Science Resource: Seymour Simon

Seymour Simon is a children's science author whose books couple vivid photographs with good, easy to comprehend writing. He has a long series of books about bodies in space like the planets, comets and the moon.

His website SeymourSimon.com has an author blog, children's resource and game section and an educator section that might be of interest. The kids' and educators' sections have a registration process to ensure that kids have parental permission to use the site.

College Credit By Exam

Burning Question: Where to take CLEP/DSST while stationed here in the Kanto Plain of Japan? Do you have a high schooler, especially a Jr/Sr level schooler and wants--nay, needs to take the CLEP/DSST?

Well I found info... Que audience applause... Thank you, thank you.

Now, as I had discovered through half a school day spent on the phone being bounced around from one office to another, not much help is available to us through college hill on base if you are not active duty military or a high school graduate dependent of a DOD sponsored individual. Thanks to the lack of support and services, I have been keeping this pot simmering on my back burner to find a way around this quandary and have been richly rewarded.

I recently (as of this morning) came across information in how to get CBE: Credit By Exam. This is done via CLEP or DSST. While in Japan, you can take CLEP without constraints (ex: must be military or already enrolled at the college etc...) at Temple University, Tokyo; and DSST also in Tokyo at CAS and Temple University. 

I hope this helps out. Below are the links of where I garnered this informaiton along with the addresses of the two sites in Tokyo. 

Good Fortune and Happy Monday--oh, and Holidays too!

Article concerning CBE http://www.rosettastone.com/homeschool/articles/new-approach-to-college

CLEP in Japan http://apps.collegeboard.com/cbsearch_clep/searchCLEPTestCenterResults.jsp?searchCategory_country=Japan&DBACTION=SEARCH_TC&clepSearchType=International&x=35&y=10

DSST in Japan In the search criteria box enter "Japan" and for Region select "International." http://www.getcollegecredit.com/search.html

CLEP and DSST

http://www.tuj.ac.jp/default.html
Temple University - Tokyo

3F, Test Center
2-8-12 Minami-Azabu, Minato-ku
Tokyo,   106-0047
03-5441-9877

DSST 

http://www.cas-jpn.com/aboutus-en.html#en2

CAS Center for Advanced Studies 

Sanei-Hoshino Bldg., 3F, 

10-2 Sanei-cho, Shinjuku-ku, 

Tokyo, 160-0008, JAPAN
International Phone : (+81)3-3226-7462　

Fax : (+81)3-3226-7465　E-mail :info@cas-jpn.com

Waiting for the Typhoon

Well, it looks like we have another typhoon headed our way this week. I'm sure everyone has already started securing loose items on the balcony and in the yard.

If you're looking for some interesting educational ideas for typhoons, check out some of these.

Beaufort Wind Scale illustration from Howtoons. Last year we did our own illustrations in the spirit of this chart during the "back to school" typhoon.

Typhoons and hurricanes are the same kind of storm, just happening in different locations. Weather Wiz Kids has some good info on hurricanes and what causes the different resulting effects of the storm like storm surge.

The education section of the National Weather Service has some good stuff on weather in general and storms in particular.

NOAA has a great education site. Weather, reef exploration, climate, marine life, etc are all profiled and explained. They have tons of info on hurricanes.

If this strikes up an interest in weather science, you might be interested in the online weather course available from NOAA. It's called Jetstream and it seems very good.

Japanese History and Art Activities

Ellen McHenry's Basement Workshop site has some interesting hands on activities that would be fun for homeschoolers. Check out the history section, which includes some Japanese activities, like a pop up Bunraku stage. Bunraku is Japanese puppet theatre like what is described in The Master Puppeteer.

Hat tip: Our Nest of 3

Where to Put the Homeschool Stuff

We had a homeschool space challenge a few weeks back. Mommy To Bees was sweet enough to post some photos of her dining room to show how she's arranged homeschooling stuff in their Ikego home.

She also has some cool pics of the homeschooling files and their contents.

Anyone else have photos they're willing to show off of how you keep homeschool stuff in your home, either military housing or Japanese homes?

Interesting Japanese Grasshopper

I was trying to identify a giant insect that we had land on our balcony last summer. In the process I found a cool site with little posts about insects and other animals in Japan. Natural Japan is based in Kyushu (southern Japan). But even so, it has some good info. If you can narrow your search down to an order (like arachnids - spiders, lepidoptera - butterflies & moths, or orthoptera - grasshoppers & related insects) you can click on that term in the sidebar and see all the entries for that order.

By the way, the lovely on the balcony was an oriental long headed locust. Below is another one that we found last fall on the soccer fields. I think it's interesting that they seem to change colors as the rice in the fields changes from green to golden brown. If you're headed out to harvest rice this fall, or just hanging around the soccer fields, keep an eye out for these hoppers.

Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra

If you are working on music appreciation this year, you might find the Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra game useful. It is a computer game that follows the pieces in the Britten symphony to teach students about the different instruments in an orchestra. The game is a production from Carnegie Hall Listening Adventures.
Listening Adventures also has a feature for Dvorak's New World Symphony. Rather than a game, it is more of an illustrated performance. Images of both the featured instruments and the notes of the melody help you to "see" what you are listening to.

Online Art Resources

I've been putting together my plans for artist study this year and found a great resource from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. It has essays on various themes from artistic movements to artists to specific subjects to specific objects. For example:

Japanese Art (over 30 essays)
Greek and Roman Art (over 90 essays)
Horse Armor in Europe, with links to related essays and exhibitions, including Let's Look at Armor, which compares European, Japanese and Ottoman Turkish armor.

There was some discussion on the KPHS email list about Janson's History of Art. There is an extensive companion website for Janson's that includes study guides and activities like fill in the blank, true false questions, essay questions and maps. If you hover above the chapter numbers at the top you can see what the chapter topics are. I haven't checked yet, but I would expect the base library to have at least one copy of Janson's History of Art in the collection.

One more nice art resource is the National Gallery of Art's website. It has both an art education section with lesson plans and activities by artist and topic; and an NGAKids section that includes fun online activities using various artists and movements for inspiration. They have children's guides and longer Family Guides. These can be helpful when visiting exhibits at local Japanese art museums, which might not have printed or audio guides available in English.

Books, Books and More Books

I am bad, really bad when it comes to books. I LOVE books and always have. I read constantly and usually more than one book at a time--which some people have a hard time grasping. I am currently visiting the US and going crazy with all the books here: discount stores, used book stores, library sales. It's almost too much! I find I can't part with my books either for I enjoy reading them over, and sometimes over. As such, I am also trying to work at instilling this love to my children. Yes, they too love books, but I want them to also love literature. I do think there is a difference. Right now, they too love books, but they haven't quite come to appreciate good literature, even children's literature. As I sit here at the computer on these last days of my vacation, I have been doing a ton of searches on the internet and have found all sorts of fun stuff involving good books.

First, I am so excited to discover that September is Roald Dahl Month. He has always been one of my favorite authors. I have fond memories of my second grade teacher reading us James and the Giant Peach. This was actually one of the first works of good fiction that I was able to get my son to read. He already knew the story from the movie and liked it, but the transformation that took place when he was able to compare the book to the movie. It was like . . .magic! And yes, he did agree that the book was so much better. I am really looking forward to following the activities and having the boys read some new Dahl books in the coming months.

As home schoolers, I see that trying finding literature guides is a common endeavour. I have recently come across a few more sites that might be of interest and include some free literature guides to popular titles. First, there's Glencoe Literature. They have a huge list of guides and seem to be adding new ones. There appears to be a wide range of offerings and for most upper elementary levels and above, everything from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer to A Wrinkle in Time, classics and award winners alike.

A site that I just found today and has a smaller listing, but does include books for younger readers is Kidsreads.com. This site doesn't have guides as such, but discussion questions for book clubs. Another book club site that has quite an extensive listing of books is Litlovers. This site is fantastic! It has all sorts of book info, but from what I have seen the titles are for an older audience, although many classics are included too. I liked this one for in addition to the questions, it also includes book info, a synopsis, and reviews.

Finally, there's Books 4 Boys. If looking for guides is a big question, finding books that boys want to read is even bigger. This site has recommendations by age, author, theme and for all age levels, from picture books to young adult. There are no true guides, but several books do have discussion questions to accompany them. Some of the newer books even have excerpts available.

If you have a favorite book or author, please share. I am always looking for new books to read and share. Happy reading!

Hiking Around Yokosuka

Here are some hiking trails in the area.

Daibutsu hiking trail. This is a longish trail in Kamakura that can be hiked in several different segments. We started in Hase (near the Great Buddha), hiked the ridgeline, then came down into town and hit a couple of the Kamakura shrines. You can also hike all the way up into Kita Kamakura. Pretty gentle hike once you get to the top of the ridgeline, but would be very slippery when wet. More walks and hikes in Kamakura

This is my source for other hikes around Yokosuka. The site is in Japanese, but I use Google translator. The trail maps are all in Japanese and don't translate, but I've had pretty good luck by matching up the kanji for the train stations to figure out where the trail goes. These range from easy city strolls to trail hiking.

Last week we did the hike from Keikyu Taura to Yokosuka. This one is about 5 miles, but has a lot of change in elevation. It goes up to a plum forest park in Taura that has a really great kids' playground if you are taking younger kids as tag alongs. We hiked this one by taking the train to Taura and hiking back to the base. Lots of vending machines along this route, so you don't have to carry a ton of water. There are also drinking fountains and bathrooms at both parks where you can refill water.

I also like the Dollars to Yen blog for hiking and park/playground ideas. The blog author lived in Ikego for a couple years and recently moved down to Okinawa. She has posts with good pictures of several of the local trails.

Books in the base library that are useful include 40 Day Trips Around Tokyo and 40 More Day Trips Around Tokyo as well as Trails of Two Cities. Another fun book is Kamakura: Fact and Fiction. This has wonderful history tidbits about what you will see all around Kamakura. All of these are in the Japanese interest section beyond the internet computers.

Boy Scout Troop 15 in Tokyo has a series of historic trails laid out through the Tokyo metro area. If you hike three of the trails, you can then buy one of the historic trail patches. (Trails are about halfway down the page.) This page also has a good reference for plants and poisonous animals in Japan.

Not necessarily a School Room Challenge

The Kanto Plain Home Schoolers presents the Not Necessarily a School Room Challenge

Few of us have enough space for a dedicated school room. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have tons of school “stuff”. So how do you have your school stuff stored, arranged and organized so that you can find it, use it and still eat dinner at a table?

Share your school space ideas and pictures. If you have a blog, you can post ideas and pictures there and post a link in the comments section.

If you’re like me, you might work better with a deadline, so send in your submissions by 27 August.

I'm looking forward to seeing our own little version of an HGTV special.

Getting Excited About Japan

Something that I've struggled with on this tour is not really knowing what it is that I want to see and experience in Japan. Unlike France or Germany, I didn't have much of a mental image to go with Japan.

I thought that might be the case with some other people here or who are on the way. I have often turned to the Japan National Tourism Board site, which has not only city specific info for travel planning, but also a lot of good general cultural info about Japan. The KIE section, for example has several pages of information about the traditon of moon viewing in Japan. (The big full moon festivals are right around the corner in August.)

Having Your Own Summer Homeschool Conference

Again on the organizational front, I found this blog post from a homeschool mom who is having a personal homeschool conference (would this be home conferencing?). This is something that she started doing last year and you can also read about that here.

I've been listening to some of the Peace Hill Press conference lectures as I plan what we're doing this year. Susan Wise Bauer also has some cool classical homeschooling Q&A videos on You Tube.

There are also some helpful (and even some free) lectures available at Word MP3.

If you think about it, a typical school year would program in several days for the teacher to prepare for the beginning of the year, calculate grades and give feedback to students about their progress, transition to a new semester and even learn about and practice a new educational program. I don't think that it is unreasonable for us to take some of that same time to plan for our homeschool year.

Homeschool Organization

Organizing everything for homeschooling can seem like a Hereculean task at times. You might have some subjects planned out in neat lessons like math and grammar. But then you add in books that have to be read a chapter at a time, science programs with reading and experiments, spelling lists, etc; and it quickly runs out of control.

If all of your material comes from the same source, you might have a couple over arching schedules to follow. But start pulling from different curriculums or doing one pace for history and another for science and again it runs off the rails.

And all of this isn't even touching on what you do with multiple kids doing different things. Or keeping records for the end of the year. (We're likely to move to a state that requires at least some record keeping AND those high school years are looking.) It seems like this time every year I find interesting discussions online about planning and getting organized.

Last year was workboxes. The idea is that each student has a set of boxes or drawers, one per subject. Each evening, the boxes are filled with work for the next day. Some get books and assignments, others get coloring pages or activities. The next day the student works through each box. When they are done, they are done with school for the day. The Workbox System is an idea from Sue Patrick. If you search on "homeschool workboxes" you can find a number of blogs with examples of how they are put to use. Here are a couple examples. Ice cube bins as boxes. Plastic shoe boxes on racks. Even more links and photos in this review of the workbox system. It might be too much for some families. On the other hand, it might be just the thing to get good activities out of the closet and drawer where you've been saving them and into the kids' hands. And it could be a real motivator for a dawdling student if he knows there is a puzzle or a game stashed in there after math is done.

What I'm seeing discussed this year is using file folders. The general idea is that you take a folder for each week and preplan so that all of the assignments and worksheets are already there. There is a long discussion of homeschool filing systems at the Well Trained Mind Curriculum Board. This blogger has modified the folder idea for use with 3 ring binders. I do like the idea of having activity sheets right with the schedule for that week. Too often I realize that I've forgotten to do mapping or coloring sheets that I'd intended to use. Or that all of the science readings had accompanying questions to answer in another binder. So there may well be an advantage to grouping by week rather than by subject.

Anyway, something to think about while you're lounging at the pool.

Legos as Reading Manipulatives

If you have a beginning or emerging reader, you should check out the pictures at Filth Wizardry of Duplo Legos converted into reading manipulatives. It's worth checking out the rest of the blog too, especially if you have younger or crafty kids. There are some fantastic ideas mostly focusing on arts and crafts.

Free Elementary Life Science Curriculum

This website from Mr. Q has a free elementary level life science curriculum as an intro to his other science curriculum. You can also browse through the lab notes archive, which containes some interesting stand alone experiments. The blog section has been running a series of science posts relating to food.

There's some good science here using a lot of material that you probably have at hand.

Blank Homeschool Planners

I'm spending part of my summer planning for next year. I've finally learned that we really do best when I have a specific concrete and finite schedule for us to follow. For some reason, just have a specific to do list will get my kids (or at least some of them) to plug away from one subject to another. When I try to be more free form, we tend to drift more than I'm comfortable with.

So I'm working on consolidating our various school lists and schedules into something that can give us more of an overview of what we are doing, not just for the day, but for a semester.

If this is something that you're working on, you might want to check out the Donna Young website. She has a number of planners and calendars that are blank and printable. She even has a section that helps you think through the homeschool planning process, from deciding what subjects to cover to scheduling them out. This can be pretty helpful if you've recently taken the plunge into homeschooling or if you find you are making the transition from elementary days with a focus on reading and early math to something more structured. Or if you have older kids, who like mine, haven't mastered the art of keeping a calendar and planning ahead, you might want to check out the high school subject notebook

This isn't to say that you need to have your day planned out in 15 minute blocks. We went for years with our whole schedule being a half page of paper with subjects listed and blocks to check. We just did whatever was the next lesson in each subject. But the more that I merge and tweak curriculum or create my own, the handier it is for me to have an overview of what I'm trying to do. My hope is that by working consistently through what I think we Need to do, I will have more free time in which to do what I Want to do without feeling that I'm neglecting something.

As with anything in homeschooling, your mileage may vary.

Yokosuka Youth Programs

Wondering what sort of programs for kids you will find at Yokosuka? Check out the new Yokosuka Youth Programs brochure. It has information on all sorts of groups from school clubs to youth sports to chapel youth groups. (Go ahead and accept the certificate. This is a quirk of some military sites.)

H/T: Our ever helpful Yokosuka School Liaison Officer (Thank you)

More Free Homeschooling Resources

Guest Hollow has several free curriculum and resources for history and science. In particular they have American history, the human body, pre school and elementary level science and supplements for the Winter Promise Sea and Sky curriculum (which explores ocean environments).

Lord of the Rings Literature Study

I found another good free literature study, this time for The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. (Scroll down to the bottom of the page for links to the unit study.) This looks like quite a good basis for a middle school or high school exploration of the themes in the books.

I also found that Cliffs Notes are available for free online.

Free Science and Literature Studies

One of the exciting things about homeschooling is the number of families who are writing their own curriculum to suit a particular interest or area of focus. Sometimes this is tweaking of something already in print. Sometimes it is a full fledged series of books and activities. Story of the World, by Susan Wise Bauer, for example, started out as a series to fill a niche that she thought was lacking, that of a world history continuum for the elementary grades.

Even cooler is the fact that the internet allows some families to share their creations with the world at large and for other homeschoolers to benefit too. And it is great when some of what you find is available for free.

Little Blue School has several literature units that the author developed for use in her coop in Norfolk, Virginia (which almost makes me want to put Norfolk on the top of our duty station wish list).
Aeneid
Treasure Island
Elections
Novel Writing (This is a great breakdown of the parts of a novel, even if you don't sit down and write your own.)
Jungle Book

The blog Handbook of Nature Study has lots of resources for focusing your time outdoors. Barb sells some of her studies as inexpensive ebooks, but also has lots of nature study ideas that can be downloaded for free. Don't miss the Outdoor Hour Challenges and the free downloads on the sidebar.

I also found a blog called Fieldwork that was posting a series of lessons in marine biology/oceanography. She ended up only finishing 24 of the 34 she had planned, but I still think it is a nice resource. Something that I like about her approach is that it is hands on and could be used as a basis for exploring any seaside, not just the east or west coast of the US. That's something that has been important to me since we've spent the last decade living beyond the scope of most English language field guides.

A Rocky Road to Homeschooling

I think there may be as many journeys into homeschooling as there are families. Maybe more if you count the sometimes different journeys that moms, dads and children take. Some families homeschool because they've known homeschoolers and were impressed by what they saw. Some feel called to homeschool. Some don't like the idea of classrooms in general. Others are escaping a particular school situation but plan to return to school at some point.

I was thinking about these different journeys while I was reading a post by Harmony Art Mom. She is one of my favorite homeschooling bloggers, who has some rich resources in art and music appreciation as well as nature study at her other blog, Handbook of Nature Study. She has already graduated one child, has a couple in high school and one more right behind. So I thought it was interesting to read her description of how she started homeschooling. I think that the biggest take away point for me was that she didn't know everything or have a plan for every bit of the way when she started out. But she did decide that she was capable of doing her best and that her best would be an improvement for her kids. It is easy to look at where she is now, with systems in place for school work and incredible results and think that I'm not capable of that. But it really is largely about keeping your eye on the goal and just keeping on.

Yokosuka Area Attractions

I found some cool tourist brochures when we were out at Kannonzaki Park this weekend. There are several different guides, each on a theme (flowers, history, seaside attractions, etc). Turns out that they are actually produced by Coco Curry, a local chain restaurant. If you go through the website and use a translation program like Google Translator, there is quite a bit of local history and information on local Yokosuka attractions hiding here.

I even found a few Yokosuka area hiking trail maps like the trail over Takatoriyama (I think it starts at the Oppama station) or a trail around Taura that starts near the Yokosuka JR station.

Meigetsuin Temple in Kamakura

Another great temple to see hydrangea and iris flowers is the Meigetsuin temple in Kamakura.

To get to the temple, you head on the JR train to Kita-Kamakura, one stop past Kamakura. From there, you cross the tracks (coming from Yokosuka), make a right, and a pleasant, short walk until you reach the end of the street. Turn left and you'll run right into the temple entrance.

The fees into the main part of the temple are reasonable at Y500 for adults and Y300 for students. There is a fee for the "hidden" back part of the temple, another Y500 per person. If you like iris flowers, it might be worth going into once.

There are several varieties of hydrangea all over the temple grounds.

The historical aspect to this temple is interesting.

All in all, a beautiful temple.

Kris

Tamagoyaki on rice

I have a new hobby since moving to Japan. I like to shop!

My husband thinks I'm nuts, because I've never ever before enjoyed shopping. But, since arriving in Japan, I shop! I love looking in shops, in huge store, and even street vendors. I don't always buy, but I'm always looking.

There are so many things that are the same, but many more items that are so very different.

Soon after moving here I discovered a pan. A very strange shaped pan.

I found a recipe online and modified it (we have food allergies).

...and cooked.

Yummy!!!

Basic recipe

4 eggs

1/2 T oil (for the pan)

2 T sugar

1 T Soy Sauce

(we have discovered this serves 2-3 adults)

Tools:

Pan, basting brush, pancake turner, & cooking chopsticks (or fork)

If you want a step-by-step tutorial,

here is my blog post on the recipe.

Tamagoyaki on rice

Kris

Online Weather Course

I find that I have to work hard to keep feeding the science interests that my kids have. I'm not sure if this is because they are still in the "What's that" and "Why" stages or if it is the influence of science related TV shows like Mythbusters or if it's just because they like science. Whatever the reason, I am always looking for interesting science relate books and websites for them.

Today I found an online weather course from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, called Jetstream. If you dig a little into the Lesson Plan Overview section, you can find an outline of all of the lessons and quizzes for each section.

Within some of the lessons there are Learning Lessons which are weather related experiments or demonstrations. You might want to review the Learning Lessons for the modules to collect all of the items you'll need. There's nothing as annoying as needing something like balloons or thumbtacks in order to do some cool experiment and not being able to find them.

Hydrangea Time

June brings the hydrangea to the area. I'm sure you've seen them along the roads in all their incredible colors. The place to go, though, is the Hasedera temple in Kamakura, not far from the Great Buddha. I went up there yesterday on a photo safari and boy were we treated to a surprise of color. The temple was crowded, but it was well worth it. In addition to the hydrangea, there were also many irises in the ponds. I've been to the temple several times during different parts of the year, and I have to say this is one of the most colorful. I never knew there were so many different varieties of the flower. At the top of the temple, you can get a free fan with a map of the area and photos of the various varieties.

To get to the temple, you take the JR line to Kamakura then connect to the Endoshima Line and exit at Hase station. Exit the train station and go up the hill towards the Buddha, turn left at the Hasekannon intersection. The temple is at the end of the road--just follow the crowds! Entrance is 300 yen for adults and 100 for children 6-11.

World Cup Fun

At our house, we're getting antsy for the beginning of the World Cup. Geography, probability, statistics, even a little bit of political history and foreign cultures just naturally flow from watching the games. Or at least that's what I tell myself.

I don't know if any of the early games will make it onto AFN. But a friend of ours sent me a link to the broadcast schedule for the Japanese channels. If there is an X it means that the game won't be shown on Japanese tv. For late-night TV 3:30 is dated the day before the date is written as 27:30.

If you're looking for more educational tie ins, I found a world cup soccer lapbook project template and some projects that you could fold into a unit study.

Your Turn: What Would You Pack

OK Yokosuka Homeschoolers, now I'd like some help from you. Remember back when you had first arrived on base? Maybe it was in the middle of a hot humid summer or right before a typhoon lockdown. Maybe it was in the middle of a rainy winter or just before the holidays. You might have gone right into housing or had to stay in the lodge for months or settled into a Japanese house out in town.

So looking back at those days and being familiar now with what is available on base, what would you suggest someone pack or ship in their unaccompanied baggage? What homeschooling materials got you through the first weeks or months? Or did you concentrate on getting settled and let school wait for a few weeks? What did you make use of in base facilities rather than loading yourself down? If you could do it again, what would you do differently?

Birds of Yokosuka

I remember that one of the first things I saw out the window of the Navy Lodge our first morning in Yokosuka was a pair of cormorants flying just above the water. It seemed like something out of an exotic children's story. Then when my husband walked us around to show us the base, I couldn't keep my eyes off of the huge raptors that were perched on poles and buildings around the base. But identifying the birds here can be a bit tricky.

The library has a couple copies of Birds of Japan, which is sadly out of print and hard to find used. Birds of East Asia is a newer book, but it is both big and a little expensive for casual users. But I have found a nice website, created by a local geography teacher that includes a section on the birds of Yokosuka.

One of our friends printed the bird ID section as a handout for scouts who had to do some bird watching. It was nice to only have a few pages instead of a huge book. I have seen some other birds out at the campgrounds at Ikego, notably Common Kingfishers and Spot Bill Ducks. The section on the Yokohama Nature Sanctuary has pictures of these birds.

Common Japanese Spiders

One of the challenges of homeschooling overseas is trying to do nature study when you can't read any of the guidebooks.

Hooray for the internet. You can find a lot of information out there, just by searching something like "common spiders Japan" or "snakes of Japan." If you search through Google images, you can often figure out just what you're looking at.

If you're trying to identify just what spider has spun a web over the trampline or what the huge arachnid over the door of Chili's is, you might want to check out Common Spiders in Japan, which has photos of spiders grouped by season of the year.

Vivire a Pompeii

The art exhibit Vivire a Pompeii at the Yokohoma Museum of Art will close in a couple weeks (13 June). The exhibit is about life in Pompeii before its destruction by the volcanic explosion of Vesuvius in 49 AD.

The exhibit is in Japanese with little to no English explanations or audio guides. However educator resources and an audio guide to a similar exhibit, A Day in Pompeii are available at these links.

http://www.museum.wa.gov.au/pompeii/sites/wamuseum.com.pompeii/files/pompeii-junior-explorers-trail.pdf

http://www.smm.org/static/pompeii/teacherguide.pdf

http://www.sdnhm.org/pompeii/v_tour.php

Directions to the museum.

Train:
· Minatomirai station (Minatomirai Line) / From the "Museum" exit, 3 minutes walk on foot
· Sakuragicho station (JR, Yokohama subway) / 10 minutes walk using "moving walkway"

(Look for signs once you leave the station.)

Car:
· From Sakuragicho station, take the road leading towards the Nippon Maru, or turn right at the Sakuragicho station Momijizaka crossing, enter the MM21 area, and proceed towards the Museum.
· From Yokohama station, take the Takashimacho MM21 area entrance and proceed towards the Museum. Either takes approximately 3-5 minutes. (Use the Minatomirai ramp from the Expressway).

Welcome to Yokosuka Homeschooling

Yokosuka Homeschooling is a blog by, for and about homeschoolers in Kanto Plain Home Schoolers, CFAY families considering homeschooling and homeschoolers who may be taking orders to Yokosuka.

Blog posts will highlight the opportunities on base and in the community for fun and education. Hopefully it will make both homeschooling and Yokosuka feel a bit less daunting and more like our home.