I also thought that explaining how to get started with Mystery Class might be helpful. I hope my explanations will be clear enough! Mystery Class started this week, and I am not sure if it's too late to register, but you might enjoy doing it on your own as well...
The first thing you need to do is to print the two different charts. They are both on this page. The first one is the DATA SHEET. You need to have 11 of these (1 for your home location and 1 for each of the 10 mystery locations), then you will need to print the GRAPH. You will also need 11 copies of that one. You could photocopy or just print all of it, that's up to you!
Once you have all these printed, label them 1 to 10 and "home", the charts and the graphs. We like to use some tape and attach the graphs together. If you tape them together on the back and a bit of the sides of the graph, then you won't have trouble when you're coloring.
We also colour-code each location. We then keep those pencils tied with an elastic and with the charts and graphs for the whole duration of Mystery Class.
Below you can see our graph for our Home location. On Monday, we recorded the sunrise and sunset using the Weather Network. In the USA, you could use this site.
Once you have recorded the photoperiod (the amount of daylight) on your data sheet, you can record it on your graph. The numbers on the left side of the graph represent the hours. We colour the night in black and the daylight hours in whatever colour we chose for that location.
After a few weeks, this graph will be a very visual way to determine if the location is in the Northern Hemisphere (gaining daylight) or in the Southern Hemisphere (loosing daylight), along with some other clues. You can see on the photo below. This is the graph showing our home location from last year, the shift half way through shows the Daylight Savings Time:
Every monday, you record your own sunrise/sunset times and calculate the photoperiod on the chart and then graph it.
On Fridays, you can visit the Mystery Class Updates Page or if you signed up, you will receive an e-mail from Journey North with a link giving you the sunrise and sunset information for the 10 mystery classes. You calculate their photoperiod (amount of daylight hours) and you graph it for each location. After only a couple of weeks, you will be able to tell a few facts about these classes, and Journey North will begin sending more clues as well.
Journey North has journal pages that you can print out. These are a great starting point for talking about your discoveries. There is also a treasure of resources on this page, and on the Kids Page, there are many slideshows and more explanations.
If you want to tie in some reading with this activity, you can search for books that talk about the seasons, time zones, and longitude and latitude (here is a Book Sharing Monday about 2).
You can find great links on this post at my friend Carol's blog.
There are many more resources. Mystery Class can be built up into a wonderful learning activity!
I was wondering about this the other day but couldn't remember what it was called. I know it already started. I wonder if we can start late? Or is it way over Austyn's head? Hmmm...
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