Great Smoky Mountains – Educational Ideas Part 5

July 6, 2007

While visiting the Great Smoky Mountains on a family vacation, you should definitely take an hour or two out of your visit to play miniature golf at one of the many minoi-golf courses in the area.  Many of them are quite creative and can be quite an experience.  You can also make this fun experience educational in a number of easy ways.

One of the simplest ways to  make your mini-golf adventure educational is to allow one of your children to keep track of the scores.  Or, have each of your children keep track of their own scores while you keep track of the scores on your master scorecard.  Then, when the game is over, have your children figure out the differences between the scores.

For younger children, you can still have fun with math.  For instance, each hole will have a par.  After your child finally sinks his or her ball, ask your child to figure out how much below or over par the score was.  You can also introduce golf terms such as birdie (one under par), eagle (2 under par), bogey (one over par), double bogey (two over par), and so on.

Children get excited about learning new words, particularly when they hear their parents using them.  So, after each hole, ask your child if he scored a bogey or a birdie.  They will have a great time reprting back to you!

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Great Smoky Mountains – Educational Ideas Part 4

July 5, 2007

When you visit the Great Smoky Mountains, a visit to Ripley’s Believe It or Not Museum may not be on the top of your list.  But, I guarantee, if you have children between the ages of 8 and 13, they will really want to make a stop at this museum of sorts.

 While at Ripley Believe It or Not Museum, you will see a number of strange and unusual sites.  To extend this visit further and to make it a bit more educational, encourage your child to pretend he or she is a newspaper reporter.  Then, tell your child to gather as much information as possible about a person or event that is on display at the museum.  Remind your child that a good reporter covers 6 questions:

  • Who?
  • What?
  • When?
  • Where?
  • Why?
  • How?

Your child’s job as a junior reporter will be to try to answer these questions based on the information at the display.  When you get back to the hotel room, have your child make a newspaper and write one or more stories to be included in the paper. 

If you have a laptop with you and your child is computer-savvy, let him or her create the newspaper template on the computer.  Otherwise, a hand drawn newspaper will be just fine.  Tell your child to include a header like in a real newspaper.  If your hotel gives you a free paper in the morning, let your child take a look at the front page in order to see how a real newspaper should look.

When your child is done with the paper, ask him or her to read it back to as if he or she is a news anchor reporting the story on the news.

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Great Smoky Mountains – Educational Ideas Part 3

July 4, 2007

When you visit the Smoky Mountains, a trip to the Ripley’s Aquarium is an absolute must.  Your children are certain to be thrilled with the many close encounters they will experience.  In addition, there are several great photo opportunities that will provide you with photos that will bring a smile to your face years after your trip – particularly the “aquariums” that allow your children to feel what it is like to be a fish.

When your child jumps into the “aquarium” and pretends to be a fish, this is a great opportunity to test his or her fish knowledge.  Ask your child what else he would need if he were really a fish.  Then, ask him to describe to you what the life of a fish would be like.  Based on this discussion, you can then challenge your child to come up with a non-rhyming poem created from the word “Fish.”  To create this poem, simply have your child think of four lines to the poem, with the first line starting with an F, the second starting with an I, the third starting with an S, and the last line starting with an H.  The poem can be as silly or serious as you like.  For example:

Funny swimming creatures

In and out they weave

Stop and be sure to watch them

How beautiful they are

If your child seems to enjoy this activity, challenge him or her to create similar poems based on the names of the other creatures you encounter during your visit.  Then, have your child put them together in a book and illustrate the poems – what a great momento of your trip that would be!

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Great Smoky Mountains – Educational Ideas Part 2

July 3, 2007

If you take a drive to Townsend, Tennessee, you will be able to visit Tuckaleechee caverns.  Children really find caverns to be quite intriguing as it opens up a whole new world to them.  Exploring these underground tunnels is not only exciting, it also offers a number of opportunities for learning.

Before visiting the Great Smoky Mountains, let your children know that you will be visiting caverns during your visit.  Explain the differences between stalactites and stalagmites.  An easy way to remember is that stalactites hang on “tight” to the ceiling and stalagmites “might” reach the ceiling.  In other words, stalactites are the formations that hang down from the ceiling and stalagmites are those that grow toward the ceiling.  When these two formations meet together, they form a column.

To have fun with this concept, you might want to consider making some rock candy with your child.   The process of making rock candy is similar to the process of forming stalactites in that water and the minerals the water has gathered along the way drop from the ceiling.  Very tiny amounts of the minerals are left behind when the water drips and, over time, this forms the stalactite that hangs from the ceiling.

You can also explore mold with your child before visiting Tuckaleechee Caverns.  Mold does not naturally occur in caverns, but the light that is placed in the caverns in order to light the paths of visitors creates a great environment for mold to grow.  Discuss the properties and the life cycle of mold before you go to the caverns.  Then, when you encounter some during your visit, see if your child can explain to you all of the mold you see seems to be growing near to the lights.

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Great Smoky Mountains – Educational Ideas Part 1

July 2, 2007

Although there are a number of educational activities that are quite obvious when you visit the Great Smoky Mountains, there are others that you might not have thought of.  These educational ideas are those that you can do while at the park itself.

  • Play with mental math –  There are many variations of topography within the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  Ask your youngster to determine how high you are traveling by subtracting the elevation of your starting point from the elevation of your endpoint.
  • Pretend to be a ranger – One of the duties of the rangers is to take a regular census of the animals living within the park.  Have your child keep track of the type and number of animals you spot while on your family vacation to the Smokies.  Stop off at the Sugarlands Visitor Center first so you can learn more about the animals that make their home in the Great Smoky Mountains.
  • Explore fauna – Before you set out to hiking within the park, get a field guide to plants that are found in the Great Smoky Mountains region.  Then, encourage your child to identify as many plants as possible.  You can extend this further by having your child make his or her own field guide by taking pictures of the plants you see or by drawing the pictures.
  • Roleplay - Since the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is just as rich in history as it is in natural beauty, you have a great opportunity for role-playing.  When you visit the churches, farms, and homesteads within the park, have your child pretend to be living years ago.  Join in the role playing to deepen the learning and to have some fun yourself!

With these activities, your family vacation to the Smokies will be even more memorable for the entire family. If you have any other ideas or if you want clarification on any of these activities, feel free to drop me a comment!

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