4/29/19

Last week, the class learned about quotation marks and how to use them.  They worked in groups to come up with short skits, with the farm animals as the characters.  They worked together to write down their stories, and then we created puppets for the animals.  This week, they added the finishing touches, practiced with their group, and then presented them to the class!  It was a perfect day for some outdoor theater!

Our rescue barn cats have been on the prowl and keeping the rat population here on the farm to a minimum.  One of the young cats, Mrs. Chippy, has made friends with the baby lamancha goats.  They hang out and play together, and they are even similar in color!  The class played an outdoor game called Barn Cats & Field Mice.  The three "cats" had to chase the mice and catch their "tails".  If the cat tagged them, they had to go sit out under the canopy.  But, the mice could grab an extra tail and rescue their friends!  There were sweaty faces and tired kids by the end!

Once inside, the class heard a short lesson on soybeans.  Most kids don't realize how useful soybeans are, and how they have many uses outside of being food!  I showed the kids a big bag of flaked soybean oil.  We talked about the difference between transparent, translucent, and opaque, and then the kids were able to see how heat changes the soybean oil from opaque to transparent.  In Swiss Family Robinson, the Robinsons just dipped wicks into an oil from berries to make candles.  I morphed our literature lesson with our agriculture lesson today, and the class was able to see how time consuming it is to dip candles!  At first, everyone was excited to give it a try... but once a few came up to participate, they realized that it would result in very delayed gratification!  We continued to dip the candles throughout the day, and the kids were able to see how the wax builds up to create a candle.  Next week, we'll work on a simpler and much quicker soybean oil candle so that the class will be able to take something home!

4/22/19

Working on their skits!

Baby Goat Tag

4/15/19

We tackled some pretty cool things today in our Farm Fusion lessons!  First, the class learned how to make sure conditions are sanitary for goat milking.  We milked the goats, fed all the animals, and talked about Farm News.  Then, the class had a little chemistry lesson as I walked them through the steps to pasteurize milk and make chevre, a simple goat cheese!  Throughout the process they learned about acids and pH, curds and whey, how to read a thermometer (reading and estimating between the numbers on a thermometer), and more.  As the kids took turns constantly stirring the pot of milk, the class listened to the history of John Deere tractors.  We also talked about humidity and its importance to a healthy hatch of duck eggs.  We even candled some duck eggs as we moved them from the big incubator into the hatching incubator.  They could easily see the developing embryos moving around, one egg that showed no development at all, and one that was rotten inside!  After disposing of the bad eggs, we placed the healthy ones in the hatch box.  Hopefully more ducklings will start pipping in the next few days! 

After our milk hit the correct temperature, we did a little math with fractions to decide how much vinegar and lemon juice to add to the milk.  While the curds began to form, the class "got their wiggles out" with some fun in the sun!  We then poured the curds into cheesecloth and hung them to drip.  The kids were able to choose from different fresh herbs and mix up their own chevre to take home.  This is a soft cheese that is great on crackers, or I can hang it longer and create a dryer, crumbly cheese that is great on pizza, salads, and in lasagna!  I explained to the class that all the whey left over could be put through the process again, which would result in ricotta.  We didn't have time for this, however, and the hogs were happy to splurge on all of the nutritious whey!