“Well Trained Mind” Second Grade Science Activities for Part One – Earth Science
Earth Science and Astronomy are the sciences suggested for Second Grade in the Classical Cycle. For our homeschool, we use (sometimes loosely) the framework in the book The Well Trained Mind, by Susan Wise Bauer. The book is in invaluable for the classical or classically-inspired homeschool.
It is suggested that for Second Grade you divide the year into two 18-week sections: Earth Science and Astronomy. For us, that is a little ambitious; especially since we do so much supplemental scienc-ey things and classes.
This is the first image ever taken of Earth from the surface of a planet beyond the Moon. Taken by the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit one hour before sunrise on the 63rd Martian day, or sol, of its mission. (March 8, 2004)
The image is a mosaic of images taken by the rover’s navigation camera showing a broad view of the sky, and an image taken by the rover’s panoramic camera of Earth. The contrast in the panoramic camera image was increased two times to make Earth easier to see.
The inset shows a combination of four panoramic camera images zoomed in on Earth. The arrow points to Earth. Earth was too faint to be detected in images taken with the panoramic camera’s color filters.
Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Cornell/Texas A&M
Earth Science with The Well-Trained Mind
Suggested Texts
For Earth Science, the main spines are the Usborne Internet-Linked First Encyclopedia of Our World, along with More Mudpies & Magnets – for activities and experiments.
How to Teach
The Well-Trained Mind suggest in the First-grade section to allow the child to pick a section that interests them each day (from the encyclopedia), read it and do a corresponding experiment.
While the pick-and-choose method is great for following interests it is not great for pre-planning activities to accompany the subject. So, instead of going day-by-day, this curriculum is based on the main text and is a 15-week curriculum with many activities from Pinterest.
Of note is that there are 28 chapters in the the Usborne Internet-Linked First Encyclopedia of Our World that this curriculum is built around. This curriculum only uses 15 of the chapters.
What is Included
This .pdf covers 15 subjects from the encyclopedia with activities, videos, games, etc. that go along with the subject. Some sections have more activities than you may want or have time to do and some have some lower level activities thrown in there since most homeschoolers have a wide age range of learners at home. Further, this is a text for personal use. You may find value in visiting the sources to adapt them to your family’s needs and levels.
Subscribe below to get the Elementary Earth Science Curriculum and Activities File
Have a great day!
Disclaimer and Personal Notes:
This is not for sale, replication, or profit. It is only for personal use. It is just something I put together for my family. However, it ended up being a lot of work and I thought by sharing it it may be able to save some other hard-working, time-crunched family the effort.
I believe that sharing this complies with the Fair Use Doctrine (as defined by HTMLGoodies (Who is this? I don’t know, but I could understand the way they explain it in a nice user friendly way) as: “According to the Fair Use Doctrine (Section 110 (5) of the Copyright Act of 1976), it is allowable to use “limited portions” of a copyrighted item for works such as commentary, news reporting, academic reports, and the like. But you still have to give credit. You cannot claim the work as yours. You must cite where it came from.”
I diligently include appropriate links, but I’m human and maybe I missed something? There are a few experiments in there that are so prolific I do not know their origins or to whom to give credit. Please contact me if you find anything objectionable about the material.
