Michael's Main Lesson Block: Folk Tales

Michael just wrapped up a main lesson block on American folk tales. While folk tales are often covered in the Waldorf curriculum in fifth grade, I decided to use a non-Waldorf resource for teaching this block. I'd heard a lot about Moving Beyond the Page, and decided to try it out. Because we're also hitting American geography pretty hard, I decided to go with American Tall Tales and Legends.

Billed as "a homeschooling curriculum for creative, hands-on, and gifted learners," Moving Beyond the Page has been the talk of the message boards this past year. In my opinion, it doesn't live up to the hype. The books' organization is confusing, with information needing to be pieced together from two or three different places. There was a good bit of creative writing involved, but "hands on" seemed to be a bit of an overstatement, with a lot of cutting and pasting and worksheets involved. As far as the claim that it's great for gifted kids, it did not present much of a challenge for my fifth grader.

The best thing this curriculum had going for it was the recommended books: Cut from the Same Cloth and American Tall Tales.

Cut from the Same Cloth: American Women of Myth, Legend, and Tall Tale fills in an empty gap in folk tale canon-- stories of strong, courageous women. Bess Call, Annie Christmas, Old Sally Cato, Sister Fox, and Otoonah are just a few of the tales told. The stories represent America's rich multicultural heritage as well, featuring women from Native American, African American, Mexican American, and Canadian backgrounds.

American Tall Tales by Adrien Stoutenberg tells the tale of eight American folk heroes: Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill, Stormalong, Mike Fink, Davy Crockett, Johnny Appleseed, John Henry, and Joe Magarac. These were a quick, no-nonsense read... other than the nonsense of the tall tale of course! Last of all, we used some Stephen Kellogg's picture books to fill in the gaps.

What else did we do today?

We started a new read-aloud, one of my absolute favorite books from when I was a little girl-- Little Witch by Anna Elizabeth Bennett. It's a short read, about a hundred pages, so we should be able to wrap it up by Halloween.

I finally found my twisty turny olive wood nutcracker, so Nicholas enjoyed cracking nuts. If you're one of my Facebook friends, note the lime green goggle behind him.

Preschool math-- put the number cards in order and then place the corresponding number of cubes on each card.

And when it was all done...
To the farm stand for a pumpkin!

Daniel really wanted this one...

But Katie Grace set her sights on something a little bigger.


While the older two went to Awana, the big boy and the littlest boy went out with Daddy (the biggest boy of all!) and I to TGIFridays, where crayon lightsaber wars took place. A good time was had by all.

Workbox Wednesday: Michael

Workboxes are great for the little ones, but my older children were somewhat resistant to the idea. To make it a little more palatable, I use file folders rather than boxes for my older two. Here is what Michael, my ten-year-old fifth grader, is up to.
Today was the feast of Sts. Simon and Jude. Michael read about St. Jude in A Year With God. It was a rather cutting edge graphic novel presentation of the saint's life. Very cool. He then made a main lesson book page.

Next he visited Spelling City on our very messy computer and practiced his spelling words. Test tomorrow! Also, looking at the picture, there's some weird shadow stuff going on. Our computer area is messy, but not that messy!

Next he revised some writing.

And then on to Life of Fred.

Fellowship of the Rings was next.

And then grammar-- pronouns in Voyages in English. I generally try to make grammar more interesting, but today just opted for some exercises in the text book.

Then he moved into the kitchen for Calculadder, a timed math drill we do several times a week. To save paper, I bought the CD-ROM from Rainbow Resource. I then printed them out and put them in page protectors in a binder so they can erase and re-do as needed.

Next was a logic puzzle. Michael is doing a critical thinking class at co-op and really enjoys these.

He conducted an experiment on how salt melts ice and lowers the melting point.
And then added a "lab report" to his science main lesson book.

Mad Libs--especially Star Wars Mad Libs-- are a great way to review the parts of grammar.

And finally, he wound things up by writing in his journal.

Keep in mind, his files are by no means a complete curriculum. He also has a main lesson with me each day, which lasts anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes. This month, we worked on folk tales, although as I admitted in an earlier post, October has been a bit of a loss. Every other week he also practices cello as part of his independent work (on alternate weeks his cello is at the local elementary school, where he participates in orchestra daily).

Wordless Wednesday: Light Saber Battle at TGIFridays

Halloween and Autumn Crafts!

Felt Make-a-jack o' lantern


Sponge painted candy corn and see-inside jack o' lantern cyclops

Jack o' lantern window transparency

Beeswax owl and tree from Autumn Seasons of Joy

Hey, Ho, for Halloween! A circle time

This is being posted a little later than I would have hoped. I'm slowly getting my groove back, and some days are better than others.

This year, our Halloween circle is framed by a lovely little story by Nancy Foster called "The Naughty Little Hobgoblin." It can be found in Let Us Form a Ring. This is a great book and I highly recommend it, even if just to learn how a Waldorf circle "works." I also found a copy of the story here.

At the end, there's a lovely little traditional song:
Jack o' lantern, jack o' lantern,
You are such a funny sight
As you sit there in the window,
Looking out in the night.

You were once a yellow pumpkin
Growing on a sturdy vine.
Now you are a jack o' lantern.
See the candle light shine!

To this, we add a few songs from my childhood.
Pumpkin, pumpkin,
Big and fat
Turned to a jack o' lantern
Just like that!

and

Let's take a jack, jack, jack o' lantern.
I'll show you how, how, how it's done.
You simply start with a little orange pumpkin
Then carve a pumpkin face for fun!

Naturally, this one follows:
Five little pumpkins sitting on the gate.
The first one said, "Oh my! It's getting late!"
The second one said, "There are witches in the air."
The third one said, "But we don't care."
The fourth one said, "Let's run and run and run."
The fifth one said, "I'm ready for some fun!"
Whoooooo went the wind and out went the lights
And the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight.

The next few are from the Autumn Wynstones book:

I am a pumpkin, big and round.
Once upon a time I grew on the ground.
Now I have a mouth, two eyes, and a nose.
What are they for, do you suppose?
When I have a candle inside burning bright
I'll be a jack o' lantern on Halloween night.

Three little pumpkins, lying very still
In a pumpkin patch on a hill.
This one said, "I'm very green,
But I'll be orange by Halloween."
This one said, "I'm on my way
To be a jack o' lantern some day."
This one said, "Oh my, oh my,
Today I'll be a pumpkin pie."

You may notice that this is a very gentle Halloween circle time. With Daniel being just two, I didn't want anything too spooky. I have a slightly scary circle time from last year here.

Happy Halloween!

Weekend Round-Up

Hey ho for Halloween!

I've found some great seasonal ideas around the Blogosphere this week.

For Nicholas's birthday, I'm definitely adding cookie cutter tracing from My Montessori Journey.

This pumpkin banana bread looks easy enough for Michael to make with minimal supervision.

And for Katie Grace's work, this bean dip math game from Our Little Nature Nest will be a great way to review math facts. For fun, she might enjoy making this tiny fairy doll from Treasures for Tots.

We'll all probably find something from this list of crafts with acorns and conkers compiled by The Crafty Crow.

We've switched from allowances to commissions a la Dave Ramsey, so these printable chore charts from ModEco Kids should help.

Author Spotlight: Edna Miller

Come South with me,
Come right away,
Your house will never do.
The wind will blow,
The snow will snow
And chill you
Through and through.

So speaks the phoebe bird in the beautiful little picture book we checked out of the library, Edna Miller's Mousekin's Golden House. It was a sweet little nature tale with beautiful, innocent illustrations in gentle, muted colors. I was thrilled when I looked on the back and saw she wrote many more than this one! I was even more thrilled when I saw that so many of them listed on Ebay.

You can read about Edna Miller here. I'm trying to declutter, but am going to have really difficult time not collecting more of these sweet little books.

Workbox Wednesday

We've been having great success this year using Sue Patrick's Workbox system. It's modified to suit our own needs-- ah, the joys of homeschooling!--but it's really helped settled our days.

This is our set up.

The plastic boxes are for Nicholas. As he completes the activities, he takes the number off the box and places it on his number strip, which is sitting on top of the first box.

Katie Grace's box is the teal one, and Michael's is brown. They each have 12 folders. The first folder is always yesterday's marked work/work to be corrected. Their folders are pretty predictable. Michael generally has corrections, spelling, writing, Life of Fred, math review, literature (Fellowship of the Rings at present), grammar, Christian Ed, geography, science or social studies, cello practice, and scouts or co-op homework. Katie Grace has spelling, writing, corrections, math review, literature (Little House in the Green Grove), grammar, handwriting, Christian Ed or a seasonal project, some sort of geography, social studies, or science, violin practice. She enjoys art projects, so I try to throw those in there as well. It's actually less rigid than it sounds. I try to keep things fun and interesting, but they're older and don't need to be entertained quite as much as the six-year-old.

Today I was going to show all of Nicholas's workboxes, but it got to be too much to keep up with four children AND take pictures. Here are some of them though:
Sewing a gnome hat. Great for small motor skills, and he was so proud of himself! You can see him wearing the hat throughout the day.

Lego letters. He's a lego maniac, and really enjoyed this.
A worksheet. I hate worksheets, but I'm trying to work on Nicholas's small motor skills and try to hit it from every angle.
A shape matching memory game. Note the granola bar at his elbow.
A magic leaf picture-- it's super cyclops leaf! This is an activity from Autumn Seasons of Joy. Note the apple. Nicholas always has a snack!
Sorting nuts. He's been having tons of fun with these this week.

Well, that's 6 out of 12. I would post the rest of what he did, but I honestly don't remember, LOL! Ah, life with 4.

I'm hoping to make Workbox Wednesday a weekly thing. Next week I'll show what's in Katie Grace's "workfiles."

Katie Grace's Main Lesson: Native American Stories

I must admit, I'm totally unprepared for this lesson. This month has been a very difficult one, and I haven't had the time to dedicate to researching the lesson that I usually would. We're definitely flying by the seat of our pants!

On the Homeschooling Waldorf yahoo group-- which I highly recommend, there are some great conversations going on there right now-- I asked for and received the following recommendations:
The National Museum of the American Indian website
The Keepers of the Earth series by Michael Caduto
Books by Joseph Bruchac (and we actually own 13 Moons on Turtle's Back, so yay!)
Paintings by George Catlin and Edward Curtis
On the Trail Made of Dawn by M.L. Webster
Niwechihaw I Help by Caitlin Dale Nicholson
Bonnie Shemie's Native Housebuilding books

Unfortunately, I only allotted October for this unit and I don't really have time to get these. Those Bonnie Shemie books look awesome though!

So, what we're doing...

We start out by reading one biography in We Are the Many : A picture book of American Indians. I checked out several books in the Native American Crafts series by Judith Hoffman Corwin, and we're working slowly through it. While Katie Grace works on the crafts, I tell her stories and legends from the tribe we're learning about.

So far, we learned about the Pomo tribe while Katie Grace decorated a basket and learned how Coyote made the moon and sun.

Later, she rewrote the story in her own words and also used a Pomo poem for copywork.


We also learned about the Ute people. Katie Grace decorated her own Ute miniature horse, complete with rainbow felt saddle blanket. The Buffalo Hunting Porcupine is a great story. She's also been working at our Brio loom.
Today, we started learning about Native Americans from the Great Plains. She began a pinch pot from air hardening clay-- forgot to take a picture, sorry!-- and will paint it tomorrow.

I do feel badly that I wasn't more mindful when planning this unit. It's certainly a topic that's worthy of my attention. Ah well. I'll be more prepared next time, and maybe we can come back to it later this year. I try to focus on Native Americans in Pennsylvania when we do our state study in fourth grade, so I'll have a chance next year as well.