We're planning this trip to Disney World next month.  It's been six years since we were there, so my younger two boys have never been (well, the five year old was in utero, but I don't think that counts).  They are all really excited.  As am I, since Disney is my favorite place ever and I would live there if I could.

Anyway... I was looking at the lists of attractions at each park and thinking about the fact that many of them require a visitor to have some sort of prior knowledge to understand them.  For example, what is the Swiss Family Treehouse if you've never read the book or at least seen the movie?  And I thought, hey, I should come up with a Disney unit study, where we discuss different attractions and study the stories behind them.  This will be particularly good for EPCOT, which by its very nature is full of educational opportunities, but it will work for all four parks, really.

So I'm going to spend the weekend putting together a few days' worth of studies based on Disney attractions.  With a little planning, I think this will make an exciting group of lessons, and will really enhance our time in the parks once we're there!

I love finding lesson plans and resources on the web because it's free and I don't have to leave home to get it.  The other day I found this awesome website with hundreds of games for learning and practicing English grammar.  You can choose the level of the child, the topic (antonyms, for example), and then choose the activity.  DS8 played the game I picked for him, plus two more without being told!  Check it out!

Shell, the oil and gasoline company, has a great section on their website that explains what fossil fuels are, where they come from and how they are used.  There are cute little videos to watch, games, and other stuff like that.  We happened to be starting the Stewardship section of Konos yesterday, and the first section in there is about natural resources, so this fit right in.

The only caveat is that they talk about it taking "millions of years" to form oil or coal, but besides that, this was a great resource.