We Don't Need No Education

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Vikings

TCOO: How the Vikings of Old Sought and Found New Lands

Viking Tales by Jennie Hall

Vikingapyssel This site isn't in English, but there are some neat things to check out.

BBC Primary History: Vikings

Viking ship coloring page from Crayola

Friday, October 16, 2009

Classical Music Composer Study for Second Grade

I explained how I have planned to do Composer Study in a previous post. Now I'll list the actual composers we're studying for second grade and link to the resources we're using.

1. Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (b. 1840)
(Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

2. Antonin Dvorak (b. 1841)
(Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

3. Edvard Grieg (b. 1843)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

4. Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (b. 1844)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)
    Rimsky Korsakov's Scheherazade: Learning About Symphonic Music

5. Claude Debussy (b. 1862)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

6. Zoltan Kodaly (b.1882)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

7. Sergei Prokofiev (b. 1891)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

8. George Gershwin (b. 1898)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

9. Aaron Copland (b. 1900)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

Classical Music Composer Study for First Grade

I explained how I have planned to do Composer Study in a previous post. Now I'll list the actual composers we're studying this year and link to the resources we're using.

We're trying to study them chronologically, but I've found it hard to decide exactly how to do that! I've gone mostly by date of birth, but some composers may be slightly out of order because I also tried to keep composers of certain eras together.

I'll update any missing links as soon as possible. We're all sick right now, so if I don't get around to it feel free to remind me!

(Podcasts to Download) Unfortunately this list won't take you directly to the composer, so you'll have to look through the whole list to find the composer that you want.

1. Antonio Vivaldi (b. 1678)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)
    ArtsAlive ~ Vivaldi Activities

2. George Frideric Handel (b. 1685)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

3. Johann Sebastian Bach (b. 1685)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

4. Franz Josef Haydn (b.1736)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

5. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (b. 1756)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)

6. Ludwig van Beethoven (b. 1770)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)
    ArtsAlive ~ Beethoven Activites

7. Franz Schubert (b. 1797)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)
    ArtsAlive ~ Schubert Activities

8. Johannes Brahms (b. 1833)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)
    Brahms in 1890s Vienna: Learning About Chamber Music

9. Modest Mussorgsky (b. 1839)
    (Activity Sheet - pdf) (Listen Online) (My YouTube Playlist)
    NY Philharmonic Kids ~ Orchestration Station

How To Design your Own Composer Study Using Classics For Kids

Classics For Kids is my absolute favorite resource for classical music composer study.

The Activity Sheets are full of great info about the composers, as well as activities.

Combine the Activity Sheets with the Podcasts (there are four podcasts for most of the composers), add a few YouTube videos, and you have a complete composer study!

How To Design your Own Composer Study Using Classics For Kids:
Step 1
~First decide which composers you will be studying for the year. (We will be studying 9 composers this year. There will be more to come on the composers we're studying in another post.)
~Print out the Activity Sheets for each composer selected.

Step 2
~Download all 4 Podcasts per composer.
~Create playlists in iTunes (or your favorite MP3 player software).
~Burn your playlist to a CD.

Step 3
~Visit YouTube and do a search for the composer.
~Select four to eight videos per composer. Try to select videos that contain the entire piece of music. (Note ~ When completing the weeks lessons; if you save more than four videos for a composer, watch two videos some weeks.)
~Add your selected pieces to your Favorites list.
~Create a Playlist for each composer and add the selected videos to it.

Step 4
Composer 1, Week 1
~Listen to the 1st Podcast about your selected composer at least once (more if your child enjoys it.)
~Watch/listen to the 1st YouTube video you saved to your composer Playlist.
~Complete the Activity Sheet to go along with your selected composer.

Composer 1, Week 2
~Listen to the 2nd Podcast about your selected composer at least once.
~Watch/listen to the 2nd YouTube video you saved to your composer Playlist.

Composer 1, Week 3
~Listen to the 3rd Podcast about your selected composer at least once.
~Watch/listen to the 3rd YouTube video you saved to your composer Playlist.

Composer 1, Week 4
~Listen to the 4th Podcast about your selected composer at least once.
~Watch/listen to the 4th YouTube video you saved to your composer Playlist.

Repeat for each composer.

The composers we will be studying for the early elementary years include:

Baroque Period
Antonio Vivaldi
George Frideric Handel
Johann Sebastian Bach

Classical Period
Franz Josef Haydn
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Ludwig van Beethoven

Romantic Period
Gioachino Rossini
Frederic Chopin
Johannes Brahms
Modest Mussorgsky
Piotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Antonin Dvorak
Edvard Grieg
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov

Modern Period
Scott Joplin
Sergei Prokofiev
George Gershwin
Aaron Copland

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Free Audio Books List

LibriVox is the best resource that I have ever seen for free audio books. The following is a list of some of our favorites, or ones we have on our "to-listen-to" list.

Science
LibriVox » The Insect Folk by Margaret Warner Morley We're really enjoying this audio book!
LibriVox » The Stories Mother Nature Told Her Children by Jane Andrews

History
Peeps at Many Lands: Ancient Egypt by James Baikie
LibriVox » The Iliad for Boys and Girls by Alfred J. Church
LibriVox » Famous Men of Greece, by John H Haaren and AB Poland
LibriVox » Famous Men of Rome by John H. Haaren and A. B. Poland
LibriVox » Famous Men of the Middle Ages by John H. Haaren and A. B. Poland
LibriVox » Famous Men of Modern Times, by John H. Haaren and A.B. Poland
LibriVox » Men of Iron by Howard Pyle historical fiction about knights
LibriVox » Otto of the Silver Hand by Howard Pyle a story about medieval times
LibriVox » Our Island Story, Part 1, by H.E. Marshall
LibriVox » Our Island Story, Part 2, by H.E. Marshall

LibriVox » The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett
LibriVox » The Reluctant Dragon, by Kenneth Grahame
LibriVox » Hans Brinker or The Silver Skates by Mary Mapes Dodge
LibriVox Aesop’s Fables
LibriVox » Fifty Famous Stories Retold by James Baldwin
LibriVox » The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood, by Howard Pyle
LibriVox » Robinson Crusoe Written Anew for Children by James Baldwin
LibriVox » Great Big Treasury of Beatrix Potter
LibriVox » The Blue Fairy Book by Andrew Lang
LibriVox Anne of Green Gables
LibriVox » Little Wizard Stories of Oz, by L. Frank Baum
LibriVox » The Emerald City of Oz by L. Frank Baum
LibriVox » The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus by L. Frank Baum
LibriVox » The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
LibriVox » The Colors of Space by Marion Zimmer Bradley
LibriVox Edith Nesbit stories
LibriVox » Tales from Shakespeare by Charles and Mary Lamb
LibriVox » Through the Looking-Glass, by Lewis Carroll
LibriVox » Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie
LibriVox » Princess and the Goblin, The by George Macdonald

A list of the audio books we have listened to for Kindergarten/First grade year.
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare by Edith Nesbit

I just downloaded the MP3 of Beautiful Stories from Shakespeare by Edith Nesbit from LibriVox. I adore the My Audio School website where I originally found the LibriVox download link; there are some beautiful illustrations on the site.

I've had A Midsummer Night's Dream scheduled to be read for two weeks and haven't managed to squeeze it in yet. I finally decided an audio book to listen to in the car might be the way to go or we may never end up getting to it!

The track list:
00 - Preface and A Brief Life of Shakespeare
01 - A Midsummer Night's Dream
02 - The Tempest
03 - As You Like It
04 - Winter's Tale
05 - King Lear
06 - Twelfth Night
07 - Much Ado About Nothing
08 - Romeo and Juliet
09 – Pericles
10 – Hamlet
11 – Cymbeline
12 – Macbeth
13 - The Comedy of Errors
14 - The Merchant of Venice
15 - Timon of Athens
16 – Othello
17 - The Taming of the Shrew
18 - Measure for Measure
19 - Two Gentlemen of Verona
20 - All's Well That Ends Well

Unfortunately, I couldn't fit the last track (All's Well That Ends Well) onto my 4th disc, and didn't want to burn a CD for just the one track. We'll have to remember to listen to that one sometime when we're near the computer.

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Japan

Kids Geo Asia Map Match Game
Japan tourism video on YouTube
Samurai on YouTube
Sumo on YouTube
Origami
Your Name in Japanese
Kokeshi Dolls
Japan Seen Through American Eyes (for 6 to 10 year old children)
Time for Kids: Japan
Zen Gardens

Nik's Zen Garden

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Biomes

I don't think I've mentioned the science program we decided to use this year. We chose it because it was free. We figured first grade life science was a pretty easy subject to cover without a curriculum, so we didn't want to pay a fortune. We're using Scott McQuery's Classic Science: Elementary Life Science and we're enjoying it so much that we're pretty sure we'll fork over the $50 for the next book.

The unit that we're about to begin covers the biomes of the world. I found some nice notebooking pages for biomes at the Yahoo Group Notebooking2Learn.

Exploring Nature has some nice illustrations of the biomes of the world that I'm thinking of printing onto cardstock. Plus a pdf file habitats of the world activity.

More later.

Friday, October 2, 2009

Explorers of the World

This blog has some nice resources for a study of the explorers of the world. I particularly love the Explorers Cards!

Imagine of Leif Erickson for timeline
Image of Christopher Columbus for timeline
Image of Hernán Cortés for timeline
Image of Francisco Vaquez de Coronado for timeline
Image of Ponce de Leon for timeline
Image of Hernando de Soto for timeline
Conquistador coloring page

Teacher Oz has a nice list of links for Exploration and Discovery.

The Mariners' Museum also has some nice resources on Exploration Through the Ages.

We hear so much about European explorers, but what about explorers from other parts of the world? Chinese mariner Zheng He (Cheng Ho)

American Journeys is full of eyewitness accounts of exploration in North America for the older student.

Social Studies for Kids has lots of good info about a dozen or more explorers.

Thirteen Colonies

I came across a nice resource for the thirteen colonies that will be useful to us in the future. This is a set of downloads for printable wheels that would be great for a lapbook.

Thirteen Colonies Wheels

Ancient Egypt

It's nearly time for us to study Ancient Egypt. I'm gathering resources to use right now. The problem isn't finding activities, it's limiting them because I've found sooooooo much!

PASS World History Part 1 - Early Civilizations in Ancient Egypt Part A Part B free pdf text

My newest find came this afternoon in a Playmobil newsletter. Did you know that Playmobil now has an online game called The Nile Game? They also have a little movie titled The Magic Key. Scroll around the screen to find the links to them, for some reason I cannot link directly to them. The Nile Game is on the ship and The Magic Key is in the pyramid. There are other things like an Activity Sheet, which appears to be a printable coloring page, and a Quiz! My boys are going to be so excited!

We'll also be using Minnesota State University's Ancient Egyptian Culture page along with library books and books we already own.

ThinkQuest Ancient Egypt is not to be missed! ThinkQuest is an amazing resource!

Video Resources
~The are some History of Egypt videos on YouTube that we will be utilizing.
~And maybe the BBC documentary Pyramids - How They Were Built (also at YouTube.)
~And the National Geographic Tools For Adventure: Explore A Pyramid activity
~We will definitely use the Horrible Histories video (another YouTube one) called The Mummy Song. My kids love the Horrible Histories!

Lapbook/Notebook Resources
~Homeschool Share Ancient Egypt Unit Study and Lapbook

Coloring Pages
~Kids-n-Fun Ancient Egypt coloring pages

I'll update with more links as I find them.

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Geography

I have geography on the brain today. I've found some really great resources in the last few weeks and I have to share them.

The first resource is a set of pdf files titled Growing Up Around the World. Each file has a list of books depicting life in various countries around the world. Every continent is covered with the exception of Antarctica (for obvious reasons...LOL.) The US isn't covered, either, as the list is intended to give American children an accurate picture of what life is like for children in other countries around the world.

The second resource is National Geographic Maps. Lots of neat things there.

Third is one that is a big favorite with my son.....the Kidsgeo.com Map Match online game.

Oops, I have to run! I'll be back to add more later.

Sparkle Box - Free Printables

Ok, I have had a very successful hour of internet searching today! First I came upon Sparkle Box, an awesome free printables site from the UK. One of the printables was for story masks for the Hindu story of Rama and Sita. We're studying Asia in geography right now, so these will be perfect! That led me to search for the story online, which I finally found at another awesome site, Balagokulam, a Hindu website with activities and resources for children and teachers. I copied and pasted the story into a MSWord document and uploaded it to my Sony Reader. I'll add in the other stories I already checked out from the library and some map work and we're all set for our geography lesson for next week!

We Don't Need No Education

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Math Links

Geography Links

China

World History Links

Thanksgiving

American History Links

Dinosaurs