Wrapping Up Week 10 (2016-17)

Posted on September 17, 2016 by Deanna

My passions were given free reign this week as we continued our study of American history, moving on to the story of Paul Revere and the battles at Lexington and Concord. Although we did do all the rest of our normal subjects, history pretty much ruled our week. We even got Daddy interested through all our discussions. Leigh Bortins talks about how homeschooling redeems the education of two generations, and we are definitely experiencing that in our family. Eric and I both learned alongside the boys this week as we dove into the American Revolution.

History: The Start of the American Revolution

I am really glad we are using The Light and the Glory for Children (and its sequel) as our “spine” this year. It is helping set a good pace for us as we move through the events of early American history. Without it, we might be tempted to speed through the entire Liberty’s Kids series, but because we are going chapter by chapter in the book, we have time to really explore each event, looking at various books and videos to help the children become familiar with the important people and details.

This week in The Light and the Glory we read “Chapter 12: War!” It covered several important subjects:

Paul Revere: We’ve talked about Paul Revere before, when we were going through Five in a Row, but that was three years ago, so we pulled out some of our favorite resources from that study, as well as adding a few new ones this time around.

book: Paul Revere’s Ride (there’s an audio recording of this poem from Homeschool Radio Shows)
audio: “Listen My Children” from Homeschool Radio Shows.
audio: Adventures in Odyssey #197 “The Midnight Ride” (This was interesting because it discussed some errors in Longfellow’s poem as well as giving more information about Paul Revere.)
video: Liberty’s Kids episode 5 “Midnight Ride”
video: “The Flame Returns,” part of Animaniacs Season 3, Episode 25 (streaming on Netflix right now, though they call it Vol. 2, Episode 12)

Lexington and Concord: The battle at Lexington lasted only about 15 minutes before the British moved on to Concord, but it is important because it marks the beginning of years of fighting between the Americans and the British. We found several good resources for learning about it, and the boys really memorized a lot of details that kept popping up in each one.

book: Sam the Minuteman (We also used the literature guide from Progeny Press, which led to some great discussions, as well as a helpful vocabulary lesson that was reinforced in several other resources we used this week.)

George the Drummer Boy by Nathaniel Benchley tells about the battle from a boy on the British side

video: Liberty’s Kids episode #6 “The Shot Heard Round the World”
video: Schoolhouse Rock “The Shot Heard Round the World” (and we watched “No More Kings“)
video: April Morning (This is full-length movie starring Tommy Lee Jones about a father and son at Lexington. It’s not rated, but my husband and I watched it with the older boys and we were okay with it. It is about battle, but there’s no gore and as about little violence as one could have given the subject.)

Ethan Allen and the “Green Mountain Boys” at Fort Ticonderoga:

video: Liberty’s Kids episode #7 “Green Mountain Boys”

Ian and I also watched The American Revolution, which covered all these subjects. (I found it this streaming on Amazon Prime and it’s aimed at children, so I figured we’d give it a try. Ian, always ready to watch anything, joined me in previewing it, but I found it a little too slow to show to the other kids and after we got interrupted I didn’t bother going back to finish the whole thing. The best thing about it was reinforcing things we had already learned about.

Chapter 12 in The Light and the Glory also mentioned the battle of Bunker Hill, but we’re saving that until next week when it’s covered in Liberty’s Kids to talk more about it.

Biography

The last sentence of Chapter 12 in The Light and the Glory introduced the man who would step up to lead the new Continental Army: George Washington. I decided to make him the focus of our biography studies this week so the boys would be more familiar with him as we move on. We read George Washington: America’s Patriot from YWAM Publishing’s “Heroes for Young Readers” series, as well as George Washington by Ingri and Edgar Parin d’Aulaire

Veritas Press

Elijah has been begging me for months to sign him up for a Veritas Press Self-Paced History Course, and while he loves his VP self-paced Bible course, it just hasn’t satisfied him. This week I heard the VP was having a Back to School Sale (use code BACKTOHOMESCHOOL for $100 off until 9/26!) on their Self-Paced courses, so I decided to go ahead and get him started on “Explorers to 1815.” In the first three days he completed 7 lessons, and the first words out of his mouth when we woke up Saturday morning were, “Can I do a history lesson?”

These courses really are amazing. The only thing I would change is that I wish I could purchase them on CD-ROM so we could pass them down from one child to the next. I’m not requiring him to do any of the lessons at this point. It’s just a chance for him (and Ian to some extent, as he enjoys watching) to review things we’ve already learned about, and hopefully eventually he’ll catch up to where we are in our family history study. I’ve made a note of when 6 months is up to make sure he’ll have enough time to complete the course before our subscription runs out, but I’m hoping he’ll just go through it at his own pace without me ever needing to schedule it.