Finally did some nature study-what is in the box you ask?

When we went to have my dd's wisdom teeth evaluated, we found oodles of these pods laying about under a tree that I didn't recognize.  So to keep the boy busy I had him gather some up (that translates to him not picking up the ones already on the ground-like every good boy he jumped and jumped and tried to gather from the largest tree all those pods that were way up there. Well at least he got rid of some of his ya-yas before we went into the appt.).  Later in the week, I put them in a shoebox workbox with the tree identifying book, some paper, a pencil, tweezers, a magnifier and a container.  The goal?  To open those babies up and examine the seeds, count them, average them and to just kinda explore these crazy pods.

We figure it is a Honeylocust (thornless version) since it fit the description to a T, was used as landscaping for that building and such.  He enjoyed the task.  Well, say for the beetle that popped out of a pod.  He jumped a bit since he wasn't expecting it and that little beetle took a swim into the depths of the sewer line (aka: it was flushed).  Oh and the biggest pod held 26 seeds!  We have them saved and will disperse them about hoping the birds/animals eat and distribute them later via the natural way (since they do germinate better when they go thru a critters system).  I didn't have him record or draw them this time-since we were running behind on other activities but I truly don't feel we need to journal/data entry/draw every. single. thing. we do in nature study. But I am a rebel like that.

Hopefully, we'll have a few of the Honeylocust trees in our neighborhood (in a few years) and maybe next time I will be a better NS instructor and request a notation in his nature study book-or maybe not.