unEarthingMe

for A.

World History - Monday, the co-op worked on a timeline and map of Australia/Oceania demonstrating which parts were ruled by which American/European powers from 1836 to 1914.  As they colored in each area, Jean lectured on the circumstances of how that particularterritory was taken.  Then, they talked about how every part of Africa but Ethiopia was ruled by a European Nation after heads of state met and divided all of Africa without attention to the location of various tribes/cultures or without even taking natural boundaries into consideration.  As a family, I hope to rewatch the PBS series, Africa, as it deals with some of the aftermath of these divisions.  I haven't been able to locate these dvds since our move but I'm going to try again.   A. has been reading the Father Brown mysteries independently to get a feel for the time period (and because she loves a good mystery).  Later in the week, we watched Fiddler on the Roof which I was pretty impressed by.  There seemed to be a theme for us this weekend as coinsidentatly, we had also been watching A&E's Pride and Prejudice (unrelated time period) - another tale of five daughters to be married off and the customs of the times dictating such things - as well as the challenge of those customs.

Economics - This week the students had a discussion of monopsonies and read an article Is Walmart a Monopsony?  Kim gave an example of mirror producer's experience selling to Walmart.  Kim is great at presenting various sides and letting the kids draw their own conclusions.  A.'s conclusion was that Walmart is pretty much a monopsony.  From last week's viewing of You've Got Mail, they entered a discussion of big firm versus little firm and the tendency of people to vocally support the small guy but then end up economically support the big guy.  They finished up by watching Norma Rae and will discuss labor and unions next Monday.

Language Arts - She has been feverishly working on a Beatles fan fiction story.  She has also been reading Beatles fan fiction online in addition to the Father Brown mysteries.

Math - a little Algebra this week.  In addition to her own continuing game of calculating mileage and time to predict when we'll arrive either in Richmond or Staunton.

for J.

Cultural Studies - Heidi led the Bloom in History co-op by giving the children some information of Islam as they colored in a Map of Arabia.  Then, she read a tale from the Arabian Nights.

Visual Arts - J. has returned to one of her passions - fashion design.  With a "new" How-to book (a cast-off of someone's left in the book donation box at our UU Fellowship), she has been using stencils to trace figures and then has been drawing her own clothing onto them, sometimes embellishing with stickers, fabric strips or patterned paper.

apparently, I never published this last week.

For A

World History - Co-op began with a discussed Ruyard Kipling's The White Man's Burden and what they thought it meant which was basically a justification of the Western World's treatment of peoples in the rest of the world.  Also discussed was an 1899 speech by Senator Tillman of SC quoting part of Kipling's poem to support his opposition of US decision to annex Phillipines.  The kids read through the speech and made note of both things they agreed and disagreed with.  The group concensus was that while Senator Tillman had the right opinion, not to annex the Phillipines, it was for the wrong (racist) reasons.  A. particularly disagreed with the section "...two races side by side that can not mix or mingle without deterioration and injury to both and the ultimate destruction of the civiliztion of the higher."  They moved on to the  Republican Platform of 1900's claim that we needed to invade to elevate other races.  She really enjoyed  Mark Twain's satirical To the Person Sitting in Darkness.  I wasn't exposed to World History like this until college and as a result, of course, never enjoyed it until then.  We have been viewing the series Flambards all week to add to her "feel" for this time period.

Economics - Credit cards pros and cons were reviewed and discussed.  After watching You've Got Mail there was a discussion on monopolies and monopsonies.  Later in the week she responded to questions on how technology effects economy.

For J

Cultural Studies/History - History In Bloom covered Medieval India this week and I led the group in a discussion of Diwali which began last Friday.  We looked at pictures of Rangoli, sand art made by commoners - as opposed to trained artists - to welcome the goddess Lakshmi.  Then the kids made their own pictures with colored sand.  The nice thing about Story of the World is that you can just pull something out of the activity book, you can expand on it (the option I chose this time) or you can come up with your own project.  It's nice to have all of those options depending on what's going on in your life or what your areas of expertise are.  We're enjoying doing this with our old pals.  She has also enjoyed watching Flambards.

Math - We've been playing Pizza Fractions (a fun math game we have with several variations on how to play) and chess.  J started make a little booklet with addition facts.  She received her first trophy this week for her participation in Junior First Lego League.  She was absolutely beaming.

Language Arts - Everyday, J. impresses me with her growing reading and spelling skills and all of it self-taught.  It's so incredibly rewarding.  I will sorely miss some of her invented spelling once she transitions into knowing more and more words.

For A.

World History - a bit of catch up here to come forward from Civil War era where we left off last year to about 1910.  As part of her fabulous History co-op, she will be traveling around the world in five periods ending the year at the end of the 20th century.  Currently (the first period) the focus is on pre-WWI, the 1880's to 1914.  To catch up she's researching the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago and hopefully this week we'll be able to cover the golden age in European History known as Belle Epoque as well as the Gilded Age/Progressive Era in the United States and take a look at the 1904 World's Fair in St. Louis.  Tonight we watched Magic of the White City Expo narrated by Gene Wilder about the Chicago World's Fair.  It was fascinating if a bit cheesy.  We'll be frantically trying to dig through our personal library and the Staunton library for reading on "the West" pre-WWI.  Tomorrow we'll watch The World's Greatest Fair about the St. Louis World's Fair.  With any luck she will be able to review Asia during this time period, which is what they covered Monday, over the weekend.  We won't even attempt to read ahead for this Monday.  She'll be doing quite well to cram all of this in by next class.  Ms. J has great things in store for the kids (as usual) this year!

Economics - My friend K has put together a fun a challenging class as she did a few years ago.  So far most of what she has covered has been Supply and Demand.  This too A will try to catch up on this week.  Fortunately she is somewhat familiar with these concepts because K did such a great job of teaching them before.  In fact, recently A just re-read the Invisible Heart: an economic romance that was assigned the last time she studied econ. under K.  She just decided to pick it up one day and told me that she had gotten more out of it this time around.  A has some websites to visit and articles to read to evaluate the changes in supply or demand discussed.  She will also track her personal spending for four weeks - which should be relatively easy since she doesn't do any.  Lastly, she needs to get opinions on credit cards from three different people that will encompass the views good, bad and ugly.  They had fun in class Monday watching videos and commercials.  They even watched a great Trend Spotting clip from The Daily Show on college grads. and credit cards.

Biology - Yeah, I know I talked up how we were going to be studying Chemistry this year.  While we (A & myself) did do reading and prep. work in that direction, there were a multitude of reasons that I couldn't lead the Chemistry co-op I had planned.  So, it's back to Biology for us.  My friend, P, teaches a mean science class and it all falls into place on Mondays after History and Econ.  I don't really know what A needs to catch up on here and I think she's just gonna have to jump in where she is and hold on tight!  Perhaps next week can be heavy on Biology because she has got plenty on her plate for this week and we have out of town guests coming this weekend.

Algebra - What more is there to say.

Language Arts - This is really incorporated into the writing and research she does for everything else.  She's always been a voracious reader.  She writes humorous fiction when the mood strikes.  I think we've got this covered.

Music - I want to take her music class!  She's taking a class from a Charlottesville musician, Matty Metcalfe, called Making Music at the Community Homeschool Enrichment Center (which offers REALLY cool classes) in C'vlle.  I never know whether they'll be studying Hank Williams, the Pogues, or Tom Waits; writing jingles or learning orchestration.  This week, they head into the recording studio.  Lucky girl.

For J.

Cultural Studies - We skipped forward from where we left off of Story of the World with the Greeks about halfway through Book One so that J could rejoin the co-op I started last year.  They plowed ahead over the summer and are in the beginnings of Book Two (Medieval).  Upon her return on Monday they were working on the Byzantine Empire and making mosaics with tiles set into Plaster of Paris.  We'll be preparing for Monday's topic (when I teach) on The Medieval Indain Empire by listening to that chapter of SOTW, doing some additional reading from the library, some mapwork and whatever activity I put together for Monday.

Language Arts - J is starting to take off with her reading.  She is now picking up books and trying to read them on her own.  It has been so rewarding to NOT teach her to read and to let her come to it on her own.  She is so proud and I'm all the prouder.  Writing is pretty much the same.  She uses invented spelling and sounds things out, sometimes asking how to spell something.  As time goes on, more and more of her words are spelled correctly.  She is evolving into literacy.  We read aloud to her religiously, especially Bill.

Math - Hmmmm.  This week I'd say - trying to decide on a math program that works for her.  I have my eye on Right Start, just not my wallet.  Saxon would be torturous, as I knew it would.  I thought I could adapt it but, it really would be a burden with the way it's set up.  Aside from anything formal, J is kicking butt at chess (mine that is), playing Thinkominoes and participating in Lego League which sadly ends this week.

Music - We really need to get the piano off of the step van for her.  She has been her usual little composing self and has come up with at least one song this week.

Visual Arts - Constantly

Practical Arts - We wrap up our Herbcraft class at the Community Homeschool Enrichment Center this week.  Last week we made massage oil with Essential Oils.  J altered an existing recipe of Lavendar and Juniper with the addition of Sandalwood to great result.  It really rounded out the smell.  This week we'll be making potpourri.  We're supposed to bring orange peel to contribute and I never dried any.  I'll have to come up with something and soon!

J. has begun Junior First Lego League at the Staunton Library.  Her team, the Power Club, is largely made up of girls her age.  B. takes her to this weekly event on Wednesday afternoons making me a little out of the loop.  J. has been taking along her camera and getting photos of their work with B. jumping in to take pictures every so often.  The league's challenge this year is Alternative Energy.  Learning about where energy comes from is new ground for J. although she has had exposure to environmentalism and conservation.  In the past for science we've done Biology or Earth Science/Astronomy.  We're working on Chemistry this year and now we'll have a dash of Physics thrown in.  J. was having a hard time wrapping her mind around some of the concepts she needed to know.  At the same time, she has been obsessed with making Cootie Catchers after attending a Religious Education class at the Waynesboro U.U. last Sunday where they handed out Cootie Catchers with facts about famous U.U.s.    She needed to know where energy came from, identify items in the kitchen that used energy, and offer suggestions for conservation.  B. had been discussing these ideas with her over the course of the week but she wasn't quite there as far as being prepared for League Day.  I decided to grab onto her obsession of the week and she made a Cootie Catcher of these ideas.  The outer eight items were about where we get energy:  sun & wind, water, geo-thermal, oil, natural gas, nuclear, chemical (batteries), .  The middle eight items were energy consumers in the kitchen, grouped four ways: hot water & stove, refrigerator & overhead light, clock & flashlight, and can opener & food processor.  For the inner flap the suggestions for conservation came into play.  When you opened hot water & stove you found out that they ran on gas and you could monitor and limit your use.  The refrigerator & light consumed electricity and were necessary but, you could avoid holding the fridg. door open and turns off lights when leaving the room.  Batteries ran the clock & flashlight and those could be rechargeable.  Finally, the can opener & food processor were unnecessary electric appliances easily replaced manually.  The project was fun and helped to organize and cement the concepts.  It also seemed to satisfy her desire for cranking out Cootie Catchers non-stop.  You never know when Mom is going to go and turn your fun into a lesson.