Posted by Cindy on November 17, 2010
Ancient Civilizations and the Bible continues to be a huge hit – with me AND my children. There is so much more than we could ever use contained in the pages of this book! Since I last wrote about history, we’ve been on a journey through Mesopotamia and Ancient Egypt. Below are a just a few highlights from our studies.
Caleb's poster report about Ancient Sumeria
The first page of Mahayla's report about the culture of Ancient Mesopotamia
A quick model of the Nile River as we discussed the importance of this mighty river in Egypt's history
Mummy making during our study of Ancient Egypt
As we listened to the CD about Ancient Egypt, the kids created pipe cleaner figures to retell the story
Caleb's poster trying to sell land in the flood zone of Egypt
We’re finishing up a study of Ancient Israel this week that includes lots of fun, hands-on activities. I’ll write a post soon!
Posted by Cindy on September 15, 2010
We are absolutely LOVING Ancient Civilizations and the Bible by Diana Waring! There is SO much to choose from for every single learning style. We’re only skimming the surface of the depth that could be reached with this curriculum, and we’re still diving way deep into Biblical world history!
Here are some photos from our first unit culminating projects based on Creation and the flood. At the end of each unit, Diana Waring has included a huge variety of project ideas. Your children choose whatever most floats their boat as far as topic and learning style. This time around, Mahayla chose to create a poster of the lineage of the Seed line up to the point of Noah and a demonstration with research about the effects of the world-wide flood.
Caleb chose to rewrite Genesis 1 and 2 in the form of a comical puppet show.
I haven’t even included pictures of the mapping, timeline, vocabulary work, poster projects and artist study we did! I may put up another post of those soon, but more likely I’ll wait and try to include those in a unit 2 wrap-up.
Until now, I’ve never found a single curriculum that I haven’t had to add to in some way or another to make it exactly what I was hoping for. This is even more perfect than I had imagined!
Side note: I’ve had several people ask me about the age appropriateness of this program. I’m using it with an 8th grader and 5th grader. The 5th grader is a tad bored once in a while when we get into more technical or drawn out readings or discussion. That’s when I pull out the activities from the younger student activity guide. To really get the full benefit from everything available in the curriculum, I’d say it’s most appropriate for 7th or 8th and higher. I don’t have any regrets bringing the 5th grader along, but there are just some of the fascinating learning opportunities that are flying over top of him right now. On his own upper elementary level, though, he’s gaining a ton from the study, too! If you have the option, I’m just saying that I think waiting until upper middle and high school is better. Hey, it can count for a world history credit if you wait!
Posted by Cindy on May 18, 2010
Tucked away in downtown Maysville, KY, overlooking the Ohio River is the National Underground Railroad Museum. My children had the pleasure of touring the museum located in the Bierbower House, which was a safe house for runaway slaves. Crawling through an underground tunnel that opened into a small room of four beds, runaway slaves could rest here before crossing the close-by river into Ohio and into freedom.
Many stories, artifacts and displays went along with a tour of the house and safe quarters. It’s a good addition to a study of slavery, along with The Freedom Center in Cincinnati.
Posted by Cindy on April 8, 2010
ALL planned unit studies for the 2009-10 school year are finished! To wrap up the school year by the end of April, we’ll be completing plans and texts for all of our other subjects and adding in a few fun writing, science and art lessons. While the kids work, I’ll begin the process of putting together end of the year portfolios and start reorganizing the school room for next year!
I’m looking forward to spending more concentrated time with Eli and his preschool fun this summer as I start planning for our next school year.
As promised, here are some pictures of the completed Overview of the 20th Century lapbook from A Journey Through Learning.
Below are the books we used to round out the century.
1970′s, 80′s, 90′s to Present
Also, I just posted a review of Legends and Leagues over at The Curriculum Choice. It’s a fun mapping curriculum for early and mid-elementary children that uses a literature book and workbook to teach several map skills.
Posted by Cindy on March 27, 2010
I hate to admit that our study of the 50′s and 60′s was a bit more boring than the 20th century thus far. It’s partly because the gusto of school is waning as we see the end in sight, and partly because we covered most of this previously when we vacationed in Alabama last November.
So, besides time lines, continuing our lapbook activities, lots of reading and a documentary or two, we didn’t do anything exciting. We’re lumping together the 70′s, 80′s, 90′s and noteable events of the 21st century as we try to wrap up this last history study of the school year.
1950′s and 60′s Resources
