Even though we have been recording a number of homeschool days already (in PA we have to document 180), our official start to Term 1 of formal lessons will begin in just 1 day . . . I feel excited and mostly ready.
Despite feeling the need to simplify and reduce in many areas, we are going to continue most of the "bonus subjects" that a Charlotte Mason education has to offer including folk singing, composer study, artist study, Shakespeare, and handicrafts. They can be fairly easy to include, especially if I can be satisfied with however we manage to get them done.
Bible
I will read and the kids will narrate from the old and new testament using the lists on Ambleside Online.
Poetry
Each term we will focus on one author and I will read the same poem every day for 1 week at breakfast. I chose the following poets this year:
Term 1: Sara Teasdale
Term 2: Robert Frost
Term 3: William Blake
I use Ambleside Online's poetry selections as a starting point for choosing poems, but I only pick about 12 poems per term. I also select poems by that author for the kids' recitation selections.
Artist Study
I selected the following artists to study using picture study aids from Humble Place during morning time.
Term 1: Waterhouse
Term 2: Michelangelo
Term 3: Brugel
These three studies were ones I downloaded for free a while back and had the prints made this winter by my local university print shop. The prints came out beautifully and were affordable. The print shop charged me $6.36 for 2 copies of the prints for one study. Now that I know how much this actually costs, I won't hesitate to buy these study aids when I run out of the ones I've already printed.
I prefer these from A Humble Place to the Picture Study Portfolios on Simply Charlotte Mason. I like Rebecca's selection of prints better and I prefer the quality of the prints I had done to the ones from SCM. I felt that some of those studies were way too dark or miscolored.
Last winter I subscribed to SQUILT on a whim because I knew I was neglecting our composer study and my oldest child just loved the live lessons. He loved them so much that he asked for a 3-month subscription for his birthday. We will start our homeschool year with August's live classes and then we will use the SQUILT daily listening calendars we haven't finished OR performance links here to listen to music during our morning time.
I'm not going to worry about whether we focus on a specific composer, although we may. I'm just going to focus on enjoyment and appreciation.
Folk Songs
We will learn one folk song at a time until we know it pretty well. Ideally, well enough to sing it in the car without lyrics, but sometimes it doesn't make its way into our permanent repertoire ;-) I'm planning to work from this list during morning time. A few are left over from last year and more will be added if needed. Youtube links for many of the songs can be found on Ambleside's folk song page.
The Golden Vanity
Brown Girl in the Ring
The Ballad of Casey Jones
The Swapping Song
King John And the Abbot of Canterbury
The Happy Wanderer
Heath to the Company
Down in the Valley
Handicrafts
I am reinstituting the idea of afternoon occupations that was pretty successful for my oldest son the year before last. This time around it is going to look like gathering as a family at 2pm on most days of the week to
- read a chapter of a fun book (we are starting with The Peterkin Papers)
- taking a short nature walk (maybe using some of the Exploring Nature with Children prompts)
- writing or dictating a nature journal entry
- creating time! This is where handicrafts will fit in, but also art and one nature journal drawing per week
- any extra time before 3:30 will be for exploring some passion project. I imagine that this could look like learning a skill like typing or coding, reading a book or watching a youtube video on a particular topic, or more handicrafts.
I am not going to dictate the handcrafts because that is not my season of life right now. Instead, I am going to encourage them to do at least one project in embroidery and basketmaking because I bought those supplies. And help them plan and purchase materials for other handicrafts they enjoy, like sewing and cooking.
Plutarch
Apparently Charlotte Mason didn't start Plutarch with students until 5th grade, but since I started Peter in grade 4, I'm making John do it too. He will join us in Term 2, after he listens to Stories from the History of Rome using the free recording on libravox during Term 1.
Term 1: Coriolanus (This was our Shakespeare play in the last term of last year)
Term 2: Publicola, supplemented with this guide
Term 3: Brutus
I am using Anne White's Plutarch texts on Ambleside online (saved as PDFs and uploaded to my Google Play Books library). I will read from the full text and the boys will follow along in the student text. We will do this lesson one day a week at the end of our morning lessons.
Shakespeare
We enjoy reading 1 play per term with each family member reading different parts. In the past years, only Peter was required to participate, but other kids often listened in. This year, John will join us in reading the following 1-2 evenings per week after 3-year-old Harry's bedtime:
Term 1: The Tempest (Line counts to help us assign parts)
Term 2: Henry V (Line counts to help us assign parts)
Term 3: King Lear
I've linked to the free PDFs from the Folger Library. I load these onto Google Play Books on our tablets for 1-2 of us to use. The rest of us use Folger editions of the play I buy used at book sales or on Thriftbooks (affiliate link). If you want to make sure to buy the same editions on Thriftbooks, try searching by ISBN number.
Morning Time
Sadly, morning time no longer fits into our breakfasting as it did for the last 6 years. I'm so sad to let go of the way we used to do things as it worked so well for so long.
But it wasn't working and it was straining my every nerve to get everyone at the table and available to listen at the same time. This summer we've been doing morning time in the midmorning as possible and it works better. My hope is to make a 9:30 morning time a constant touchstone in our homeschool this year.
At morning time we will do the artist study, music appreciation, and folk singing listed above. But I'll also be using this block of time to supplement history and cover geography using the books listed at the bottom of this post, study special study topics each term chosen from this list, and revisit some favorite myths and stories, plus some other selections that will particularly please 3-year-old Harry.
These are the group subjects we'll be doing this year. It always look like a lot on paper but it usually feels easy to spend just 5-10 minutes per day or week on most of these subjects.
I hope your school year is awesome!!!
ReplyDeleteIt certainly looks that way from what I've read. :) :) :)