A Trip to Greenwich

One of the best things about homeschooling (or eductating kids that aren't even school age yet) is the ability to go on fun family trips and learn a whole bunch of cool new stuff.

That's the theory at least, just remember that there is a whole load of battling to get dressed, fed, in the car, out the car, don't touch that, over here... you name it.

Still. Good fun though.

After a moderately tolerable breakfast involving a mandatory session of naming all the dinosaurs, counting all the numbers – twice – and refusing to have our nappy changed unless we lay on our front with a mouth full of toast, we finally bundled into the car and trekked up the M2 to Greenwich in search of an astronomy exhibition at the National Maritime museum.

Things that made the journey bearable

• Lots of snacks, particularly quiet chewy ones that take time and effort to eat, and provide at least a pause in the monologue enough to check the directions
• Soreen malt loaf
• Packs of raisins
• Babybel cheese
• Anything slathered with peanut butter
• Books – preferably sturdy ones with thick pages and flaps that can be thrown about and dropped without too much worry
• Nat and Louisa’s storytime on Spotify is a godsend
• More snacks
• The reverse why game
• Use their own tactic against them – for everything they say, ask ‘Why?’ and just let the conversation take whatever whacky twists and turns it wants to

After we found a parking space at the end of the hour and ten minute journey, we calmly endured a fifteen minute temper tantrum demanding to go home immediately, before gently encouraging the hoard in the direction of the museum with promises of further snacks.

I have absolutely no problem using outright bribery.

Things we saw, and what we talked about

Anchors

• Gravity and density making anchors sink very quickly, friction and Newton’s third law meaning the anchor and the boat pull on each other with the same force

Boats

• The concept of ‘goods’ ships and ‘warships’ and why controlling the seas means you could control the world before flight was possible. (Brief detour into the idea of boats that can also fly). Also revisited density, this time allowing boats to float, even the really big and heavy ones.

Guns

• Pistols vs rifles, automatic vs single shot, why guns beat swords in a fight (discussing mainly the distance you can be away from your enemy), gunpowder and explosions and why this makes guns very dangerous. Brief chat about the materials involved and why a gun made of cheese might not work.

Cameras

• Exposure times allowing light in for much longer to allow for brighter pictures of the night sky, different coloured light and cameras that can detect other things such as infrared.

Pictures of space

• As above

Speedboats

• Why it’s harder to go fast over sea than land, what happens if the boat flips over and why boats are faster now than they used to be
• The idea of engines burning less fuel but getting more energy out of it
• Paddle steamers and propellers
• The fact that paddle steamers are easier to turn around in tight spaces, and that propellers can be made with three, four or five blades

An enormous map of the world printed on the floor

• The penguins live in antarctica, and look how far it is to America from our house!

The gigantic lighthouse lens

• How the small light can be focussed using a lens to make a very powerful beam that can be seen many miles away
• Brief confirmation that miles are indeed longer than metres and longer still than my fingers.

The journey home involved incessant ‘boat poems’ from the four year old, involving propellers-blending-fish-into-a-paste-but-also-sometimes-being-broken-by-big-fish, demands from the two year old for the Wellerman Sea Shanty Song on relentless repeat through the car stereo, a brief interlude at Medway services with a very loud play on the toy boat and a much needed coffee for mum and dad, and finally a return home to an overexcited dog who immediately demanded to go for a walk.

The scene of the crime at Medway services.

Drawing associations

In the week we were talking about space, planets and nebulae and looking at a variety of pictures, so it was lovely to go to the museum and see the actual pictures taken by professionals. We then talked about how the horse head nebula and the dolphin head nebulae related to their respective animals, and how the boats in the museum were similar to the ferries we’d seen at Dover when we visited Samphire Hoe the preceding Tuesday.

Treasure hunt

If you do decide to visit the national maritime museum, which we would heartily recommend that you do, then see if you can spot these things that caught our eye!