More memory song (how to)

For those who asked how I added the song to my blog, I followed the directions here. I already had Movie-maker on my computer, so I didn't even have to download that program.

Memory Song Test

OK, I'm trying something new on the blog. I put some of memorization recommendations in The Well Trained Mind to a tune. I feel the need to apologize for the cheesy lyrics and the poor sound quality. I'm trying to make due with some of the programs my computer already has on it.


Wars of the Middle Ages (tune of Battle Hymn of the Republic)
The Wars of the Middle Ages start with the Crusades
The Muslims and the Christians, the Holy land did raid
They battled for 200 years before they were all done
From 1095 to 1291.

The first ten ninety-six to ninety-nine
A Wild mob surrounded Palestine.
The second in 1187
They thought if they fought they would go to heaven.

In 1191 the Lionheart took the lead
He couldn’t win, but he had them sign a treaty
The 4th Crusade in 1202 to 1204
They looted Constantinople till there was no more!

The tried to send the children in 1212
The Children’s Crusade was not good for their health.
The fifth and 6th didn’t get much done.
And finally in 1291 Egypt won

The Hundred Years War fought with England and France.
They both wanted Kingdoms so they thought they’d take the chance.
The start in 1377 and all the years between
Don’t add up to 100, but 116.

Joan of Arc of Arc, a very young girl
Led the people into battle
Many bloody battles were lost and found
And in the end, neither side had gained much ground.

The Wars of the Roses wasn’t like a flower
The Yorks and the Lancasters both wanted power
From 1455 to 1485
Until a Lancastor took a York for a wife

The final war that we will relate
Went from 1562 to 1598
The Catholics and the Protestants were fighting for the rule.
The French Wars of Religion just weren’t cool!

Yearly Planning for Next Year

I understand that not everyone loves to plan and organize as much as I do, so you will have to bear with me in my extreme "geeky-ness!" I get great joy out of planning and I find our school runs so much more smoothly when I have a plan!

The first thing that I did was to look at next year's calendar and mark out the weeks we would be gone and figure out how I wanted to break up the 36 weeks. I chose 36 weeks because TOG has 36 lessons and even though we technically school year-round, I do try to have a difference between the normal year and our summer work.

The next thing that I have done is to break all my curriculum up into 36 weeks. This I have listed on the chart below. This is the first year that I have done this with all the subjects, and so I know that there will be weeks that we don't get through everything, but I really like to keep moving on our TOG studies so that we can get through the whole curriculum by the time we go on vacation in June. It has worked this year, and knowing that I can't stop has been a great motivator to keep me pushing forward. I have been pleased with how much we did get done. We'll see how it goes with everything pre-scheduled! Whatever we can't finish will be finished in our summer weeks.

The final thing that I am working on is making up my notebooks. Last year I had wonderful sucess with my history notebooks that I am going to make monthly notebooks with the kids daily work. I have been tearing up workbooks and copying pages that we will need, but I think it will be so nice to have everything in one place next year.

The final step is to make my checklist. I don't like working from a strict schedule (meaning from 9-9:30 we do math, etc.) I much prefer having a list where I can make sure we completed everything I wanted to get done that week. I use this page (which I "stole" and modified from Jessica. On this page I write down everything I need to remember to accomplish.

Week 35-TOG

History: The focus of this week was the Coliseum and the gladiators as we approach the end of the Roman empire.


Church History: We read about the catacombs and the persecution of the early church.


Literature:


Dictation: We finished up I Corinthians 13



Writing: We wrote about the Gladiators



Notebooking Pages: We drew a picture of the Coliseum and found pictures of the early Roman catacombs. (pictures coming later)

Week 34-TOG

This week the focus has been on Roman life at the end of the empire with an emphasis on the activities on the Colosseum. We are also talking about the early church.

History:

Literature:

Church History:

Dictation: We used the first half of 1 Corinthians 13 for our dictation this week.

Writing: This week we wrote about the gladiators and the activities at the Colosseum.

Memory: We are working on adding 1 Corinthians 13 to our memory list.

Notebooking: We colored a picture of the Colloseum, listed vocab words that have to do the early church, and found some pictures of the Roman catacombs. (pictures to come soon)

Week 33-TOG

This has been a crazy week. I have had three extras to homeschool this week (my neices and nephew) since my sil is packing boxes to move. It has been great to have them with us! We have also had dress rehearsals every night for Annsley's Beauty and the Beast. This has made for a full (but fun) week!

History: The focus this week was finishing up the daily life during Roman times. We focused on the five good emperors.

Literature:

Bible: This week the focus was on the early church and the book of Acts. We also started the Church history book.


Dictation: This week our dictation was famous Roman sayings.

Memory: We worked on memorizing the first 15 Romans emperorsWriting: The kids wrote about the erruption of Mt Vesuvius and the city of Pompeii.

Notebooking pages: (coming soon)

Projects: We painted murals like they did in the Roman times to put on the walls. (We didn't paint them directly on the walls, much to the kids' chagrine!)

And, of course.....we took a Roman bath. (Men and women separate)

Week 32-TOG

How is it that we are already to Week 32?!? It feels like I just started Tapestry of Grace, and now we are almost done with Year 1. This week the main focus was on the first five Roman emperors and daily life in the Roman Empire. We also looked at the death and resurrection of Jesus.

History:

Literature:

Dictation: We used the Be-attitudes as our dictation for this week

Memory: We added the Be-attitudes and the first five Roman emperors to the memory CD.

Writing: This week for our writing we wrote a paragraph about Nero and his terrible influence on Rome.

Evaluation: We did the Upper Grammar fill in the blank quiz to test some of the vocab we learned in this lesson.

Notebooking Pages: We did the lapbooks on the Resurrection and What the Cross Means to me.

Fine Arts:This week we are going to paint a mural (not really on the wall, I hope) in the Roman style.