Evolution

Antarctica has now cleanly melded into a vigorous inquiry on the beginning of time.

I had intended to introduce the concept of American history this fall by beginning with the Land Bridge, since that would be the beginning of human American history, but it's funny how when you try to begin in one place it can seem as though you need just a little more first. Land bridge? What about the humans who used it? So okay, early humans it is first. But that's kind of an open beginning, and after watching the History Channel's Ape to Man he had questions about evolution, and the step before that is the introduction of life, yadda yadda. If we were an actual unit studies family one might have to call this the American History Unit Study: From the Big Bang to the American Revolution and Onward. Ha ha.

Calvin is now all kinds of interested in the dawn of time. We followed up Ape to Man with BBC's Walking with Monsters, a rather enjoyable series of three videos on the Paleozoic Era. This afternoon found us scouring the library for books on evolution, Charles Darwin, and the very beginnings of life. There's a surprising amount of good material out there and we have a tall stack of books to go through this week, or as we see fit, plus some related play dough and painting projects, a science look at what it means to be alive, color by number (addition) pictures of Paleozoic life, and possibly some new felt to design, make, and play with. I'm sure we'll also watch the videos again, and there will be other activities that suggest themselves as we go. We'll spend as much time as we like traipsing through seriously historic history, and eventually we'll get around to America and U.S. history. Eventually.