Field Trip in Istanbul to 1453

Our travels to Turkey in September 2012 went almost unmentioned here on the blog.  So, I decided to finally include pictures of one field trip while in Istanbul on the European side from G1's history notebook page this week.  Our Story of the World Medieval Times spine directed us to readings about the conquering of Constantinople by Mehmet, but we'd actually seen one of the Byzantine forts along the Bosphorus during our recent trip.  Below you see the parapets, inside the gate, cannons and chains that stretched across the Strait to the Asian fort on the other other side.  It was a wonderful visit and G1 shared personal reflections in his notebook page unlike some of the other weeks of history.  He was also able to mention the Turkish influence in Vienna after our November 2012 visit to the street that replaced the city walls Medieval Ottomans couldn't take. 

Hit this link to see what a Middle Easter Scholar Sees 1453 Image

Back in the Saddle Again

It's spring and difficult to focus on school. AWANA Games came along to rescue us this week. All three Gs are busy each evening this week preparing for all the physical competition involved.  A big thank you to their adult team leaders as I praise God for them everyday. What wonderful examples for my kids to see.

Otherwise, we commenced with Bible study, math, spelling (G#1 nailed his pretest and put away spelling for the week), grammar, history (boys on gladiators and girl on Punic Wars), science (reptiles), flags (North AND South Korea), habitat and band practice.  We listened to the second chapter of Famous Men of Rome and reviewed the SOTW Ch23 Greek and roman mythology names. 

Primer was applied to the garage door and the Daddy traveled to the left coast for work.  I got to the Goodwill donation center with 3 large trash bags of stuff that needed to go (PURGED). It doesn't seem like we just had a two week break. Maybe the end of our school year will sneak up on us, and we'll be done with 5th and 4th grades!

Checking In with Weekly Report

Ok, so y'all are always posting weekly accomplishments and I'm the sluggard who is just trying to keep up on who ate last and who is going where. So, here is a run down or sum up of what point we are in the schedule for 4th and 5th grades. 

G#2 started a week earlier than her brothers because she was ready while they were still playing with legos until noon back in August. She is completing Week 26 of an approximately 40 week schedule for 4th grade.  She read and finished all the sources for the Story of the World chapter 28 about the Roman Empire. She enjoyed a video about Ancient Roman art from Harmony Arts Mom's 5th grade plans.  She learned some new words from Spelling Workout lesson 26.  She is done with Rod and Staff English 5 lesson 56 and Saxon 5/4 lesson 73.  She survived flute in homeschool band for week 18 along with her brothers as well as read about Mongolia after moving all the way East in Asia from the Mediterranean Sea.  Her habitat studies have her and her brothers in the rainforest with the Hands of a Child crew answering a question in paragraph format regarding why the rainforest is a great place for animals to live.  She was especially grateful for poor weather this week as it was the Elemental Science Logic Stage Life Science week for Amphibians and a frog dissection. The dissection which needs to be done outside was postponed until better weather hits the Chicagoland area.  Our CBS lessons took us to Genesis 33 and it was a nice change to have more action from Bible study.

G#1&#3 both sailed through the same habitat, flags, CBS, science and art lessons. They both have their own grammar, spelling and math lessons which keep them busy.  History finds them in chapter 25 of SOTW and notebook pages from our 2009 Rome field trip were completed with pictures of each kid in historic locales.  G#1 finished reading the final book of the Roman Mysteries and wrote a short narration to complete his collection which will get printed out and placed in his history binder.

We were all active for gym time on Tuesday and enjoyed time with friends on the ice for homeschool kids ice skating time.  So much activity is initiated around here from time off the couch while playing the Wii games.  I actually allowed a library Wii game after each G completed the winter reading program from our local library on Wednesday. I'm so glad for the freedom to move in and out of the library during a regular school day.

Time to Finish the Roman Mystery Series

We're on a road trip, & we are also almost done with ancient Greece. So, it's time to have each of these Gs complete the series about the four main characters named Flavia, Jonathan, Nubia and Lupus. I wonder if there is a series similar to this that I can read with them for the Medieval Ages stage of the history cycle?

Our Iliad and Odyssey Visit Goes along with Star Wars Viewing

These images are of the version of the books we read and are copied from the marketing site called Amazon.com where we buy many books both for our shelves and for the Kindle.  Your kids can read these books too.

Black Ships Before Troy  and The Wanderings of Odysseus by Rosemary Sutcliff are written for the 9 to 12 year old kids in my house. The boys certainly appreciated the bloody battles in the first story as well as the art renditions.  My daughter was always asking why Odysseus did the stupid things he did in the second book.  Discernment runs deep in we women of the household.  The boys were the first to say, "Pride!"  As if that made any of the choices Odysseus made correct, except that he did lead his people well during the Trojan War, and finally got back to Ithaca after learning much about leadership.

For a notebook page to be inserted into the Story of the World curriculum chapter 20, these three pre-adolescent kids answered questions about how Odysseus was similar to characters from the movie series called Star Wars.  These answers flowed freely as each child typed complete sentences that were later printed onto the color we've assigned to "The Arts and Great Books" category as directed in The Well Trained Mind.  When asked how Anakin was similar to Odysseus, all three gave answers relating to creative problem solving, head-strong actions and bull-headed decisions of both characters.

So, in the end, we used notebooking to record organized answers to literature content of what we read, AND we practiced typing with correct fingering to produce the page.  In another lifetime, these questions may have been answered only about the classic Homer tales in worksheet form and by hand.  Sadly, the worksheets would then have not been organized into a binder. A binder which will be used a third time (we created the first pass through of SOTW in kindergarten and first grade) when we are in high school.  We also demonstrated how serious we are about Star Wars movies. 

SOTW4 Modern Age History and Associated Individual Reads

Firstly, Twenty-one Balloons by William Pene Dubois is such a fun story full of all kinds of History and Geography! My kids were not cajoled into reading this book. I merely mentioned it once, never happens here, and they jumped on the opportunity to read this book about Professor Sherman.  My purpose for imposing this book upon my kids was to discuss the explosion of the island of Krakatoa in 1883.  The Story of the World Modern Age brings up this location and its struggles in Chapter Nine.  The fictional story of Professor Sherman's visit to this Dutch East Indonesian location helped my students discuss the historical and political struggles between political powers of the age. 

Secondly, Secret of the Andes, however, did not catch my kids attention even once we relayed the information from their Aunt who studies in Lima and travels throughout Peru this fall semester.  This book by Ann Nolan Clark was a mysterious read for me several months ago as I pondered my sister's travel to a South American country. But proved too, should I say, deep for my 3rd and 4th graders.  The SOTW Modern Age (SOTW4) chapter about Peru and other surrounding countries was Chapter Nine, but I wasn't able to work my kids through the book completely before the moment passed.

Lastly, a success in the INDIVIDUAL READ category! Actually, this story about Brazil which correlated to our SOTW4 Chapter Thirteen is read aloud by Patricia Conolly.  The book is Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson. The audio product I checked out from the library says that it takes 8 hours to hear the whole story, but I can't get these people to sit for more than 15 to 20 minutes per session.  So, it's going to take a week to get through this one, but I will continue to push through this and the chapters of SOTW4 so that we WILL FINISH our history cycle before the end of MAY!

More about our successes and failures in history later; more specifically the rate of stories finished per week AND the use of the outline worksheets and notebook map pages included in the study guide materials.  These steps are taken deliberately in order to prepare these young children for a new cycle AND method of history study next fall.

Science & History Field Trip

To Westminster Abbey with the sun shining in London.

There was a BRILLIANT children's activity.  Four pages of well designed questions that didn't necessarily have to have a correct answer!  AND, a 3" diameter chocolate coin when you turned in the clipboard at the end.  SCORE!
BONUS: We visited Isaac Newton's burial place in the second picture near the end of the visit. We were feeling pretty snarky by then to have done all the work on the first day off the plane without a nap.

Bath England - Field Trip to Roman Baths

Just don't touch the water...

Venetian Masks Type History Project

This week the 3Gs made festival masks that might somewhat resemble Venetian party masks. It was a project for last week and the history chapters about France where King Louis the 16th and his wife were ruling a poor people of France from Marseilles.  We also drew a daily scene from our home along with the Artistic Pursuits lesson about the French artist Millet. The initial sketch was done lightly with a pencil and then today traced with water color pencils and water applied to blend colors. The left picture is from our school room of a beautiful green chair. The center picture is of the stairway. The right picture is of Purple the Hippo in an orange box who also sits on the stairway as the guard squirrel looks on.

"I'll take History for 1000, Alex"

Years ago I would sit and watch Jeopardy with my Grams each weekday evening.  Those people had so much useless knowledge in their brains. Or so I thought they did.  Now, I'm facing the challenge to guide my 3Gs through the ancients to the break up of the Soviet Union in four years time.  We aren't anywhere near on schedule.  In fact, I've smashed quite a bit of history into a small time since August, we've covered half of SOTW2 and we are almost through the first half of SOTW3.  Which means that we've yet to cover the second half of SOTW3 from Captain Cooke's "discovery" of Australia to SOTW4 and that fateful event when 15 republics broke apart.  I have been using narration and accompanying games as well as suggested reading, but it just seems like we're whooshing through it all so fast. Will they remember any of it? I wonder how they will handle it when they approach it from a different angle during their Logic and Rhetoric years. Do they hate/love history? Have I permanently scarred them?

History explores Ottoman and Persian Empires

As we read through Story of the World 3, I've combined chapter content from one chapter a week to two chapters a week. Last week was one such week, full of History and my favorite region of the world, southwest Asia.  So, in addition to covering the material from SOTW3, I added Arabic letters and the sounds those letters make. At right you will see the memory card picture and information from Hannah's Helps Yahoo group as well as the coloring page image from the SOTW3 Activity Guide.  There is a definition of janissary as well as 2 Arabic letters. Maybe somebody in this house will learn Arabic someday; possibly even me. 20 years isn't too long for me to take to learn the 4th most difficult language in the world, is it?

Take the Kids to Rome!

Yes, take the kids to Rome and do it during the off-season. While everyone else is rushing around in their black, gray or brown, you have a light sweater on and there are NO CROWDS! We walked right into the Colosseum and Forum with our Roma Pass (one adult per child under 11 years old for most things, but we did have to buy 3 kid passes in the Ancient area) and didn't elbow a soul to get around. The Pantheon was a bit more crowded (free). As was Trevi Fountain (free) and the Spanish Steps (free), but that's where everyone shops. We scooted right through the VATICAN (small cost) and SISTINE CHAPEL (NO LINES, NO SWEATING, CROWDED passageways!) and the guards weren't shushing to us under Michelangelo's masterpiece because my kids had free Rick Steves mp3 guides in their earbuds. St. Peter's was gigantic and we were HUNGRY, but we got there. Quirinal hill where the old Pope/new president's residence sits was interesting and Piazza del Popolo was fun to watch people. Found as many of the 7 hills that Rome is built on as possible with short legs and un-gelatoed brains. The Sant Angelo's castle was build for kids and we romped all over that place. By the way, the ROMA PASS covered our Metro and city bus travel too. No taxis for us in ROMA. The Catacombs were a necessity for the Daddy and we got a wonderful neighborhood tour on the city bus to get to the Apian Way. We saw flocks (do you call them flocks?) of bats at dusk just as I'd seen in Austin Texas years ago. We ate gelato and pizza and one expensive pasta meal with Chianti. We took the express train to and from the airport and got out on the first planes we tried. Take the kids, and the gramma for that matter. It was a blast for Thanksgiving abroad this year!

It's a good thing it didn't rain on us in Rome.

THE PANTHEON ROCKS!

Early Christian Burial Sites near Rome

It is probably best that Gramma decided not to go to the Catacombs. It was definitely a tight squeeze and a few stairs. It was austere for me to see this sight. I look forward to taking the kids and Daddy to sites underground in central Turkey, and then I can complete the comparison for early Christians.

Kids at St. Peters in the Vatican

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At the Colleseum

Happy Thanksgiving!
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The Colleseum

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Tell tale signs of autumn

Pumpkin spice latte is back, but it just didn't taste the same. It's nippy and moist in Chicagoland and I'm still drinking coffee, but maybe not a 5$ calorie laden cup of spiced latte anymore. Maybe it's my affair with my favorite tea, but maybe I've out grown the pumpkin latte. I'm anxious to save money for the Thanksgiving trip to Europe/ Asia Minor, but you'd think I could justify how much I deserve a decent latte. I went on a date to a new mom/pop Italian place on Friday night for a few hours with a stop at the bookstore to put my hands on travel books for Bavaria and Cappadocia, but waited to buy my choices on Amazon today. I'm even saving money for the trip by reading a kids' mystery series from the library instead of buying them or renting movies to fill my entertainment budget.

The series, btw, is called The Roman Mysteries, and I love it! I found it by searching for juvenile Roman fiction at the library. I made the kids listen to one of the books on the drive back and forth from Iowa. I started reading another book in the series to them out loud, because the library doesn't have the audio for it. But now I've read ahead and am on the next book. I made the Daddy read some to the kids (he's the expert in Latin btw). The story discusses a time period that I'm very interested in about the early church. The sermon today at New Church started a series on The Acts of the Apostles, which of course, delves into my favorite part of the world apart from Central Texas and western Iowa, that is Turkiye.

So, the rain stopped and the temperature is dropped. I've added a blanket to the beds and pulled out the cold weather clothes. I'm busy ripping up the carpet in the living room as the dining room is finished. The wood flooring is available for pickup anytime I'm ready to go up there and pay for it. I've contacted some people who are experts with power nailers, but in the mean time I'm set to prep the floors with black paper and the insulation level with a staple nailer. Soon the 17 boxes of flooring with arrive to set for 3 days and be power nailed by someone. Pray. Yep, I'm not big on asking for help and locating day labor. I will wait on the Lord according to His plan, but in the meantime to prepared for whatever He delivers.

And, btw, home school my kids, be a soccer mom, a gymnast mom, a piano lesson mom AND an AWANA mom all at the same time.

A new week, A fourth week Oh Best Beloved

We've added Explode the Code as well as Spelling Workout today. We did well to discuss ancient India and listen to a few of Kipling's "just so stories." The sun chapter from Apologia wasn't so overwhelming at all and we'll finish it tomorrow. Then we'll go on to Mercury for a day on Thursday. We'll also review Ceasar and move on to the fall of Rome and the birth of a Savior.

My students did so much cleaning last week due to the fact that I inherited a different, new-to-us vacuum. There was a basil bread recipe for enticing workers. I also found the Habitat for Humanity ReStore in Elgin on Saturday. That was interesting indeed. We recovered over a quiet weekend from the previous when an Iowa aunt and uncle with cousins visited. We had explored Millenium Park with the Air and Water show on the shore of Lake Michigan at Navy Pier.

So, soccer is in full swing and piano lessons begin too. I've signed up the little girl for gymnastics and we look forward to an adventure over Labor Day Weekend. We'll have 20 days of school by then, so hoorah for diligent students!!!

New supplies arrived!

I'm beginning to ORGANIZE for August 4th. Believe it! We arrived early Monday morning in Chicagoland after an awesome weekend with friends in Johnson County Kansas, to a new box of school supplies. My first task is to hang and fill these storage pockets for my 3 Gs. I hope to encourage independent work by filling each pocket with one subject assignments for the week. Yep, it might be a little early to ask my 2nd and 1st graders to find something to do from their school pockets, but I've got to start somewhere. I know that the goal is to finish work for math (MUS), grammar (Explode the code), spelling (spelling workout B &C), penmenship (reason for handwriting) & president/ music/ art/ latin reports using online forms & library books for research by Friday afternoon. These are all morning activities scheduled to be mostly independent while I do guided work with each on First Language Lessons and Bible journey journal.

The afternoons 3x a week are set aside for SOTW and 2x a week for space then earth science. These afternoons are, by necessity, guided and can take as long as we need to do them. I know that nature hikes will be included here in these hours. Trips that require flights to where ever field trips take us will include work out of school pocket folders and necessary books.

I've also received a solar system model to complete while we go through some lessons from Apologia and from the list outlined by Jessica at http://triviumacademy.blogspot.com/. I hope to encourage Bible verse memorization and small scale artwork/sketching by displaying images in this postcard holder that arrived in the box too. We might also be able to mail ourselves postcards and display them here too. We'd welcome anyone else's notes here, that's for sure!


These are all mere attempts to keep these children on a schedule that they appreciate and respond to in other parts of our lives. And for me to not "fly by the seat of my pants" this year while trying to get it right the first time, because that's the one time that counts in home schooling.