Yes! We completed a school year!

Should I break into dance?  This is what this homeschool mom feels like doing besides shamelessly brandishing her self earned medal for a successful year.  Either that, or break down in disbelief!  Really?  I did it? Is it possible?  Is it done? YES!

At first I was meticulously following Ambleside Online’s Year 2 and Year 5, respectively and losing a lot of hair in the process!  Catherine Levison’s books helped me immensely!  And she seemed to give me the courage to be brave enough to step out of the bonds of the syllabus and to be practical to combine subjects at different levels.  To be honest, Ambleside encourages flexibility but the driven side in me makes me want to take it all on…but I’m learning to be true to Charlotte Mason’s philosophy – the gentle art of learning versus the frantic code of cramming!

Here’s what we covered this year:

Weekly Nature Study.  Many thanks to Barb and Debi for extra inspiration here!

Scripture Memorization – we memorized Psalm 46.  We did something a little different with it – but that’s for another post!

Math (I continued with MathUSee).  Steve Demme’s advise to refrain from hurrying through lessons but master each step in progression has preserved my math comparison sense from scrambling into a terrifying need for psychiatric intervention.  Slow and steady.

For Penmanship/ Copy work, I used Sonya Schaffer’s Spelling Wisdom and completed Marie Rippel’s All about Spelling level 1 and 2. (If anyone is interested in purchasing either one or both levels from me, let me know).

We introduced formal grammar studies this year with Ed Vavra’s KISS Grammar and so far that is working well for us.

For Phonics/ Reading,  Brandon read aloud My Father’s Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannet and Harriet Treadwell’s First and Second Reader and has started on the third.  He also read aloud parts of Backyard Animals.  He definitely can read but is not so terribly excited about it.  I am just trying to be consistent in having him read aloud in small enough measures to not frustrate him but still increase his proficiency.

For Music Appreciation we followed  Wheeler and Deucher’s, Sebastian Bach, The Boy from Thuringia and Mozart the Wonder Boy.  It comes with a lovely CD to listen to  and also coloring pages that go with each chapter’s reading.

For Art Study we read about Monet, Georgia O Keefe and Michaelangeo.  I had a frame

Their take on Georgia O Keefe’s Art

made so that I could put in a different print every week to look at from a Monet Taschen Portfolio that I had found on sale at Barnes and Noble.  I also found the awesome Georgia O Keefe, by Nancy Frazier at a thrift shop in Baltimore.   Beautiful photographs!

The discovery of a used The Great Artists’ Book on Michaelangelo at The Calcutta Samaritans charity jumble sale was a great find!  It was an in-depth look at his masterpiece – the Sistine chapel vault and also the altar wall fresco. Brandon was particularly fascinated by this.   There is so much detail AND nudity!  At first I was a little apprehensive and then decided to be matter of fact and not draw attention to it.  He finally asked, “Er, Mom, why are most of these people naked?”

“Well, Brandon, the human body is incredibly beautiful.  But it just doesn’t work for humans to go around naked.   This way the artists can show us how beautiful human bodies are without shame.  We can appreciate it that way too and not have to get all weird and embarrassed.  Also it’s amazing how the artist can draw the pull and turn of the muscles in different positions.”

“That is pretty cool,” he agreed, “that makes sense.”

Whew! Goes to show that as parents we have a great part to play in setting a child’s perspective in the right direction

As far as Physical Education, they enrolled in Tennis classes and joined the Sports Complex Pool ( Ok, this they really loved!)

Science – Adam did Jeanie Fulbright’s Astronomy with both of them.  They each had their respective notebooks – Elementary and Junior.  He did a great job doing this class with them.  I think the children enjoyed having a different teacher for a change.   This teacher enjoyed the change as well and that teacher had greater appreciation for this teacher when astronomy class was done!

Year 2

Instead of Island Story,(H.E Marshall),  I took on Indian History one day a week.

We started the Little Duke and for some reason could not get into it.  So I stopped and we actually mostly incorporated Ria’s literature list for year 5.  Brandon seemed to follow along just fine.

We enjoyed Seabird and Pagoo (Holling) and I followed CM’s Elementary Geography.

We read d’Aulaire’s Abraham Lincoln which nicely coincided with Genevieve Foster’s Abraham Lincoln’s World.

We had already read Heidi  and Jungle Book last summer.

Year 5

For our one story from Plutarch’s Lives, we chose Marcus Brutus.  I simply have to make mention of Anne White’s incredible  study notes that saved this Mama’s time and sanity!  She has done an awesome job!

Shakespeare’s Unabridged Twelfth Night – which was a huge hit!  We read in segments and followed along with the BBC Youtube movie.  (watch it through before showing it to your children – it requires a little discretion.)  I found Ria the other day with her nose buried in the pages of Twelfth Night and laughing to herself!

Ria continued to read Country of Ours on her own and then she would narrate to me – either in written form or orally.  She is four chapters shy of completing the book.

Abraham Lincoln’s World– Genevieve Foster ( I highly recommend her books).  I love the big world view and the different events within a set period of time.  Geography, History and character study all at the same time.

Of Courage Undaunted: Across the continent with Lewis and Clark by James Daughterty.  This is an awesome book!

A photobiography of Alexander Bell and an overview of Louis Pasteur.

Poetry was a conglomeration of Longfellow, Kipling and Best Remembered Poems by Martin Gardner.

We continued with Thomas Bullfinch’s Age of Fable.  I could have definitely made use of this book in college!

King Arthur and His Knights by Howard Pyle.

Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist – which we loved!  How on the mark is Charlotte Mason when she says that children are perfectly capable of understanding the unabridged classics read to them without painful wordy interruptions and lengthy explanations.  Let them have their own perception of the author’s words and not the Mama Reader’s opinions (my very abridged version)!

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery.

We started Isaac Newton and Physics for Kids by Kerrie Logan Hollihan and are taking that with us into the next year as well.

My mother in law sent us the classic The Princess Bride DVD.  Our rule is we cannot watch the movie until we read the book.  It is fantastic!  Honestly, way better than the movie.  The only draw back is the lines are terribly infectious!

Ria is an avid reader.  She is a huge Roald Dahl fan.  She also loves the Narnian series by C.S. Lewis, The Little House on the Prairie series and also likes Enid Blyton and Ruskin Bond as well, to name a few.

We are on a decided school break since we move to Goa next week.  Once we are settled in a bit, I hope to start the new school year.  In the meantime we will continue with our cheat start on Tolkein’s,  The Hobbit and keep steadily proceeding with Math and of course, Nature Study.

My next post will probably be from Goa.   Thanks for paying any attention at all to my blog!  See you next post!