This is how I know our study of history is sticking: at GMan's tball game last night the heavens opened up and it POURED. Everyone ran into the dugout. As the boys are all going stir crazy, GMan looks around and says "I know what happened. Poseidon sent this storm!" Ok. I thought it was witty and clever. I am pretty sure I could read the faces of some of the parents in the dugout, though -- looked something like "Oh ~ he's that homeschooled kid!" What gave it away? Or, maybe it was my children riding their scooters in the driveway this morning making up songs about Icarus, Athene, and Heracles... seems like everything we learn transfers to real life. What a minute -- LEARNING IS REAL LIFE!
We are beginning our study of Ancient Greece. Let me tell you, this is probably the most fun thing we have learned about this year. Once again, I'm learning as much as the kids. I'm sure we are going to spend several weeks on this period of history.
First, a look at a fun and simple hands on activity. Last week we learned about Persia, and the kids made "Persian Plates" - an activity from the Story of The World. Basically, they covered cardboard "plates" with aluminum foil and then transferred things that were precious to us onto them. Hard to tell, but Miss B's has a peace sign, and GMan's has a baseball and him playing baseball. Shocker. It was a quick activity which showed them silver was precious to the Persians.
- Comprehensive Map of Greece - from WorksheetWorks (I love this site!!), home of many comprehensive maps that I use with my children
- Greek Cooking for Kids -- we love to cook, and a few of these recipes will be going into our menu plan over the next few weeks!
- You Wouldn't Want to Be a Slave in Ancient Greece -- GREAT book... many others in the series which you can find at the publishers website. My nine year old loves these. I give them to her during quiet reading time and ask her to "sticky note" interesting facts to share with me.
- Adventures in Ancient Greece -- comic book format with TONS of great information. My six year old was engrossed in this today!
- The Usborne Book of Greek Myths for Young Children We have sat at lunch for the past week and read out of this book. The kids BEG me to read more each day. It is a favorite in our house.
- Ancient Greece Coloring Pages -- I have a coloring fanatic in my house. Thank goodness, because he does this while I read aloud to both of the children.
- Archimedes Copywork and Notebook Pages -- created by Jimmie of The Notebooking Nook. Scroll down the page and watch the left hand side for Archimedes to find the downloadable file. These are printed for my daughter to add to her Ancients Notebook... she loves notebooking!
- Ancient Greece Lapbook by In The Hands of a Child.... (a few weeks ago I won a Currclick certificate from The Homeschool Village - thank you - paid for this lapbook!)
and last, but NOT LEAST......
- Check out this lapbook for The Iliad -- WOW! We are going to be reading Black Ships Before Troy and I am going to use the character cards as we read.
We're just delving into Ancient Greece - if you have a favorite resource let me know!
