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Draw and Write Through History

Sep9

Are you interested in combining history, art, and cursive this year? The Draw and Write Through History series of six books does just that.

The workbooks are in full-color and are Non-consumable. The recommended ages are 8 and up. I think this would be fun to do together with your son or daughter. They are affordable with each priced at $10.00 or if you purchase all 6 you save $1.00 per book. These are from a Christian worldview and are divided into the following time periods:   Creation to Jonah  |  600BC to 395AD  |  793AD to 1600s |1492 to 1781  |  The 1800s  | 20th Century

If you are curious to learn more, here is a description of the second book, Greece and Rome. “Take your children on an exciting journey through time as you draw and write your way through history! Learn how to draw a Greek soldier, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, The Great Wall of China, Hannibal’s war elephants, the Colosseum, a gladiator, and more in this second book in the Draw and Write Through History series. Each drawing is broken down into easy to follow steps. Cursive handwriting copywork about history is also included.” (source: http://www.amazon.com)

 

Have a great week!  ~Lisa ~ 

Grandma Moses

Jul22

Grandma Moses is one of my favorite American artists. I love how she painted simply and portrayed everyday scenes of farm life. I admire how she began her painting career when she was in her late 70’s after her arthritis got so bad that she couldn’t embroider any longer. I want to be like her when I grow up, not giving up because you can’t do something any longer, but finding another course to pursue.

Anna Mary Robertson, one of ten children, was born on September 7, 1860, in upstate New York in the town of Greenwich. She married at the age of 27 and had 10 children, 5 of whom died in infancy. She loved to cook, bake and embroider and her first paintings were gifts to family and friends. During the nearly 30 years that she painted, she created over 1600 canvasses! Grandma enjoyed a rich life and passed away on December 13, 1960, at the age of 101.

Have you ever done an art study with your student? Grandma Moses’ artwork would be interesting and fun for all grades. Here are some paintings to investigate.download.jpg

You can ask questions such as:

What is the theme of this painting?  What do you like about this painting?

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What season is this painting depicting? What clues let you know? images.jpg

What is taking place in this picture? Which of these buildings have a water wheel? Do you know what purpose there is for a water wheel? (It provides electricity/ power to a building.)

Further things to do:

  • Study more paintings of Grandma Moses. CLICK HERE
  • Visit a building with a water wheel, Clifton Mill in Clifton, OH has a working grist mill powered by a water wheel that you can visit and a restaurant attached to it. To learn more, CLICK HERE. Make a day of it and go to John Bryan State Park or shop in the little town of Yellow Springs.
  • Have your student copy a quote by Grandma Moses. (picture and quote courtesy of http://www.brainyquote.com)Screen Shot 2019-07-21 at 2.04.32 PM.png

Have a great week! -Lisa- 

 

Teaching to Interests

May14

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Teaching to your child’s interests is this week’s post, thanks to a friend of mine’s suggestion. So, how does one go about doing this? Do you need to ditch the textbooks? It’s really a great way to get your child interested in learning and can be done at any grade on any topic.

What really interests your son or daughter? I am sure you already know the answer to that question! Several years ago I tutored a young man who hated writing and just plain ol’ refused to do it for his mom. He was in 5th grade and his wise mother knew that he could not continue in his ways. Enter me, the tutor, to get this young man to write. I quickly found out that he was passionate about space travel and spent hours drawing models of ships. Not only did he draw them, but he had an extensive Lego collection of various types of Star Wars aircraft and other types of space modules. THIS was his passion and that’s how I reeled him in and got him to write. The first writing project was for him to describe the details of these spaceships.  Gladly writing, the young man enlightened me on a subject about which I knew nothing.This took several weeks before he exhausted this topic. Next, he went on to make paper towns and houses and writing billboards and descriptions to advertise houses that were for sale in his town.  Writing was not as tedious and gut-wrenching as he had thought. 🙂

If your daughter loves horses and your son is crazy about snakes (Just examples as we know anyone can be interested in these topics), why not incorporate these into your school day? You don’t need to get rid of your curricula, but you can use it to enhance what you are doing or replace a topic that is going to be covered next year. Horses or snakes (or whatever the topic) can be studied, drawn, read, researched, and written about, and a poster or PowerPoint can be created to wrap up the study. Look at all of the subjects we just included using those areas of interest: science, fine arts, language arts, and technology. You can even make up math problems involving that topic. For instance: 5 snakes were sunning themselves on the horse path. Along came 3 horses, but they got frightened and two ran away. How many were left? I couldn’t help myself! I had to combine both into a story problem. lol

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Have a great week! ~ Lisa ~ 

 

5 Indoor Winter Activities Kids will Love

Jan22

Wow! winter has been putting on a little show here in SW Ohio the past few weeks. It was so cold here for a period of time that the Ohio River had big sheets of ice on it! So, when inclement weather has you housebound with your youngsters, how do you keep them happy and still focusing on school? How about some winter-inspired activities?

  • Make paper snowflakes. You can back your creations with tissue paper either white or colored for some pizazz and hang them from the ceiling and close to a light source so you can see through the tissue. (art)
  • Play a Scavenger Hunt- Instead of just hauling the books out from their usual location, why not create a scavenger hunt to start out the day? Not only have the schoolbooks hidden, but add a treat for a special surprise. Clues could be:  Clue #1 Go to the room where you brush your teeth. (Hide the clue somewhere in the bathroom such as under the wastepaper basket or inside the vanity. Clue #2 Go to the place where we eat our meals. (Hide the clue under the tablecloth or a placemat or salt and pepper shakers, etc.) Clue #3 Look in the place where pots and pans are kept.  Clue #4 Find the place where you rest at night. Here you can have the books hidden under the bed. Clue #5 Bring all of your books to the schoolroom and there you will find the treasure to begin our school day. Your treat can be a piece of fruit, a cup of hot chocolate, a new Read-Aloud book, or whatever you think would be a fun idea to have as a reward. (reading, physical education)
  • Create Word Poetry– Do you have old grocery fliers or magazines that you can cut up for this activity? You can create a simple poem that has two lines that rhyme or you can create a free verse poem. You can make the poem’s theme as simple as food if all you have is grocery fliers or as elaborate as you like. Since we are in the middle of winter, what about that being the theme? (language arts)
  • DIY Window Clings– with a little bit of glue and some paint your son will have lots of fun making these. I bet you would enjoy making a few too! (art)

Window Clings

You will need for each color:

2 tablespoons White craft glue (like Elmer’s)

2 -3 drops Liquid food coloring

2 drops Liquid dish detergent

1 small paintbrush

Combine 2 tablespoons of glue with 2 drops of dish detergent. Add a few drops of food coloring and you are ready to make your design! Lay a page protector down so that you can paint your design (using your paintbrush) directly on it so it will be easy to pull off when it is dried. You can create your own designs or use cookie cutters and paint inside of them.  Make your design about 1/4 inch thick. If you make it too thick it will take a long time to dry. If you are using a cookie cutter, let the glue set for a few minutes before removing it. Let designs dry overnight, poke with your finger to see if they have set well enough to remove from the page protector without tearing.  Carefully peel off of the page protector and place on your windows.

  • Make popcorn and cups of tea or hot chocolate and snuggle up with a great Read-Aloud book. I just finished the 1957 Newberry Medal, Miracles on Maple Hill, by Virginia Sorensen. This is a delightful book about a family who is in need of a miracle for their father who has come home from the war and how an old homestead restores him and his family.  (language arts)

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Ideas for Teaching Subjects for Homeschool

Nov6

Teaching subjects can get to be a bit overwhelming. So, how do you teach all of them? Where do you find the time? When students are just beginning school and in the primary grades remember attention spans are short, so teaching a lesson needs to be short too. Take small breaks and return to subjects if necessary. For example, 15 minutes of explaining and showing examples, 15- 30 minutes of practicing/ doing what has been taught.

Over the course of the next few weeks, I am going to be concentrating on teaching elementary students.  I don’t want these posts to be too long so I will be talking about a few subjects each week. I can see just concentrating upon just one subject at a time, but I’ll save that for a later date. So many years of teaching, so little time to explain. lol  If you have an older student, I promise to address teaching junior high and high school students in future posts; please stay tuned. 🙂

Language Arts

Reading- I believe that teaching a child to read is the single most topic she needs in order to succeed in life. As far as language arts is concerned, my concentration would be to only teach reading in Kindergarten and 1st grade until your daughter is reading fluently. Incorporating spelling, grammar and handwriting can be done informally through writing the alphabet, her name,  street address, creating homemade cards, writing simple stories, etc. If you are interested in teaching these with a formal program, this can be added to your studies once reading is progressing well.

Spelling and grammar- The best way to teach spelling and grammar is by incorporating these into reading and writing. Practice writing the words you are teaching your son to read. If he is able, he can write simple sentences and perhaps a story using these words, which will reinforce what he is learning.

Handwriting- While many schools are opting not to teach cursive, I have read studies that say this is good for your brain since both hemispheres are involved in the process. It also requires less of the pencil to be taken off of the paper and nearly all letters are made in a forward fashion. I think teaching handwriting formally with a program is important since you want your son to be able to not only write it (neatly lol), but also to be able to read it. I am encountering junior high students who can no longer read cursive. I wish I had the time to instruct them so that they can read old documents, communicate with others who use cursive, etc. Don’t you want your student to have every means of communication available to him? Copying passages of favorite literature or poetry or writing out spelling words or science terms is an easy way to incorporate this into your lessons.

Social Studies (Geography, History)

Geography- While teaching young students geography and history can be taught by learning your address, what state and country you live in. When reading a book that has a specific setting, have your daughter investigate where that is located. Have you used Google Maps or Google Earth? These are fantastic apps to see the world and where we fit into it. Do you have relatives that live out of state? Use google to show her where this is in relation to your home and to the world. Still using the app, you can pick a destination such as the Statue of Liberty and take a virtual tour. I think it’s a pretty cool way to teach geography.

History- With young students, I like to begin teaching history that is relevant to them. For instance, create a personal timeline with your son. Choose events such as his birth and things that are memorable to him (learning to ride a bike, losing a tooth, the birth of a sibling, etc.) Creating a family tree gives meaning to history as well. This can involve interviewing grandparents, aunts and uncles, etc., which can be a lot of fun.  Once the concept of things occurring in the past has been established, history takes on a bit more meaning since much of it is about people. Field trips are a fun way to teach history. You can go to a local history or museum and discuss what you see and the time period in which it occurred. Dressing up in period clothing like we did when we studied Ohio presidents, and reading a famous speech or reading a short biography such as the series of books by David Adler brings history to life. (Click on the book for the link.)

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