Thursday, March 25, 2010

The Elusive Tapir......

Right now we are flying by the seat of our pants for our science curriculum. The Youngun loves animals and wants to be a zoologist or biologist when she grows up, so for science right now we are just picking an animal and learning all we can about it. We did wolves first and really enjoyed it. I asked her what she wanted to learn about next. Tapirs, she promptly replied. Hmmmm Tapirs.

I logged onto the library network and started searching. In the entire library network I found one book on Tapirs, and it is actually Animals of the Tropical Forests by Sylvia A Johnson. It has one small page about Tapirs.

Off on a wild internet search I went! I was thrilled to find this site which is just chock full of wonderful information about Tapirs!  I emailed the chief Tapir lady Sheryl to see if I could print out some of the information for our homeschooling use.  Sheryl got back to me within hours to say absolutely and to let any other homeschoolers I know about the site.  I, of course, thought of you my awesome blog readers!  If your children are interested in Tapirs at all, this is the site to go to for wonderful information and photos. 

Thanks Sheryl for all the wonderful work you are doing to promote and take care of the endangered Tapir! 

Till next time........GOD BLESS!





6 comments:

  1. What an awesome concept! Learning about things that you're interested in!! Enjoy the learning!

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  2. i must admit that i had to google tapir to even know what you were talking about :) That's really cool that she's already able to study the things that excite her!

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  3. Thank you and thanks to your daughter! Learning by studying what you like is a great concept! I like to read that way, going from book to book or web site to web site like a bee to floweres.

    About the lack of tapir books. This is truly sad. When I got started with my interest 40 years ago, there were no books, and the situation has not been remedied. Several people have made the attept. One issue is that existing information is conflicting or just plain wrong, and the would-be author ends up doing more research than writing. I'v been around tapirs and tapir info for many years now, and I still hope to write that book. It takes time, and this year I'm short on time to write. I'm no longer anxious about hopefully being the first to write "that tapir book," because any book that's accurate would be a big help to the world's resources and to the potential conservation of tapirs. If someone else writes it, I will be thrilled. My version, when I write it, will add to the available info sources. Thanks for your post and for the link!

    Sheryl

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  4. Is it bad that I didn't even know what a Tapir was until I clicked the site? lol
    Interesting animal. We will be doing an animal of choice each month next school year. I will have to let them in on Tapirs. Thanks for sharing the website, it looks really neat. I will be bookmarking it for future use, if my kids bite the bullet. :)

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  5. ummm, I've never heard of a tapir. You're child is already smarter than me!

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  6. LOL! Don't worry ladies, I wouldn't know what they were if it weren't for The Youngun!

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