I spent some time this afternoon reading the few blogs that I check in on regularly and following a variety of links.
I found one site which appears to be a party-plan-cum-club thingy with ideas to build and strengthen family ties. It's in America, and even if it was in Australia I have neither time nor money to put into commit. But they do have some good ideas which I could probably explore even without the club.
I also found some links to history curricula and helps that I've been considering for next year or the year after that (not sure when we'll start our first history cycle because I want to focus on basic reading skills first).
Mystery of History (stories from history with ideas for related activities)
[It's either that or Story of the World]
History Through the Ages (timeline figures on CD to print and colour)
And a few more blogs that look like they could be interesting:
A Spacious Place
To Love, Honour and Vacuum and
The Nesting Instinct.
Another blog which I found recently and enjoy, especially as it's written by another Australian Christian whose husband is in ministry, is In All Honesty.
Also, Andrea at Heritage Academy has recently written a great post of "Confessions of a Rookie HS Mom".
Friday, 18 April 2008
Got stuck in the wwweb this afternoon
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3 comments:
An honerable mention - how very nice! Thanks so much! I just love heading over here to see how you all are doing too. I'll be sure to check out your links!
J asks about the boy from 'down under' (he just loves that phrase) and was interested in his yellow belt (he only just started and doesn't even have his ghee yet). I would love it if my dh would do it with him too - great family activity!
Good pics of the 'zoned out' tv faces! Even the "teaching" shows tend to do that. I've noticed that my normally compliant, well-behaved J starts giving much more passive-aggressive attitude to us and his siblings after only ONE hour of tv! Needless to say we do our best to keep it to a minimum for this reason. Do you see a similar effect in your kids? Just wondering if it's just mine.
We've used Story of the World this year and liked it. But not enough to keep using it. It's laid out nicely with plenty of activities but isn't taught from a biblical perspective (which means additional work for me to tie things in such as Esther, Isreal's captivities, etc.). Have you looked into Tapestry of Grace?
http://www.tapestryofgrace.com/index.php
Just my 2 cents! Blessings!
Andrea
To be honest, Andrea, Joshua doesn't have his uniform either, so far he's just been wearing shorts and t-shirt to classes. We're going to have to spring for them now though, but at least now it is worth it because I can see that Joshua likes this activity and Jeff is enjoying it also so it is something that they will keep on with. It really helps that they only have to walk to the corner of our block to go to class! I'll post a pic when he gets his new uniform.
Our kids definitely get agro when they watch TV. I have a health promotion ad from the newspaper stuck to my fridge that reminds me kids should have a maximum of 2 hours screen time in any one day and I try to ensure we only reach it once a week. At the moment Abigail is whinging when I turn off the TV, but I've told them what they can watch and when and I just tell her "It's not going back on" once and then leave the room so the only one who has to listen to her whinging is herself - she usually stops quickly!
I think I like that SOTW includes the major Biblical events but not every single thing that happened to the Israelite nation. We plan on reading through the whole Bible story each year (at least while they are grammar stage) so they'll hear the stories then, and I can always mention where this fits historically as part of our Circle Time. (We have enough books of OT survey on our shelves with suggested dates of authorship and events for me to work most of it out, and I enjoy the search for info.) I can see that it is really important for kids to understand that Biblical history is a part of real history, but I also don't want to overwhelm them and bore them with repetitiousness.
I have checked out a friend's copy of Tapestry of Grace and it just seems like too much of a package for me. Also, because I'm not American, the later years are just not appropriate in their huge focus on American history. We need a program that covers world history including, but not limited to, Western history. We also need to be able to skip bits (without worrying we're missing vital parts of the whole) so we can add in more Australian history, especially in the later years of a history cycle. I think Mystery of History might be a good fit... if I decide not when I've researched it a bit more, I can buy a friend's 2nd hand SOTW and use that.
~ Sharon
From my own personal experience, SOTW did great for when my children were younger. Now that they are older we have done some Mystery of History I and will be starting book 2 in term: 3.
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