让疫情的居家生活充满乐趣

智能家居让生活充满乐趣 #生活乐趣# #生活趣味盎然# #科技与生活的趣味结合#

Looking back now, renting a bighorn owl specimen for my child was obviously a compensation.

In fact, this is to make up for a lot of things. First of all, at that time, in October 2020, the children were only with immediate relatives or mediocre people in their care for six months. Their only connection with friends is through video chat or the occasional outdoor play date. My family and my dear felt confused, not simply because of the epidemic, but just a few months ago, we had no place to live for the time being due to the raging wildfires in our area (luckily, our home was unscathed). In short, it’s all confusing, terrifying, and frankly, it’s really frustrating.

However, the owl specimen is homeschooling to compensate my homeschool children. It is obvious that public schools in our area will remain unopened until the end of summer, at least in the fall, and may not be open again after the fall. Distance education is a disaster for both children in spring 2020. My first grader cried every day before logging in to the computer, and my fourth grader later told me in annoyed that he liked distance education because it was so easy that most children played video games all day. The truth is, my ex-husband and I can’t stand the idea of the kids sitting in the room all day in class with the computer.

As a divorced and two jobs, our children are not suitable for homeschooling. However, there are several factors that work in our favor. We are both lucky to be able to work remotely and our schedules have a lot of flexibility. It was incredible that the former babysitter who cared for their children when they were young and now moved back to the area and agreed to help us. We can even sign up for the official “Independent Learning” program through the school district to ease my guilt about kids giving up on public schools. So with part-time babysitters, enriching classes with weekly independent learning programs, and monthly meetings with school district consulting teachers, our kids embarked on a homeschool journey.

The kids were really angry about it. They just want to meet their friends at school, no matter what the "school" looks like. So, I started trying to make homeschooling as fun as possible, but I tried to make up for it all.

Of course we brought the owls to it too. My children have deep roots in their love for "specimen". When my eldest son was four years old, he became obsessed with birds. As his brother naps, he starts watching them on our balcony with his babysitter (now helping homeschool nanny). We gave him a very mature field guide, The Sibley Bird Guide , and thought he would like to see beautiful illustrations. He was eventually forced to read all the key details about each bird that adults were reading until he remembered the entire 500-page book.

At the peak of his bird obsession, we came home from kindergarten one day and found a bird hanging in our indoor cat’s mouth. I was frightened. However, my bird-loving son responded calmly and asked if he could help by calling his brother, and I pried out the lifeless bird from the reluctant cat's mouth.

He soon showed up and asked if he could recognize the bird. "Oh, OK!" he exclaimed. "This is a purple-green swallow. They are not uncommon." Then, "Mom, this is so cool! Now we have our own dead pet bird!"

Needless to say, I didn’t really like his enthusiasm and once he showed it to his babysitter I took it off.

My kids have not missed the opportunity to check dead objects up close since that incident, and luckily they are usually in museums. We have visited specimens at sites of all sizes, from our local Natural History Museum to the amazing California Academy of Sciences Center for Naturalism to the legendary American Natural History Museum in New York, not to mention the animal specimen exhibitions in every place, state, and the national parks we have been to.

So when it was announced on the homeschool list server that the local Natural History Museum was renting specimens to educators, including homeschool parents, I certainly had to check it out. I learned that for a $10 fee, I could take a wild duck, a big horned owl, or even a golden eagle or coyote home for a whole week. Even though it was me, I was fascinated. Is there any better way to make my kids think homeschooling is cool!

Of course they want coyotes. Fortunately, the website states, "Golden Eagle and Coyote specimens are large boxes that require 2 people to carry and are not suitable for standard passenger cars. Trucks, vans or hatchbacks are required." My Prius is actually a hatchback, but I can't imagine other sane adults would help me load a coyote in the back of it. So, we agreed on the election of the Great Horned Owl.

I arranged to pick up the item at 11 a.m. Tuesday. Due to the epidemic, the museum was closed to the public and it took a while to find the relevant staff.

“We are here to look for owls,” I said.

"What?" she asked, obviously confused.

"Great Horned Owl. We have an appointment."

"Oh," she said. "Okay. Wait for me in the back."

A few minutes later, she showed up again at the back door with the owl. Its box is large, about three feet tall, and the base is two feet square. The staff started pushing it onto my car while I nervously tried to talk.

“It’s great that you guys offer this program during the pandemic!”

“We’ve actually done this for at least 10 years, and it’s just that people don’t know about it until the homeschool network finds out.” It’s a bit disapproving, like the look of the director when he sees my Prius.

The owl's box is clumsy. Children must make sure that they don't let it slide in the back.

When I got home, I realized it was very heavy. If loading and unloading owls is considered a one-person job, I began to think that coyotes might need at least four. My eldest son helped me get it in. We ended up putting it on the dining table, mainly because if we put it on the floor, I don't think I can lift it up again.

I had thought that maybe raising owls at our homes would inspire children and improve their natural paintings, or learn more finer details of bird anatomy. Their nanny had some great lessons in mind, and my youngest son tried at least some sketches. But it turns out that most of them just like to see that bird. Most mornings, when I get up, one or two of the kids are awake and stare at it quietly. During a limited distance course, they are used to sitting in front of it so they can show off. “We have an owl,” my youngest son told a bunch of kids, helping them lean on the side so they can see more clearly. I wish he wasn't wearing headphones so I could hear their reaction.

The morning we had to return the owl, the kids got up early to spend time with it. I was relieved to be responsible for making sure nothing happened to it in my hands, but also strangely sent it home. In a year where there have been so many farewells, it feels like another farewell.

Just like our homeschooling year, our attempt to inspire children’s excitement and enthusiasm for the owls was a bit of a failure. The truth is that before spring comes back to playing baseball, nothing can make kids excited about life again. Nevertheless, I think renting an owl would be one of our happy memories during the pandemic, despite the risks, while building how to build a cardboard fort that takes up most of the garage and learning how to make mini skate park ramps using a 3D printer and just three of us going camping, the most memorable of which is when we were hugging in bed and reading together all day.

Have I ever hoped that a large part of my children’s childhood was disrupted by the epidemic? Of course not. But now that it has to happen, I’m glad we’ve been able to spend so much together and we even had such a great time with the owls.

网址：让疫情的居家生活充满乐趣 https://klqsh.com/news/view/54925

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