My Olympians

We continued our studies of ancient Greece this week with the alphabet, Homer, and the Olympic games. We discovered that although the barbaric Dorians and Sea Peoples (Philistines) destroyed the developing culture of the Mycenaeans, which led to the Greek Dark Ages, over the period of a few hundred years these same barbarians developed their own culture; a culture which looked very much like that which they had decimated on arrival. They learned to read and write, built homes then cities then a government, and pretty much became the Greeks we know and love to read about today.
We've been reading various books and watching some cool videos about the Trojan War, the Illiad, and Odysseus's struggle trying to get home to Penelope and Telemachus. Today we tried translating our names into Greek (hard to do when you have Ss and Ls!) and even held our own little Olympic Games, complete with a torch to announce the date and contests in javelin-throwing, long-jumping, and, of course, a foot race (stade). The girls made their own wreaths from our tree out back and proudly placed them on their heads.

Recent Earworm

No harm's done to history by making it something someone would want to [learn/sing about].*



We've covered three of the four so far: Sargon, Hammurabi, and Gilgamesh.
UPDATE: We've learned about Ashurnapal now, too. Another of the meanie Assyrians. At least he loved stories enough to create the very first library.

Speaking of history, here is a recent illustration by my 6 year old home scholar. Both of my girls are really loving the story of history.
*Adapted from a quote by David McCullough

What We've Been Up To Lately

I've been a bad blogger but I have a really good excuse: My less-than-2-year-old computer --- you know, the one connected to the $1200 monitor, the $600 printer? The one that is the life-blood of my very connection with the world??? --- Well, it's good as dead. I got a virus. A really, really BAD one. And so now I'm stuck with a borrowed laptop that has none of the capabilities of the old that I was so fond of :(
Today I managed to upload & edit some photos so here's an update of some of our recent activities.

We set up the pool in the front yard in this 100+ degree weather. The girls vacillate between jumping on their boogieboards in the 2 ft deep water and riding up and down the empty street on their skateboards.

We're continuing our studies about the ancient Egyptians, mummifying Barbies and making pyramids out of sugarcubes. I also built this most-awesome model from a book in this series by Iain Ashman/Usborne. (We also have the skeleton and Trojan Horse ones for science and later history studies!)

Finally, we joined a community garden effort near our home. Thus far, we've only toured the grounds and spent a few hours harvesting sunflower seeds, but we are all looking forward to how we can schedule gardening days into of our learning-thru-living lives.

The 1st Writing

We have been exploring the people of the Nile and the Fertile Crescent in History these first few weeks of 1st and 4th grades. I gave the girls a choice of whether to write in heiroglyphs or cuneiform and they decided that pictures were more interesting than wedges.
I am happily surprised how much Ella can retain after reading our section in The Story of The World. And Shelby told me this week that History is her very favorite subject this year :)

Mission San Luis Rey: Oceanside, CA

Yesterday.

REASON #245: The Complexity of Reality

AS MUCH AS ONE CAN RESENT THE CHANGES IN CULTURE THAT TECHNOLOGY AND THE GLUT OF (MIS)INFORMATION BRINGS, SOMETIMES YOU GOTTA LOOK AT THE POSITIVES. ONE SUCH POSITIVE IS THAT WHEN YOU ARE TOO TIRED (LAZY) TO WRITE ABOUT SOMETHING YOU FEEL STRONGLY ABOUT ON YOUR BLOG, THERE IS ALWAYS SOMEONE ELSE WHO HAS WRITTEN IT (BETTER THAN YOU COULD HAVE) AND POSTED IT ON THE WEB. [From "Dodging the Homeschool Stereotype" by Susan Wise Baur]
Classical education leans heavily on the evaluation of evidence: The educated child learns to avoid logical fallacies, to decide whether arguments are trustworthy or flawed. And both secular and religious classrooms are prone to simplistic thinking. "The evidence for evolution is unambiguous!" announces the public-school science text, without any reference to the growing "intelligent design" debate. "The evidence for a young earth can't be refuted!" insists the Christian school text, in a breathtaking display of selective reasoning. Ad hominem attacks abound. "Only people who are in rebellion against God espouse evolution!" concludes the science teacher in the Christian school. And the secularist retorts, "Creationists want to plunge education back into the Dark Ages!"
With which teacher should I entrust my children?

Nor do I want my kids to learn history with all questions of religion either censored or simplified. Were the Crusaders soldiers of God or soldiers of Western imperialism? Religious educators are often too afraid to admit that devout believers did bad things; secular educators are often all too happy to point out that the love of God is the root of all evil.

My public school would teach my 9-year-old that Columbus was a self-aggrandizing representative of an expansionist empire determined to acquire more money and power while wiping out native cultures. On the other side, the mother of a Christian-school student told me with wide-eyed exhilaration of her son's American history lesson the week before: "Columbus went to the New World to share the gospel with the Indians! I never knew that! Doesn't that change the way you think about this country? We were founded on the declaration of the gospel! Isn't God good?"

So was Columbus a patriarchal aggressor or a humble servant of God? He was both.

I won't say that no classroom can address this issue in all its complexity. But there isn't one near me. Until there is, I'll continue to teach my kids at home.

SWB ~ I {HEART} YOU!

Why I Know Homeschool's For Me and Mine

Upon discussing my decision to homeschool my girls with family and friends, one of the biggest elements I emphasized was my desire for my kids to know history; not Social Studies. HISTORY. No one seemed to deny the fact that we have been raising children with little to no understanding of their place in the world but I did have one friend tell me that she did not want the school system "wasting time" teaching history. She said that the job of the schools was to get the kids into college and into well-paying jobs and, if she wanted them to know something about our past, she'd take them on vacation to Williamsburg. Yup. That's what she said.
So here's just one of any number of reasons why I am opposed to this type of thinking: There is nothing new under the sun. Humans are humans are humans. Different times, different places, different clothes, different faces. But the same themes of greed, corruption, consumption, domination, annihilation have clouded over us from the beginning of time. Same sinners, different century. Creepy and sad.
READ THE SHORT ARTICLE ON PLATO'S REPUBLIC and the CURRENT ECONOMIC CATASTROPHE HERE