Friday, March 11, 2016

School Summary - World War II, the Atom Bomb, and the Holocaust

I respectfully ask that you not pin pictures of my children to Pinterest. Thank you!
A Summary of February 15 - March 4
I changed our school calendar around to allow for some time to help my parents get settled after a recent move and to host a girls' only crafting weekend at my house. We did a few days of school, took of the rest of the week, the weekend, and the beginning of the next week; then, we finished week 2 with a few days of school. So our winter break was in there somewhere. I think. It didn't feel like a break. lol That was followed up by a regular week of school.
Here's what we did:

Things that were scheduled:
Math
Soprano is moving along with Saxon and adding in Life of Fred for a fun supplement. We had been doing Life of Fred rather slowly but I realized that we should be completing more than 1 book a year. Now, each time I assign it (after every 7 or so Saxon lessons), she does 4 chapters in Life of Fred. She's on Dogs, right now. (And loving LoF days!)
Language Arts (Grammar with Writing and Literature for both; Spelling for Soprano)
Tenor finished up his 1st of 2 literature units, The Prince and the Pauper. Next up is a unit of the poetry of Robert Frost. It'll be our first concentrated effort in poetry analysis. I'm looking forward to it. 
 
Electives:
Greek and Computer Science (Tenor), American Sign Language, Photography, and Sewing (Soprano)
Sewing. sew.ing. *sigh* Sewing is killing us. Soprano is more of a flight than a fight, so when a new skill is difficult for her, she tends to want to give up without really trying. Sewing has been difficult for her. However, it's a useful skill and we've spent quite a bit of money buying all the supplies to make these projects so she has been told that we're going to finish it. All the bits and pieces of a pieced doll quilt are laying on the table at this very moment.

My Father's World 1850 to Modern Times
WWII. This era of history really touches me... I'm not sure why. Perhaps because my grandparents served in the military then? Or I'm just a 1940s gal at heart.... then the atom bomb and holocaust... I cried my way through most of the history readings and the videos we watched.

Bible: This year we will be learning (reviewing) basic Christian beliefs and memorizing key Bible passages. We spent two weeks working on verses from Psalm 46. With the presidential election nonsense, it's very timely to recall that "...know that I am God. I will be exalted among the nations; I will be exalted in the earth."
 
History and Geography: 
Project-wise: we figured out the winning parties at the Elections at Bundestag
and Identified War Planes. We also did the outlines and writing from outlines, timeline pieces, and maps. (We skipped the optional research projects though. We had lots of book basket titles to read and movies to watch.)
 
Science: We're also using the World of Science reading assignments to review what we learned this summer. Because of time (and energy), I didn't pull out the magnet kit. We did it over the summer, and I thought I'd let them try the cards again for review. It didn't happen.
Other MFW: 
Music:  We have the iPod playing at lunch most days. The Gershwin playlist has been my pick for these two weeks.
Art: More marker techniques this week. I suppose I could let them use my nice Copic markers to really work on shading... um, yeah. No. :)

Extras:
Web:
You can see them all in my Youtube playlist for weeks 17-34.

Videos:
The Presidents by the History Channel
Pearl Harbor (we did some fast forwarding and muting)
The Sound of Music
I Am David
Swing Kids (can be intense for younger kids)
Grave of the Fireflies
Midway
The Miracle of the White Stallions
Molly
Tora! Tora! Tora!
Valiant
D-Day and the Providence of God

Favorite Books: 
American Girl Molly books
One Splendid Tree by Marilyn Helmer
You Wouldn't Want to Be a World War II Pilot! by Ian Graham
Always Remember Me by Marisabina Russo
In My Pocket by Dorith Sim
The Cat with the Yellow Star by Susan Rubin
The Cats in Krasinski Square by Karen Hesse
Harry S Truman by Mike Venezia

Wednesday, March 2, 2016

School Summary - Mussolini, Japan and China, the Great Depression

I respectfully ask that you not pin pictures of my children to Pinterest. Thank you!
A Summary of February 1-12
Just more of the same for these two weeks with a little extra deep cleaning around the house going on. :)
Here's what we did:

Things that were scheduled:
Math
Language Arts (Grammar with Writing and Literature for both; Spelling for Soprano)
 
Electives:
Greek and Computer Science (Tenor), American Sign Language, Photography, and Sewing (Soprano)
 Tenor was finding it hard to complete his work some days so I rearranged his schedule. He now does science on Monday and Tuesday, Greek on Wednesday, and Literature on Thursday and Friday. It seems to be helping a little bit. Math is taking him a long time each day (like 3-4 hours long). We need to find a solution for that. No pun intended. Lol

My Father's World 1850 to Modern Times
We read about Mussolini and Japan and China (including the Long March). Then we dove into the Wall Street Crash and the resulting Great Depression.


Bible: This year we will be learning (reviewing) basic Christian beliefs and memorizing key Bible passages. The curricula allows for several weeks of reviewing verses of our choice. We finished reviewing James! They did really well considering we haven't worked on it at all since the end of the last school year. (I'd love to upload a video but it's 15 minutes long
 
History and Geography: 
Project-wise: we read about the Fasces (Soprano colored hers) but didn't make them
 
They colored the Chrysanthemum throne emblems
 
We did the Long March math activity and the Inflation project.
We also did the outlines and writing from outlines, timeline pieces, and maps. 
Science: We're also using the World of Science reading assignments to review what we learned this summer. We added in AIG's World of Inventions lesson 33: Moving Pictures.
Other MFW: 
Music:  We listened to several pieces by George Gershwin and used the Gershwin chapter of The Young Scholar's Guide to Composers for review.
Art: Using markers (Hooray for it not being more painting!!!)

Extras:
Web:
You can see them all in my Youtube playlist for weeks 17-34.

Videos:
The Presidents by The History Channel
Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
Singin in the Rain
The Grapes of Wrath
Wild Hearts Can't Be Broken
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
Kit

Favorite Books: 
Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, and Franklin D. Roosevelt -- all by Mike Venezia
American Girl Kit books
Make Your Mark, Franklin Roosevelt by Judith St. George
Mimmy and Sophie by Miriam Cohen
Something to Tell the Grandcows by Eileen Spinelli
The Babe and I by David Adler
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