Christmas in Melbourne {2/2}

After a delightful morning of exploring inner city Melbourne we decided to take a walk up to Melbourne Museum for a picnic lunch and explore.

The gardens and beautiful Royal Exhibition Building

 After a peaceful picnic lunch in the gardens we decided to explore two of the newest displays in Melbourne Museum

Even the Dinosaurs had joined in Christmas this year!

Dinosaur Walk

The children enjoyed seeing the huge dinosaur skeletons and touching all the hands on displays and always a winner with the children are the computer animations explaining different aspects of dinosaur life. The museum has Educational resources available, a Virtual Exhibition as well as Prehistoric fun activities for children.

600 Million Years Victoria Evolves **

Next we explored a new division recently opened in the science and life gallery.  The amount of things to see in this gallery is a little overwhelming and you could take a full morning here to read and explore.  I was not prepared for what we saw and had not prepared Sir N who encountered the 100's of millions of years put forth as fact!  Needless to say we are having a few discussions about time and evolution.
You can take a virtual tour, enjoy some Fossil Fun activities, access educational resources or watch some video's.
** As a family we believe in Creation and young earth.
 
Dynamic Earth

Our next point of call and revisit was to Dynamic earth.  We briefly explored this exhibit in October and it made such an impact on the children they begged to see it again.

I stand in awe of our creator God who made all these beautiful things.  The images here do not do justice to the things we saw and experienced.

The website has a comprehensive overview of what you can see here as well as a library of video's,  Earth fun for children and Educational resources.

Christmas Blessings

It was a wonderful experience enjoying the outdoors, Christmas delights and earth science explorations for us.  It's days such as these that make homeschooling a delightful past time.

Which museums do you enjoy visiting with your children ?

Blessings




This post is linking with: Look What We Did
Photo collages made with: Photoscape a FREE photo editor

Melbourne Museum

To finish a week long unit study about Helen Keller and Louis Braille, we made a a special trip to Melbourne Museum to have a look at Living in a Sensory World a temporary display.  We had lots of fun exploring this and other exhibits on display.

Here is a photo story of our day.

We started off in the Living in a Sensory World where we explored the world of the blind and the things that have been developed to help make their world an easier place to live in.

The lighthouse is a symbol for the blind in Australia.  This brass light house was awarded to Helen Keller.

From here we did a little bit of exploring in The Melbourne Story.  We ran out of time to fully explore this exhibit. You can take a virtual tour of this.

The children enjoyed a 'ride' on an old roller coaster
followed by a trip to a movie theater.

We had a look through an old part of Melbourne and how they used to live.

From here we went to find the Dinosaur Walk exhibit only to discover that they have opened a new Dynamic Earth exhibit which we took a very quick look at and found it very hard to pull the children away from.  We had to promise to please come back to explore! (Gold to a mothers ears!!)

It was a wonderful day out and I am so pleased we have a family Museum Membership to enjoy this resource in Melbourne.  If you haven't been here in a while I invite you to come and explore it more fully.

Blessings
Chareen

Geelong Wool Museum

Last week Wednesday we join three other families and went to the Geelong Wool Museum to enjoy two displays: The National Wool Museum and Step Right UP.

I confess that I had not gone to this museum before because I had heard reports that it is expensive and not worth it.  I wish I had done my own research because we had so much fun and really enjoyed our time here.

We arrived and started our explorations at Step Right Up.  The children had a lot of fun exploring and playing with the items on display.  From the write up on their website I had expected a lot more from this display.  I was disappointed but the children really enjoyed themselves.

From here we entered the rest of the museum which was a truly wonderful experience. We all had a wonderful time and ran out of time to fully explore this resource.  I hope to return again with Sir N.

The first half of the museum explores the cycle of sheep farming.  From the different types of sheep and the wool they produce to life on the sheep farm.  You get to see the process of shearing, grading and baling the wool.

The second half of the museum is dedicated to cleaning, carding, spinning and weaving the wool.

When visiting this museum give yourself more than a morning or afternoon to fully enjoy it's displays.

Blessings
Chareen

Two hours at the Museum

We joined some fellow home schoolers for the Bugs Bugs Bugs talk.  It was a great time of hands on activity and we also had a 30 min window of being in the bugs gallery on our own as a group.

I had forgotten just how much there is to see and do at the Melbourne Museum. I think that when we return from South Africa I will definitely take the time to get a museum membership so Sir N and I can spend an afternoon once a month at the museum exploring !

Bugs Olympics

1. Worlds fastest flying insect: Desert Locust [Africa]
2. World's largest moth wing-span - White Witch Moth [South America]
3. World's most poisonous butterfly - Antimachus Swallowtail [Uganda]
4. World's largest moth - Atlas Moth [Indonesia]
5. World's longest beetle - Hercules Beetle [Central & South America]
6. World's largest beetle - Goliath Beetle [Africa]
7. World's slowest wing-beat butterfuly - Holarctic Swallowtail [China]
8. World's loudest insect - Double Drummer [Australia]
9. World's best defensive strategy - Australia Bombardier Beetle [Australia]
10. World's most poisonous butterfly - Antimachus Swallowtail [Uganda]
11. World's largest butterfly - Queen Alexandra Birdwing [New Guinea]
12. World's fastest butterfly - Payen's Swallowtail [Indonesia]
13. World's heaviest insect - Little Barrier Island Weta [New Zealand]
14. Badge Huntsman Adult body length 18 mm

Dinosaur Walk

We enjoyed the big and the small of this exhibit.

Marine Life Exploring our Seas.

We enjoyed exploring our marine life.

Playing in the autumn leaves outside.

It was a wonderful day of exploring

Where have you been exploring ?
Blessings
Chareen