Dissection!

Who says dissection has to be smelly and yucky? Well, this one was a bit smelly, but in a good way. A Beka Science starts with a plant unit. I'm not sure why they thought it would be a good idea to study plants in the fall (the typical start of a new school year) since most of the plants around here are dropping leaves and getting ready for winter.

We've been working on naming the parts of flowers. Yesterday the boys drew and labeled flower pictures and today they were supposed to dissect flowers. I checked the hibiscus bush and found several blooms that were covered enough to escape the frost. I pulled those off, passed out the knives, and we set to work.

First, they carefully cut the flowers apart and studied their parts.

Then they pieced the flowers back together, glued them on paper, and labeled their parts.

Here's yesterday's drawing and the finished dissection. This isn't one we can save though. The petals quickly wilted so it only looked this good for about an hour. Hopefully, the experience was enough to help them remember what they need to know --- you know, for when they get on Jeopardy and have to come up with, "What is a sepal?"