Any home-schoolers with fun learning idea for on board?

[fredgirls]

Love this thread!
We spent a lot of time looking up! Not only did we study the stars but we learnt about clouds. There's some great handy printout guides on pinterest.

 

[usfourandnomore]

Love this thread!! We home school as well. We have traveled with DCL twice. I love the world map and stars ideas. How wonderful if the Kid's Clubs would implement some of these ideas in to their programs!! The learning possibilities while traveling with your kiddos whether you home school or not are endless....AND the best part is most of the time they are learning and don't even realize it. That is my favorite kind of learning!!

 

[Tamiele]

We are homeschoolers too. One thing my son enjoyed (12 years old) was the Captain's Discussion. They had the captain do a Q & A in one of the lounges. He loved it!

 

[elmo2200]

Kimbo71- We homeschool too! DS is an 8th grader and DD was homeschooled until the 11th grade (she is a senior this year). The kids help do research for the trip and then there is unstructured learning on the trip. We love checking out new wildlife. I hope to take the kids on the beach the night before to stargaze and look for crabs and such.

 

[DarthTod]

I don't homeschool, but when I take my kid to different biomes, I like to have him look at the native animals and try to determine what ecological influences might have caused them to evolve differently than animals in our home environment. On Western Caribbean cruises, there is also the chance to talk about the Yucatan peninsula and the extinction level event that occurred there 66 million years ago. Kids are usually pretty thrilled with the idea of massive asteroids crashing into the planet. The plate tectonics of the Caribbean are also a pretty interesting topic and a good entry into all kinds of discussions on continental drift, Pangea, etc.

And yeah, my BS was in geology ;-)

 

[Aigantighe]

We're not home schooling but we are looking to pull the kids out of school and kindy here in New Zealand for a cruise during term time so we are really interested in learning opportunities. A great thread - thanks! Travel is one of the only things you buy that makes you richer and not poorer so a big overseas trip for DD7 and DS4 will be a great educational moment!

 

[jmrbc9900]

There's also budgeting stuff. Spending $ on the ship so easy because u are using a "credit card". Basic math - add up receipts each say to see if u are staying on budget.

Sent from iPad

 

[JackieO]

I realize now that I titled this thread wrong. I should have just said "educational ideas" and left off the "home-schooling". Everyone is interested in educational opportunities.

Great ideas so far on those teachable moments. I'm going to use the world map for CM's homes, star gazing, and budgeting ideas for sure, and we're going to the library for books on the countries we'll be visiting today. Keep the ideas coming.

 

[meajuly5]

Really enjoyed this thread and decided to do some of hese things too on our summer cruie tonalaska! Hope the kids enjoy e naturalists and will definitely incorporate the stargazing etc.

 

[meajuly5]

Love this thread!! We home school as well. We have traveled with DCL twice. I love the world map and stars ideas. How wonderful if the Kid's Clubs would implement some of these ideas in to their programs!! The learning possibilities while traveling with your kiddos whether you home school or not are endless....AND the best part is most of the time they are learning and don't even realize it. That is my favorite kind of learning!!

Very true! That would be great

 

[Aigantighe]

Just saw a really great FE gift idea that would be a great educational idea for on the cruise - nautical flags. We haven't cruised yet (Fantasy Jan 2014) but the OP said there are lots of nautical flags on board and the kids can decipher the messages by using the nautical flag alphabet. Could be fun.

 

[JackieO]

Just saw a really great FE gift idea that would be a great educational idea for on the cruise - nautical flags. We haven't cruised yet (Fantasy Jan 2014) but the OP said there are lots of nautical flags on board and the kids can decipher the messages by using the nautical flag alphabet. Could be fun.

Found a great website: http://www.boatsafe.com/nauticalknowhow/flags.htm

 

[PrincessShmoo]

Just saw a really great FE gift idea that would be a great educational idea for on the cruise - nautical flags. We haven't cruised yet (Fantasy Jan 2014) but the OP said there are lots of nautical flags on board and the kids can decipher the messages by using the nautical flag alphabet. Could be fun.

On the Wonder, the passageway on the port side between the kids club and the Buena Vista Theatre had separate pictures of the Nautical flags with a cute picture and a description.

I'll post a picture tomorrow (I took pictures of each one). Sorry, can't get at it tonight.

 

[CandyPG]

My daughter is in Kinder and she will miss 8 days of school. Her major focus in school is writing and reading. I have printer about 15 different journal pages for her to work on during our trip. This will also make a fun suvioneers.

 

[jmrbc9900]

Bump

 

[Gracedis1]

Love this thread! Is there a tour of the ship you can take? My kids love learning about different modes of transportation. It would be cool to learn about how ships are made, what parts are used for what purpose, how the captain navigates, etc.

 

[McDonald5]

Our cruise isn't until October so my girls will be in 1st and 2nd. But one thing I have planned is to make a book about all of the marine life we see. I've got disposable underwater cameras for each of them and I have my own underwater camera (not disposable). So when we get back we will make little books with all of the info we can find about each fish/plant/coral etc. I plan to also include my preschooler in it too (he just won't be able to write sentences like the girls).

I can't wait until we can do a European cruise, though. Now THAT will be a learning experience for everyone!

 

[Docmom]

These are great ideas! We homeschool and are going on our first DCL cruise in 3 weeks. We've already studied about pirates and Walt Disney (totally fascinating life). We're going to do a dolphin encounter in GC and stingrays in Cozumel so are reading about both and just started a unit study on sailing ships. We planned on doing some astronomy onboard and now will include a world map to map out the CMs' native countries. May also ask them to teach us a few words in their native language. Will also have my girls do scrapbooks and journals of the trip....and I'm going to make ones for them too!