oaks growing at our campsite, the California black oak and the interior live oak. The leaves are very different in size and shape. The California black oak is a large tree with fairly good size leaves. The interior live oak has small, sharply toothed leaves.
This entry includes Amazon affiliate links to products I own and love!
I used the Peterson field guide to trees to figure out what kind of oak trees created each type of leaf. This guide is one of my favorites because of the detailed illustrations of not only the leaf, but also the bud and acorn. This makes it easier to distinguish which oak we are studying. Look for it on Amazon and note there is an eastern and western version for trees.
This day I was reminded that when you study oaks there are many other related studies you could work on at the same time: lichen, moss, mistletoe, woodpeckers, squirrels, and even lizards. Try to take it all in and see your tree as a living world.
The change of the season from summer to autumn is noticed by the changing of the air and the bursting forth of colors in the deciduous trees. You can’t help but revel in the oranges, burgundies, and yellows of autumn leaves!
Did you get outside and take note of your neighborhood trees?
Our road is lined by mostly evergreens but a few of us are lucky enough to have aspens on our property to enjoy. We’ve been watching our trees, anticipating a change in color as the nights have turned colder, hoping the cold snap will give us a colorful display.
Aside from the leaves, I really love the bark on the trunks of the aspens. But, for autumn we will focus on the leaves and then take a look at the trunks in the winter.
There’s no better way to begin your autumn nature study than with a look at the deciduous trees in your neighborhood. This week, read in the Handbook of Nature Study about autumn trees and then use the suggestions in the lesson to help your family take a good look at a tree.
Archive Outdoor Hour Challenge – Click the link above to take you to the original challenge.
Make sure to click the link below to read the entire Outdoor Hour Challenge with helpful links, nature study ideas, printable notebooking pages, and suggested follow-up activities.
Use this printable notebook pageto record your seasonal tree notes and a sketch. Be sure to note on your planning calendar a reminder to create a page in each of the seasons!
Four Seasons Tree Photo Project – This is another awesome tree entry with loads of ideas for a yearlong study of trees along with a printable activity.
This Outdoor Hour Challenge is part of the 2018-2019 Plan here on the Handbook of Nature Study. We’ll be using the Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Botsford Comstock to discover new things about the world around us. Join us each Friday for a different nature study topic. Make sure to subscribe to this blog to receive the weekly challenge right in your email box.
If you want to become a member here on the Handbook of Nature Study, you can click the Join Us button for more details. Benefits include those shown above including access to ebooks, notebooking pages, archived newsletters, and new ebooks and printables published during your membership.
Additional Autumn Tree Ideas
Watercolor Leaf Tutorial and Video – In this post from the archives, I share how to use watercolor crayons to create a beautiful autumn leaf painting.
I’m excited to share some new printable pages with you!
Prairie Wildflowers and Animals Clipart and Coloring Pages: This set of five pages can be used in many ways. There is a page of clipart that you can use to decorate a prairie nature study page, three pages of various subjects for prairie nature study that can be used as coloring pages or printed on cardstock to create small cards for your nature table, and a page that explains how to use the pocket printable in a lapbook or in a nature journal.
Sea Star, Newt, and Jelly Fish Nature Notebook Pages: These three pages have been requested by families and I had time to create them this month. I hope they help make your study of these topics a little easier.
Deciduous Trees in my Yard Notebook Page- This fun page has a space for you to draw a map of your yard and then mark where you have deciduous trees growing.
Note: If you have any subjects you would like me to create nature notebook pages for, please let me know in a comment here on the blog or in an email: harmonyfinearts@yahoo.com
Print a complete list of printables available in the Ultimate and Journey level memberships by clicking the button above.
FYI: There will no longer be a monthly printable planning page. Please note that members have access to the complete year’s plan in the Ultimate and Journey level memberships. Non-members can follow along by subscribing to this blog and each Friday the Outdoor Hour Challenge will come into your email inbox.
Kids and cattails are a great combination for a fun autumn nature study and your autumn search for cattails can begin this week! When the original autumn cattail Outdoor Hour Challenge was posted years ago, I asked my boys if they knew where any cattails were growing. Amazingly, they knew a couple places around town where they were growing so we were off on a cattail adventure.
Cattails Year-Long Nature Study
This could be the start of a year-long study of cattails in which you observe a designated patch of cattails once each season to watch the changes. As the year progresses, the complete life cycle story of not only the cattails but the rest of the critters that live around them begins to emerge. Such a valuable nature study lesson!
Archive Outdoor Hour Challenge – Click the link above to take you to the original challenge and a free printable notebook page for your family to use each season for your cattail study.
“The cattail is adapted for living in swamps where the soil is wet but not under water all the time….They usually occur in marshy zones along lakes or streams; and such a zone is always sharply defined by dry land on one side and water on the other.”
Handbook of Nature Study, Page 502
Make sure to click the link below to read the entire Outdoor Hour Challenge with helpful links, nature study ideas, printable notebooking pages, and suggested follow-up activities.
It’s a great time to join Homeschool Nature Study! We offer a multitude of science activities, hands-on learning ideas, seasonal nature studies, crafts, free resources for all ages – join the #outdoorhourchallenge community and enhance your homeschool science lessons!
This week we’re going to do the first of our seasonal weather observations using the Handbook of Nature Study. Make sure to read the pages noted below in the Handbook of Nature Study under the section “How to Keep a Daily Weather Map”. There are more pages in the Handbook devoted to weather but this section will give you detailed suggestions for observing and then recording the weather with your children.
Archive Outdoor Hour Challenge – Click the link above to take you to the original challenge.
“Few schools are able to have a working barometer, but observations of temperature and sky should be made in every school.”
Let us make it a daily habit to give a thought to weather conditions, the wind directions; the presence or absence of dew during the hours of evening, night, or early morning…”
Handbook of Nature Study, page 806
Make sure to click the link below to read the entire Outdoor Hour Challenge with helpful links, nature study ideas, printable notebooking pages, and suggested follow-up activities.
Use this printable notebook page to record your seasonal weather observations. Be sure to note on your planning calendar a reminder to create a page in each of the seasons!
Observing the weather does not need to be complicated and even looking out the window to note the sky conditions will build an appreciation and connection between what your children observe and the weather.
A complete list of printables currently available to members can be viewed here:
This Outdoor Hour Challenge is part of the 2018-2019 Plan here on the Handbook of Nature Study. We’ll be using the Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Botsford Comstock to discover new things about the world around us. Join us each Friday for a different nature study topic. Make sure to subscribe to this blog to receive the weekly challenge right in your email box.
Note this is an Amazon affiliate link to a product I own and love.
If you live in the prairies of North America or are interested in learning more about this rich and valuable habitat, you’re going to be excited about the featured book for this month’s nature book club link-up.America’s Prairies and Grasslands-A Guide to Plants and Animalsby Marianne D. Wallace describes that unique habitat with words and beautiful pictures. I’m eager to share this incredible resource on prairie wildlife that our family has used and loved.
You can look for it at your public library or it’s available from Amazon (Note that I’m an Amazon affiliate and there are affiliate links in this entry).
Using America’s Prairies and Grasslands in Your Nature Study
I love the Handbook of Nature Study by Anna Botsford Comstock but she wrote the book featuring plants and animals of her local habitat in upstate New York. Many of us live in very different habitats and to supplement our nature study we draw on other resources that talk about plants and animals we see in our neighborhoods.
America’s Prairies and Grasslands will appeal to many families because it helps us look deeper into things we see every day and maybe don’t appreciate.
This book uses maps to show where different prairies and grasslands are located in the United States. Visual spatial learners will benefit by looking at the maps or even recreating them in their nature journals. When I was homeschooling my boys, I always appreciated the opportunities to draw connections between different academic subjects and using geography alongside your nature study will make it more meaningful.
How to Use This Book for Nature Study
A great way to use this book is to go through each of the six major grasslands one at a time: tallgrass prairie, mixed-grass prairie, shortgrass prairie, Palous prairie, California Valley grassland, and semidesert grassland.
For each of the six grasslands, you can do the following steps.
Read the narrative.
Look at the map.
Look at the two page colored illustration.
Pick a plant or animal to learn more about using information in the back of the book, your own nature library, or online resources.
Wrap up your study with a nature journal page (see below).
Take a week for each grassland or if you live in a particular grassland, why not stretch it to an entire school year by taking a plant or animal each week? Use the index in the back of the book to see just how many topics you find of interest to your family. Check the Handbook of Nature Study websiteusing the tabs at the top to find any Outdoor Hour Challenges for selected topics to use alongside the America’s Prairies and Grasslands book.
I’ve created this set of six notebooking pages to use with your prairies and grasslands studies.
Member’s Benefit: Members here on the Handbook of Nature Study will have unlimited access in their printable library. (See how to purchase a membership here: Ultimate Naturalist Library.)
Prairie Wildlife Study with Printables
Member’s Benefit: In addition, members here on the Handbook of Nature Study have access to several notebooking pages in their printables library that will be helpful in a study of prairie wildlife. Learn more about purchasing a Ultimate Naturalist Library membership here: Join Us!
***New! Prairie Wildflowers and Animals Clipart set
***Look for the pages for bison, pronghorn, coyotes, elk, rattlesnakes, and deer.
Want to study a different habitat?
This book is one in a series of books that teach about the various habitats of the world. I own several of them and use them as references in my nature writing. Here are the other habitats you can read about: deserts, forests, mountains, seashores, and wetlands.
Make sure to subscribe to my blog to follow along with our weekly nature study activities.
Here are the co-hosts, their choices of books, and activities for the month:
Notebooking Pages based on The Prairie That Nature Built from Jenny at Faith and Good Works
Nature Journaling based on Wildflowers of Yellowstone & Grand Teton National Parks: A Guide to Common & Notable Species from Eva at Eva Varga
Online Nature Book Course based on The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush from Dachelle at Hide The Chocolate
Choose an engaging nature book, do a craft or activity, and add your post to our monthly link up.
The link up party goes live at 9:00 a.m. EST on the 20th of each month and stays open until the last day of the month. Hurry to add your links!
You can link up to 3 posts. Please do not link up advertising posts, advertise other link up parties, your store, or non-related blog posts. They will be removed.
By linking up with us, you agree for us to share your images and give you credit of course if we feature posts.
