Monthly Archives: July 2014

Educational Table

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A long time ago I saw the idea on a blog somewhere to make a changeable educational table. I filed it away in the back of my mind to use someday. I finally got around to doing it last week.

table1

We have a really big table (seats 8) so we had lots of space available to fill. I got a tablecloth that matches the walls in the dining room for the bottom and a hemmed plastic table cover about the same size as the tablecloth for the top.

table2

On one end is a world map. It fit the end of the table perfectly.

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In the middle are two periodic tables (since we’re doing chemistry this year) facing opposite directions so whichever side of the table you are on you can read them. We’re still waiting for them to finish uncurling since they came rolled up.

table4

On the other end is a US map. I searched for one the size of the world map, but couldn’t find one the same size. This was the best I could find without being too wide.

Already we’ve had conversations sparked by what’s on the maps and periodic tables. I figure we can change what is under the plastic (at least in the middle – the maps may just stay forever) depending on what we are learning in school.

Literature Selections

Homeschool 2 Comments

I previously wrote about the books I selected for Fritz for next year. So far I’ve read The Patchwork Girl of Oz by L. Frank Baum, Ginger Pye by Eleanor Estes, The Borrowers by Mary Norton, and Five Children and It by Edith Nesbit. I’m currently reading Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting. Then I still have The Magic of Oz by L. Frank Baum and Bunnicula: A Rabbit Tale of Mystery by Deborah Howe. I’ve kind of figured out in my mind how I’m going to handle vocabulary and word roots and derivatives. I’ve still got to figure out exactly how to do what I want to do, but I’m getting there.

For Cameron, the books/poems will be as follows:

  • Adventures of Don Quixote (abridged)
  • The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault (Little Red Riding-Hood, The Sleeping Beauty in the Wood, The
  • Master Cat; Or, Puss in Boots, Cinderilla; Or, The Little Glass Slipper)
  • From Gulliver’s Travels, A Voyage to Lilliput and A Voyage to Brobdingnag*
  • Robinson Crusoe*
  • William Wordsworth (We Are Seven, Lines Written in Early Spring, Lines Composed upon Westminster Bridge September 3, 1802, I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud)
  • Samuel Taylor Coleridge – The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
  • Rip Van Winkle and the Legend of Sleepy Hollow*
  • Robert Browning – The Pied Piper of Hamelin
  • Grimm’s Fairy Tales (Rapunzel, Hansel and Gretel, Rumpelstiltskin)
  • Benjamin Franklin, The Way to Wealth
  • Christina Rosetti (A Birthday, No, Thank You, John)
  • Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland*
  • The Adventures of Tom Sawyer*
  • 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea*
  • A Christmas Carol*
  • Alfred, Lord Tennyson – The Charge of the Light Brigade
  • Edgar Allan Poe – The Raven
  • Peter Christen Asbjrnsen, Norwegian Folk Tales (Why the Sea is Salt, East o’ the Sun and West o’ the Moon, The Three Billy-Goats Gruff, Thumbikin, Little Annie the Goose-Girl)
  • Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass*

The *’d books he will be reading using the Kindle Fire and immersion reading with the audiobook and ebook at the same time.

In addition, I’m going to put together a couple pages each of biographies about the following authors so he can learn a little background about them:
Daniel Defoe, Jonathan Swift, John Bunyan, Alexander Pope, John Milton, William Blake, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, William Wordsworth, Robert Browning, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, Edward Lear, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Mary Shelley, Christina Rossetti, Lewis Carroll, Mark Twain, James Fenimore Cooper, Jules Verne, Herman Melville, Victor Hugo, Emily Dickinson, and Walt Whitman

And then there’s Ani. She helped me pick a bunch of books that will no doubt challenge her.

  • Iliad, Homer
  • Odyssey, Homer
  • Agamemnon, Aeschylus
  • Medea, Euripides
  • The Birds, Aristophanes
  • History of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides
  • The Republic, Plato
  • Symposium, Plato
  • Rhetoric, Artistotle
  • Aeneid, Virgil
  • Confessions of St. Augustine
  • The Consolation of Philosophy, Boethius
  • The Inferno, Dante
  • Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
  • The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer
  • Le Morte d’Arthur, Malory
  • The Prince, Machiavelli
  • Utopia, Thomas More
  • The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, Christopher Marlowe
  • The Taming of the Shrew, William Shakespeare
  • Love’s Labour’s Lost, William Shakespeare

Is there really only a month left of summer vacation?

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Okay, it’s a little more than a month for us, really. The first day of public school for the local kids is August 25th. So that means we go back the 26th. And that means I’m busy planning our next school year. Mostly we’re all planned. Now I’m doing a lot of pre-reading of the books on three of the kids’ reading lists (which will be another post, hopefully later this week).

One slight change: Cameron is not going to do the virtual school after all. Once Ani decided to be homeschooled again, it really didn’t make sense to be tied to a school calendar for just one kid. So, once again, all four will be home and homeschooled.

The plans… I always start with the oldest and work my way down to the youngest so this time I’m going to start with the little one.

Adrian – age 6, 1st grade
Math: MathSeeds and some math workbooks a friend gave me
Language Arts/Reading: Reading Eggs, PAL: Reading and Writing, Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading, First Language Lessons 1
Science: REAL Science Odyssey Chemistry (along with the other three)
History: History Odyssey Level 1, Year 3 (along with the rest of the boys)
Religion: Hands-on Church History and Discover the Latter-day Prophets (along with the other two boys)
Art: Confessions of a Homeschooler World’s Greatest Artists (along with the rest of the boys)
Music: Confessions of a Homeschooler World’s Greatest Composers (along with the rest of the boys)
PE: Taekwondo… when he does it

Fritz – age 8, 3rd grade
Math: Beast Academy 3, Life of Fred
Language Arts/Reading: Reading Eggspress (maybe), Spelling Power, First Language Lessons 3, Writing With Ease 2, Oral Reading Practice using the McGuffey Readers, Literature Selections, Writing Class Taught by Ani
Science: REAL Science Odyssey Chemistry (along with the other three)
History: History Odyssey Level 1, Year 3 (along with the rest of the boys)
Religion: Hands-on Church History and Discover the Latter-day Prophets (along with the rest of the boys)
Art: Confessions of a Homeschooler World’s Greatest Artists (along with the rest of the boys)
Music: Confessions of a Homeschooler World’s Greatest Composers (along with the rest of the boys)
PE: Taekwondo

Cameron – age 13 (in October), 7th grade
Math: Art of Problem Solving Pre-Algebra
Language Arts/Reading: Spelling Power (maybe), Writing With Style 1, Literature Selections, Hands-on Grammar Activities, Oral Reading Practice using the McGuffey Readers
Science: REAL Science Odyssey Chemistry (along with the other three), Chem C3000 chemistry kit (along with Ani)
History: History Odyssey Level 1, Year 3 (along with the rest of the boys)
Religion: Hands-on Church History and Discover the Latter-day Prophets (along with the rest of the boys)
Art: Confessions of a Homeschooler World’s Greatest Artists (along with the rest of the boys)
Music: Confessions of a Homeschooler World’s Greatest Composers (along with the rest of the boys)
Critical Thinking: Complete Critical Thinker (along with Ani)
PE: Taekwondo and Kickboxing (he does more hours than any of the rest of us)

Ani – age 14 1/2, 10th grade
Math: Life of Fred Geometry
Language Arts/Reading: Literature Selections, Lots and Lots (and lots) of Writing, Teaching a Writing Class to late elementary age kids, Writing group with other homeschooled high schoolers
Science: REAL Science Odyssey Chemistry (along with the other three), Chem C3000 chemistry kit (along with Cameron), Life of Fred Chemistry
History: World History (we put together quite a course using books, Student Handouts workbooks, notebooking, and Crash Course World History videos)
Intro to Psychology – Using MIT OpenCourseWare and Crash Course Psychology Videos
Religion: Seminary(early morning, at the church): Doctrine and Covenants
Critical Thinking: Complete Critical Thinker (along with Cameron)
PE: Taekwondo
Volunteering: Most likely at the library and hospital

The Girl is Gone

Family Leave a comment

For the next 5 weeks, I’ll be the only girl in the house (other than the dog). This morning Ani flew all by herself back to the east coast to spend the rest of the summer with her grandparents.

I think the littlest guy is going to miss her the most (he insisted on getting up at 5:30 to go with us to take her to the airport).
aniian

Love at Home Family Home Evening

Church, Family Leave a comment

I really like LDS Splash for family home evening ideas. They have a lot of quick, easy lessons that work well for all my kids. This week we did one on love at home.

Cameron cut out the printables and set up the words, grass, and stem of the flower on the wall. The little guys really liked ripping up the hearts that did not belong on the flower and they all liked putting the ones that did belong on the wall to make the flower. There were 12 hearts so we each got to choose two.

loveathome1
We really need a color printer!

After we finished, Ani and Cameron decided we needed better snacks than the mini candy bars we always have after our nightly scripture reading. Cameron made pistachio pudding and Ani and the little boys made Rice Krispies treats. They decided to dye the melted marshmallow orange and then Ani got creative and wrote “Love at Home” on them using green food coloring.

loveathome2
The only thing we didn’t do was sing the annoying part of Love at Home. We did sing the rest of it.

Indexing Challenge

Church, Homemade Things 1 Comment

Our ward is doing an indexing challenge this month. It’s adults vs. youth to see which group earns more indexing points. I’ve been averaging a couple hundred names a day so when I reported my points this morning for the first time, it was over 11,000. I take challenges a bit seriously.

Since Ani is a youth family history consultant, they asked her to make a poster to track the points earned. The high priest group leader had some basic ideas, but left the design up to her. So Ani designed it and Jamie and I put it together. I think it turned out pretty cute!

indexing

The cars are actual matchbox cars from the boys’ big box of them. They are on a velcro track so they can be moved as more points are reported (and hopefully they won’t go missing over the summer!). We didn’t write the point amounts on the tracks because until some numbers start coming in we don’t really know how many we may end up with by the end of August.