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Saturday, January 16, 2010

Living Books


Since today we have no school I thought a good topic would be living books.I am preparing for Wisdom Booklet 21 so I am in search for living books for read alouds, kids to read, and exciting research books.These are the qualities I like to find in living books.


  • visuals and pictures that make the study interesting (research books)

  • well organized in thought and categories (research books)

  • when it comes to science any creation books I can get my hands on(research books)

  • books that encourage Godly character (reading)

  • books that make history or the person come to life and you just don't want to put the book down (reading)

An awesome tool I purchased at a local homeschool workshop was The Heart of Wisdom teaching approach. This book is a must for me in a Christian homeschool as a tool ,encouragement, & a how to homeschool if you are new to homeschooling.

In the back it has lists of recommended living books organized by topic for both reading and research living books.There is so much more in this book that I praise the Lord he has directed me to this whether it refreshes me in teaching or as a tool for getting some great living books.

I purchase living books to use with the Wisdom Books and that works best for me especially during the Greek study there are tons of pictures with stickers on them lol .Most eras are not quite so bad .The library of course s a great place for a tight budget.It doesn't matter if you purchase or use the library in each case living books are the way to go.Just set them on a table and someone will be drawn in to them.It may be your 4 year old noticing a lion on a shield or you Jr.high son noticing battle formations.

I have the Heart of Wisdom link listed on as one of my tools used to feed my sheep.Gods perfect timing again I am on her email list and she sent out an email stating she has an updated HOW store.I really love the Biblical world view Robin Sampson holds so I love to fellowship with her through books & her websites.It sure is one of my favorite spices I add to using my Wisdom Booklets when digging deeper for the Wisdom Booklet projects.

Friday, January 15, 2010

Wisdom Booklet 20~History Resource


Angelina's History Pocket Book




This is what each pocket will look like after each lesson.Each lesson s different and she can add things to her pockets as she goes which makes it fun.


















The beginning of Daniels Ancient Greece poster. I am using the pictures from the History Pocket Book to add to his poster.I will post the final picture when it is completed.





Here is their shields.Angelo loves Tigers so he decided to decorate his with a Tiger while Daniel in the lions den decorates everything in lions. He also added some swords to his design.Job made one too he drew a colorful volcanoe as you can see at the top of the post. I am guessing the volcanoe came from our read aloud today :)





Wisdom Booklet 20~History Resource


Today we studied:


  • Alexander the Great

  • Ancient Greece Military

  • Ancient Greece Battles

  • Ancient Greece Navy




I began by reading a Read Aloud of the Ancient Greek time period.I love The Story of the World series written by Susan Wise Bauer.Her writing makes history come to life in a story.I consider this a great living book.It it Volume 1: Ancient Times.I will be reading a chapter daily until we read all the stories of Ancient Greece.


Currclick came to the rescue again.I purchased History Pockets Ancient Greece.I used the lessons to teach everyone.We did the Military lesson today.


We then did our projects & further research:



  • Jr.High students researched Ancient military then wrote about it. I purchased an Ancient Greece scrapbook to learn packet from Heart of Wisdom for them to use with this study. This is how they will record their learning for the entire study on Ancient Greece.

  • Angelina my 5th grader will be making the Ancient Greece Pocket History Book

  • Daniel my 3rd grader will be making an Ancient Greece poster and add to it each day as he learns something new.

  • Both Angelina & Daniel will use Ancient Greece history scribe for writing.

  • Prek-2nd Angelo & Job will be making hands on activities.Today they designed their own Hoplite shields.

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Wisdom Booklet 20~History Resource





























Our cookie map.This is our first time doing this and Greece with all the islands was for sure not a beginner country to start one on but we still had fun making & eating our map.Yum Yum!





















Wisdom Booklet 20~History Resource











Today we looked at Ancient Greece maps.













We then did a Geography Study on modern day Greece. Geoscribe goes perfect with the Wisdom Booklets because it is a designed to go with any curriculum so this is what I like to grab when we are doing a Geography study.We then fill out the information using our Encyclopedias.


I also like to use Operation world to see the prayer challenges of that country.I want my children to have a Christian world view and a heart for other people around the world.So instead of filling in the brief history on our notebook page they copy some of the challenges of prayer for that country.


Daniels project for today was to make Greece's flag.

We then made a cookie map of Greece.At least we attempted to lol



Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Wisdom Booklet 20~History Resource


My plan for every Wednesday is to always begin a resource and do just the Wisdom Booklet lesson orally.This allows me to get the family to church on time which is an important goal especially after studying punctuality in the last Wisdom Booklet lol. Each student who can read takes turns reading a paragraph from the WB.So today that is what we did for school.


Since my mineral kits ordered did not come in I am going to jump to the History resource and come back to the part1 of the science resource.That is what I love about the Wisdom Booklets it is a tool that is so flexible!


I enjoyed the lesson for today as always.My hubby is reading to the kids about Ezra PM Bible devotions so this resource ended up being God's perfect timing.I am enjoying studying the history of the Pharisees and Sadducess.It has been a good time to remind my children the dangers of religion which is not our goal but a relationship with Christ.Also to be wise concerning the traditions of men verses the word of God.


I love the spring board the Wisdom Booklet left for us to jump into the study of Ancient Greece."Every where Alexander went,he took the Hellenistic (Greek) culture with him."So off we go tomorrow to study Ancient Greece and how God's people responded to the culture and how that culture still plagues God's people today!


Excite & cause interest! Above is my Ancient Greece poster which put up to get them curious about our Ancient Greece study.I will also place a few living books with lots of pictures of Greece on the school table to start the curiosity of learning.
Next to it is my VOM poster to remind me to pray for the persecuted.







Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Wisdom Booklet 20~Science 2 Insects





















Here are some samples of what we did today.
Evolution Stumpers: Ancient Insects (such as ants, praying mantises , houseflies, and termites) have been preserved in petrified tree sap and dated by scientist at 40-100 million years old.These insects are basically unchanged from their present day counterparts.Why didn't they develop into more complex forms? Or could it be true that creatures do reproduce "each after their own kind as the Bible states.

Wisdom Booklet 20~Science 2 Insects

~*Science Resource 2*~
How Do Termites Illustrate the" Righteousness" of the scribes and Pharisees?
For our Wisdom Booklet lesson we studied termites.We then compared them as an analogy to a Pharisee.The kids enjoyed this study.Learning interesting facts about termites and challenged spiritually as we looked at the analogy. We completed the Resource yesterday and completed the projects today.
I decided to do an insect study as one of the recommended WB projects.Here is how we did it.
  • Jr.high students choose a research project from the BJU Biology book then a way to present it .Dominic decided on a mini book on major orders of insects while Joe decided on characteristics of insects doing a scrapbook to learn page.
  • upper elementary students I used Considering God's Creation and did lesson 13 on insects so they ended up doing worksheets (notebooking)
  • Prek-2nd we made a model of a moth & butterfly then compared them. Then I had them draw a bug to see what they learned and Angelo remembered insects has 6 legs, etc.Job drew his butterfly sideways which I thought was cute.

Daddy came home from work just when we finished up our projects so each child gave a report using their co mpleted work.Daddy enjoys hearing the children's reports and being apart of what they are learning.

Monday, January 11, 2010

Wisdom Booklet 20~Medicine Resource
















How the worst plague in history confirmed the value of keeping every law of God.










I enjoyed this study.We studied history by studying the "Black Plague" and looked at the conditions that lead to the spread of this disease along with other plagues in history including those listed in the Bible.










We then looked at Bible Leviticus 11:29-47 and looked at how the Jewish community was not greatly affected by this plague because they followed God's laws given in the Bible.












After we covered history we then used the BJU Biology book to study contagious diseases and how they are passed from person to person for health class.










The kids then did a short writing assignments of what they learned.The older kids learned to use the Scrapbook Max 2.0 and made scrapbook to learn pages. Daniel did copy work from the Wisdom Booklet and drew a picture copying it off of a picture I printed from the internet.Here is what they did....