Tuesday, March 22, 2011

Our Week in Review - Classical Greece, part 2

Before I tell you about our history studies, I just have to share this picture from Little Man's Bible Journal..... it has a story behind it, which I find hilarious!

We are reading through Psalms and Proverbs right now, reading the chapter from each book that corresponds to each day's date. So on March 16 we read Psalm 16 and Proverbs 16. The Proverbs are so interesting to read with the children.... each verse can be its own picture and I never know what they will choose to illustrate in their Bible journals. It is pretty amazing to look through them after class and see how they have chosen to illustrate some small gem of wisdom.

Little Man, of his own accord, chose to illustrate Proverbs 16:31, which reads, "Gray hair is a crown of splendor; it is attained by a righteous life." When he showed me this picture afterward, he said, "this is you, mommy. Your gray hair is like a crown. I think when your dye grows out this time, you should leave your hair gray and wear it like this." Hahaha! In addition to my lovely hair, I got a kick out of my pointy b**bs! I love that Little Man so much. He makes me smile.


We spent last week continuing our study of the classical period of Ancient Greece. We learned about some of the Greeks who made significant discoveries or advances in math, science, and philosophy. Fortunately for anyone with young children studying famous dead Greeks, there is a whole series of books about Greek mathematicians, scientisits, and astronomers, that are well written and very fun to read. A couple of our favorites last week were this book about Pythagoras, who developed several math formulas still in use today:


...and this one about Erasthosthenes (AIR-a-TOS-the-neez) who figured out a way to measure the circumference of the earth. Later it was realized that he came to within 200 miles of the actual distance around! Not bad!


We worked in our history notebooks last week, catching up on some explanation of architecture...



...and writing down some interesting facts we learned about other aspects of Greek life. We LOVE the lapbooks that Tapestry of Grace sells ~ what a great way for the boys to narrate back to me (and/or write down) what they have internalized from our reading!



In other news, our third grader, C, learned the difference between linear measure and the area of a square or rectangle! I guess this was appropriate since we learned about Greek mathematicians all week. At first it was hard for him to visualize, so I got the brainstorm to show him the difference between a ruler and a lego building board. That did it. He got it!


It was a great week of learning, and we are almost done with the Greeks! Very soon we will have our unit celebration and be on to the Romans!

2 comments:

Teacher/Mom said...

That is a keeper - both the picture and the boy! He made you look like a warrior princess! Or perhaps Hagar the Horrible's wife. What a hoot!

Pam said...

Teacher/Mom: yes, a warrior princess is what came to my mind also! Which really isn't all that bad of a thing maybe....