Samuel Clemens Who?

Trivia question: Who was Samuel Langhorne Clemens? Hint he is one of the greatest American writers of all time. . . He is well known for his quips and quotes like:

“A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining,

but wants it back the minute it begins to rain.”

If you haven’t figured it out it is our dear Mark Twain.

Isn’t that ironic – Harriet Beecher Stowe and then Mark Twain. Here in Hartford, they were neighbors. The Mark Twain house is one of the most beautiful houses of the time. To take a tour of the house online at http://www.marktwainhouse.org/thehouse/floormap.shtml .

Mark Twain authored more than 30 books, many of which are required reading in schools today. Several which have been made into Broadway plays.

Sadly, this year has brought many financial hardships and the Twain house was almost closed. If you are interested in ensuring that this historical building survives for generations, consider donating to the Mark Twain House & Museum.

Here are some lesson ideas.

Field Trips:
Mark Twain House in Hartford, CT
Mark Twain Boyhood Home & Museum in Hannibal, MO

Harriet Beecher Stowe

Today’s quote is by one of the great authors of my home state of Connecticut, Harriet Beecher Stowe. One of her homes is right here in Hartford.

I did not really know much about Harriet until I attended a fund raiser tea by a local library. At the tea, the curator spoke of woman who I would have loved to have met: a writer, an abolitionist, a feminist. She shared a few pieces of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, one of Stowe’s most memorable writings. As I sat and listened, I pledged that I was going to read this classic. I believe that we may have read excerpts in high school, but never the whole novel. That summer as we traveled to Kentucky, I read Uncle Tom’s Cabin as I had promised. As Eliza escaped across the broken ice of the Ohio, so I drove across it. It was truly surreal.

Later that year, I dragged the kids to the Harriet Beecher Stowe Museum. I was absolutely in awe of this woman. She would have been a force of nature in any era, but in her lifetime, her feats are even more amazing. I encourage you all to get to know her a little better. Here are a great way to do that:

Visit one of her homes:
http://www.harrietbeecherstowecenter.org/index_home.shtml
http://ohsweb.ohiohistory.org/places/sw18/index.shtml

Read about her:
http://www.sparknotes.com/biography/stowe/

Read her works:
http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/authors/s#a115

Frank Llyod Wright Designs

"Give me the luxuries of life and I will willingly do without the necessities."
-Frank Lloyd Wright

Ok, you have to check this website out . You can actually learn and design like one of the greatest architects of our time Frank Lloyd Wright. Wright is a great person to study as he was also a homeschooler. His unique view of the world revolutionized the way houses and their surrounding landscapes interacted.

Here are some other websites with background about Frank Lloyd Wright:

http://www.pbs.org/flw/buildings/

http://www.delmars.com/wright/index.html

http://www.planetclaire.org/fllw/timeline.html

If the kids really get into it and you would like more information about architecture for your children, check out some of the links on http://www.loggia.com/designarts/architecture/kids.html .

Once in a Blue Moon - A Homeschool Conversation

A typical homeschool conversation:

As we opened Christmas cards, the kids asked who one of the senders was. I explained that it was a parent of a old Girl Scout whom I hadn’t seen in many moons.

“Many moons. Why do people say that?” DS asked.

“It just means I haven’t seen her in a while,” I responded thinking that would suffice.

“Wouldn’t many moons just mean a couple of days?” He continued.

“No, they mean full moons, so they mean months.” Of course, then I had to add, “except for those blue moons.”

“Blue Moons. What is a blue moon?”

“The second blue moon in a month.”

DD piped in, “How often does that happen?”

“Daddy?” I had used up my knowledge of the moon cycles. He plugged “Blue Moon” into his laptop and came up with www.obliquity.com/astro/bluemoon.html“The average interval between Full Moons is about 29.5 days, whilst the length of an average month is roughly 30.5 days. This makes it very unlikely that any given month will contain two Full Moons, though it does sometimes happen.
On average, there will be 41 months that have two Full Moons in every century, so you could say that once in a Blue Moon actually means once every two-and-a-half years.” He read from the website.

Then we digressed into when the next blue moon was, why they are called blue, and other great astrological facts.

Then dear son brought us back down to his crazy thoughts, “Well, when will four blue moons happen in the same month?”

I thought for sure he had missed the whole concept of what we were just saying. I started waxing on about 29.5 days in a cycle, you would need more than 30 days in a month . . .DD added that we’d need more than one moon and have to be like on Jupiter. But no DS, explained God could cause a miracle and align the moon cycles to his desire. Ok, who can argue with that? I just rolled my eyes. . . “I guess you’re right!”

Now for those states that require reporting - where do you put such conversations? Should homeschoolers try to write all of their digressions down? This was not on our science plan for the day, but certainly is a valid lesson.

Today in History

As homeschoolers, we are always looking for ways to ignite curiosity. One of the ways to do that is just keep lighting the fire in as many different directions as possible and see what areas take light. As interesting way to do that is by starting your day with "Today in History" type ideas or math problems of the day, or some of these interesting daily tidbits.




You may also want to add some of these websites which can give you great jumping off points for daily learing:

Today in History - Library of Congress
Today in History - Yahoo
Today in History - the History Channel - they also have a way to subscribe to a daily newsletter of this day in history
Today in History - History Net

Not only may your kids find this interesting, but you may learn something yourself.

I never teach my pupils; I only attempt to provide the conditions in which they can learn.
-Albert Einstein

TeacherTube.com

Did you know about this? It is just like YouTube.com but with an educational bent.

In one of the lectures I sat in on last night and today, the speaker was talking about the integration of technology and education. Mind you for a homeschooler, the usage is a little different, but it certianly can impact our teaching / learning too. For example, check out the following video:



Show it to your children and then have them pick one of the items in the song to do a research on and write a quick summary.

I am looking forward to really crawling around this site to see what else they have to offer.

Website Wednesday - Newton's Laws of Physics

Newton’s Laws of Physics – Today’s subject is as much for me as it is for you. I just scored DD’s Science test and we need to understand this subject matter better. So I’m hoping a little web work will help.

http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/airplane/newton.html - This NASA site has an explanation of the laws as well as grade appropriate activities.

http://www.glenbrook.k12.il.us/gbssci/phys/Class/newtlaws/u2l1a.html - This in depth site will help mom and child understand the concepts.

http://www.physics4kids.com/files/motion_laws.html - When you think you understand the concepts, read and review this site, and then take the quiz.

Here’s a rather inventive description of the laws:

Website Wednesday - Homeschool resources

My favorite Christmas gift magazine came in the mail today. It is packed with terrific ideas for “educational” toys. I have ordered from Museum Tour several times and have always been satisfied with their service and the products that I received. They also have some neat educational activities on their site like: detarnishing old pennies, making your own ice cream, and creating balloon cars.

Another great website for easy, fun activities is activities is PBS’ Zoom. My friend, Jenn, and I actually used many of these activities to create a science co-op.

My favorite homeschooling magazine is Home Education magazine. Yes, I’m slightly biased since they have published my writing, but I have adored their magazine prior to ever writing for them. If you hurry you can take advantage of their current special $20.00 for 6 issues instead of the regular $32.

We use portions of the Alpha Omega curriculum. It has worked well as the core of our homeschool lessons. I don’t hesitate to add to the base Alpha Omega subjects and occasionally I may slightly alter something that they have included. Basically though, Alpha Omega forms the support post which all else is hung. Particularly, we use their Alpha Omega, from Christian Book Distributors, or from Amazon.

Website Wednesday - The Alamo

http://www.thealamo.org/main.html - The official website of the Alamo

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/alamo/index.html - The PBS site laying out the film and related historical information. Includes teacher lesson plans, maps, and timelines.

http://www.shsu.edu/~smm_www/index.html - Includes recipes, info on Texan Flags, and pictures from the time period.

http://www.geocities.com/the_tarins@sbcglobal.net/adp/archives/archives.html An extensive history of the mission itself. Include maps, lesson ideas, and lots of detailed history.

http://military.discovery.com/video/alamo.html Video Clips about the Alamo and some of the more famous men lost there.

Look for a Unit Study related to the Alamo on Thursday.

Website Wednesday - Eric Carle

www.eric-carle.com
The Eric Carle Official Website. There are wonderful videos of how he creates his work, incredible teaching ideas of how to use his work, and other interesting tid-bits.

www.picturebookart.org
The Eric Carle Museum website. It is located in Amherst, MA if you are interested in visiting personally.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/EricCarlePhotoProducts.jsp
Create cards, invitations, and books using a combination of your photos and Eric Carle’s artwork.

http://www.readingrockets.org/books/interviews/carle
Includes short video interviews with Eric Carle.

http://www.npr.org/programs/watc/features/2007/jul/ericcarle_slideshow/index.html
A video interview with Eric Carle.

http://www.readwritethink.org/calendar/calendar_day.asp?id=549
Some unique ideas of how to work with Eric Carle’s work. Even an online collage making website ( which can be reached directly using http://www.nga.gov/kids/zone/collagemachine2.htm )

Website Wednesday - Eleanor Roosevelt

Eleanor Roosevelt is an amazing women. I became interested in her as I worked on the Dear American Unit Study that I posted last week, so I have decided to investigate her a little more.

"One thing life has taught me: if you are interested, you never have to look for new interests. They come to you. When you are genuinely interested in one thing, it will always lead to something else."
Eleanor Roosevelt


I hope that you may find these web sites interesting:


An American Experience: Eleanor Roosevelt – DVD and the related website http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/eleanor/
The website includes a Roosevelt genealogy, copies of her “My Day” article, timelines, maps, and even a tv appearance by Eleanor. It also include transcripts from her FBI file and information on clothing of the time period.

The Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum - http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/
It is wonderful to visit this location first hand, but if you cannot get to Hyde Park or in conjunction with your trip, visit this website. There is information about both Franklin and Eleanor, curriculum guides, and tons of additional information.

Eleanor Roosevelt Center at Val-Kil - http://ervk.org/index.htm
Includes some unknown fact, audio recordings of Eleanor, and information about a workshop that is continued in her name

Biography of Eleanor Roosevelt - http://www.biography.com/search/biography.do?keywords=Betcha+Didn
Specifically check out the videos & Audios to the right upper corner. There are several Bio’s related to her life.

The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers Project - http://www.gwu.edu/~erpapers/

National Park Service – Eleanor Roosevelt: American Visionary - http://www.nps.gov/history/museum/exhibits/elro/index.html

Garden of Praise – Eleanor Roosevelt - http://gardenofpraise.com/ibderoos.htm Check out especially the middle of the page where there are some online games that you can play.

Internet Resources

I want to let you know about a website, Homeschool Helper, that I found that has some great homeschool rescources. It seems that they are building the site and some of you may have resources that they could add to it. They have unit studies, worksheets, and record keeping forms.

Of course it does not have as many entiries as Enchanted Learning, but on the otherhand, it is free. When the kids were younger though, the $20 that Enchanted Learning charged was well worth all that I received from the site. It actually probably saved me money in fact, because I did not buy whole books for things that I only needed one or two pages of. Better than that, Enchanted Learning offered me meat in my hands when I was hungry i.e. when a question or thought came to mind, I had information and activities in my hand within minutes. I did not have to wait for the next time we went to the library or the store.

I often wonder how I would have survived before the internet.

Website Wednesday - The Titanic

Today, DD and I went to see the Titanic exhibit at the XL center, so I will make our first edition of Website Wednesday be about the Titanic:

http://www.titanic-online.com/
RMS Titanic, Inc - Has the schedule for the exhibit that we went to see and other information about the exhibition pieces and conservation process. Unfortunately, you have to register to activate some of the content. Although we did enjoy the exhibit, I felt that it was overpriced (even with a coupon that the nice lady in front of us gave to us) and had expected it to be more hands on, based on the description that I had read.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/previous_seasons/case_titanic/index.html
PBS – Secrets of the Dead – This website looks at the sinking from a completely different perspective. It explores the identification process of the over 300 bodies that were recovered after the sinking. After reading the article, be sure to visit the interactive which allows you to try to forensically identify one of the passengers.

http://www.sfmuseum.org/hist5/dodge.html
Virtual Museum of the City of San Francisco - A great series of articles from the time of the Titanic’s sinking.

http://www.geocities.com/RainForest/Vines/8059/main.htm
Brett’s RMS Titanic Web Page - Not the most technologically advanced website, but full of information, statistics, and pictures.

http://www.history.com/minisite.do?content_type=mini_home&mini_id=1067
Titanic – History.com - Site includes video interviews with survivors, survey the site of the sunken ship, read primary source paperwork from the Titanic, find biographies of some of the passengers, and explore interactive about the making, passage, and sinking of the “unsinkable” Titanic”.

http://www.immersionpresents.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogsection&id=4&Itemid=11
Immersion Presents - Titanic Live - This site is too cool for words – let your child read interviews with Dr. Ballard, scour through pictures and interviews, AND MAKE THEIR OWN TITANIC MOVIE!

Here are some websites that have unit study ideas for the Titanic:

* http://www.homeschoolhelperonline.com/units/titanic.htm
* http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/SmallWorld/69044/
* http://www.rmstitanic.net/index.php4?page=422 - not quite a unit study but some great “classroom” ideas
* http://content.scholastic.com/browse/unitplan.jsp?id=89


DD recommends the following book about the Titanic: