Homeschooling at Walt Disney World

We’ve returned from our African safari!  What an amazing variety of animals call the jungles and savannas of Africa home.

Our travels at Disney’s Animal Kingdom gave us an opportunity to see many interesting and unique animals “up close and personal”.  We did our homework before we went to learn about the habitats/biomes of Africa and what animals need to be able to live in the different areas.  Here is what we were able to see and learn when we visited the animals in their own habitats:

The Pangani Forest Trail includes areas with lush vegetation and waterfalls which are home to animals such as the colobus monkeys, the okapi (imagine giraffe that has a zebra body) and beautiful birds and ducks (too many to mention but there is a wonderful guide available to help identify the various types).  An indoor “research station” has displays with naked mole rats (not as cute as in the Kim Possible show), a pancake tortoise, a scorpion, frogs, snakes and more.  As our journey continued we saw hippos enjoying a swim and meerkats on the savanna (on the day we were visiting the guide claims they were keeping a look out for a pesky hawk that was in the area).  As the trail winds toward the end there are two groups of gorillas to see (one was a family group and the other was a group of male gorillas).

Along The Kilimanjaro Safari we found hippos, elephants, giraffes, rhinos, flamingos (their private little island is in the shape of a hidden Mickey), lions, warthogs, gazelle, impala, a cheetah and crocodiles.  The Safari is designed to be more of an entertaining attraction than a science lesson (so it was nice that we did some research before we set out on our safari), but the guides do a nice job of including a few interesting facts along the way.  There is also a large sign posted inside of each Safari vehicle that shows a picture and the name of each animal on the safari to help everyone identify their favorites.

To cap off our African adventure we attended The Festival of the Lion King.  We have been to Animal Kingdom more times that I can count, but for some reason we had never taken the time to visit this amazing show…I had no idea what we were missing!!  This is a beautiful show that is fun for the kids (their favorite characters from the Lion King are front and center) but also a wonderful celebration of African music, dance and costumes.

We enjoyed our studies of African habitats and animals.  Now we can get our passports ready as we head to Asia!

Lego Store at Downtown Disney, FL

Join in the LEGO^® Store Monthly Mini Model Build!
Visit your local LEGO Store on the first Tuesday of every month and you can learn how to build a cool mini model, and take it home – for free! Quantities are limited and offer is good while supplies last only. A new model will be available every month and will be specially themed to that month – ask a Store Associate for details! Models are not for sale and cannot be purchased. One free per child. Event is open to children ages 6 to 14 only. See store for more details.

Upcoming Mini Model Build:
LEGO Groundhog: Tuesday, February 2, begins at 5:00pm until supplies last

LEGO Store Mini Heart Speed Building Event!
Saturday, February 13
Visit your local LEGO Store on Saturday, February 13 from 1:00pm – 3:00pm to participate in a LEGO heart speed building event!  Builds start promptly every 10 minutes and the fastest builder will win a special prize to take home!  Everyone who participates will receive a mini heart of their own.  See additional contest rules, terms & conditions at the LEGO Store.  No purchase necessary.

We’ve wrapped up our learning activities for our January book club selection of “The Jungle Book”.  The kids’ reaction to our new book club format exceeded all of our expectations!

Here are a few additional things we did and learned on our journey –

We allowed each family to select a version of the book that worked for them — some read illustrated classics while others read the unabridged version.  This was a great way to allow everyone to read at a level that was appropriate for their family.

We had each child conduct their own research about the author and about the time period in which the story was written.  Our children are at an age where they are interested in putting everything on a timeline as this helps them to better visualize the time period and events that may have impacted the author and his story telling.

We included a writing assignment, for this lesson we had the children write a newspaper article about a scene in one of the stories.  They learned about the various elements of a newspaper article, selected the scene they wanted to write about and created their own dramatic and fact filled stories.  It was fun to see their interests and personalities come through as they described their favorite scenes.

One of the children’s favorite activities was experiencing different versions of the stories on CDs and as movies.  Of course we watched the Disney version of the Jungle Book (who doesn’t love the fun songs!) and we found the Chuck Jones Collection, an animated version of Mowgli’s Brothers and Rikki-Tikki-Tavi.  We also enjoyed an audio CD version of the book by storyteller Jim Weiss.  We listed to the different versions of the stories and had great conversations about the similarities and differences of each presentation.

And of course we topped off our adventure with a trip to the Magic Kingdom and a ride on the Jungle Cruise.  Yes, I understand that the Jungle Cruise isn’t exactly based on The Jungle Book, but it was a fun way to wrap-up our lesson.  Since many of the silly jokes zoomed right past our kids, the moms enjoyed a few laughs while the kids gave names to all of the animals we saw along the journey.

I’m happy to say that our adventure was fun and educational.  We were able to bring a book to life and explore it for a month and as a result we will have many great memories to share!