This spring, I’m planning a number of home learning biology lessons with my daughter. These will be real life lessons based on animal observation. We’re really looking forward to raising butterflies in the house, and I am thinking of getting an ant farm. While we’d like to raise chickens, the sad fact is we have nowhere to have chickens, so we’ll skip that one.
One all weather biology activity that you and your child can create is a worm farm or a wormery. A worm farm can be very simple. At its most basic, it is a glass jar with a few holes drilled in the lid: holes too small for a worm to get out of. Fill the jar up with soil and add worms. Place leaves or other food on the top of the soil. The worms will dig fascinating tunnels. Release them when you have finished observing them.
Another real life wormery is the worm bin. Although this is for household compost, if you compost at a low level you can also use it for your studies. This makes it easy to access the worms. The kids can see worm cocoons, where the baby worms live before they are born. They can also experiment to see what foods the worms like best. The red wriggler worms you buy or find for these bins will congregate on the food that they like. Every so often, you need to move worms out of the bin because you will have so many.
Create a red wriggler bin in a Rubbermaid container with holes drilled in the bottom and give it a nice tight lid.
Selling red wrigglers is also an intriguing hobby or small business for a homeschooling teen, since these worms are very popular for compost bins in urban areas.