I have figured out the Homeschool Tracker program I bought this week and am pleased with it so far. My task this week has been to develop Noah's last 12-week term of 8th grade, which starts next week. We have always followed the Ambleside Curriculum, but I've had to pause and refigure some things for a couple reasons: We're a little out of sync with the schedule, Noah is complaining of the heavy reading load, and with our planned trip to DC and Virginia this fall I want to make sure we cover American history.
So, here is what we're planning to use this term:
Bible: Christianity 101
Art: The Story of Painting from Cave Painting to Modern Times
Health: Passion and Purity,: Learning to Bring Your Love Life Under Christs Control
Literature: The Alhambra - Washington Irving
Literature on audiobook: Westward Ho, Charles Kingsley; David Copperfield, Charles Dickens; The Innocence of Father Brown, G.K. Chesterton; Northanger Abbey, Jane Austen; The Lost Prince, Frances Hodgson Burnett
Shakespeare play: Loves Labours Lost (7 weeks reading Spark Notes and listening to audio from library and 5 weeks watching one act a week from Netflix video.)
Grammar: Daily Grammar free lessons delivered to your inbox each day
Writing: Paradigm Online Writing Assistant (free online or order the book from the site) and written narrations (goal of 2-3 a week)
Spelling: Spelling Power (our first try at a spelling curriculum, so we'll see how it goes)
Logic: How to Read a Book (A Touchstone Book)
English from the Roots Up
Math we'll continue with Math-U-See Pre-Algebra. I'm considering the Joy of Mathematics course on sale now at The Great Courses.
Science we'll continue Apologia General Science
History: A History of the American People
To Have and to Hold
Government: Are You Liberal? Conservative? Or Confused? (An Uncle Eric Book)
Citizenship: Ourselves by Charlotte Mason, translated into Modern English here
Geography: Exploring Planet Earth (Sense of Wonder Series) ("Sense of Wonder" Series)
Biography: Founding Father: Rediscovering George Washington
Current Events: Top Story from God's World News This has always been one of Noah's favorite resources. Next year I'll have him read the news from Student News Daily.
The boys love to watch movies, so I let them indulge in this by renting many historical and biographical movies from Netflix. You can see my Netflix queu here. I'm even considering allowing Noah to watch the Jane Austen movies instead of read the books. *Gasp* It has become clear that he is tired of reading, and that our taste in books is vastly different! So, I'm trying to compromise as much as possible, while maintaining at least a familiarity with many of the classics. We watched Moby Dick recently. It was a good movie, though not adequate coverage of the book. However, I remember having to read Moby Dick in high school (the only book I was required to read other than 1984), and hating it terribly. I just couldn't make Noah read it!
Hope this has been helpful.
1 comment:
I'm sure you've already seen a lot of the Jane Austen movies, but the 5-hour version of Pride and Prejudice by A&E is SO faithful to book, that it would definitely be adequate coverage. Keira Knightly's version is OK, but the A&E version is much more thorough.
Sense and Sensibility (with Hugh Grant) was really good, although some of the details in the ending are different in the movie than the book. In fact, I actually preferred the changes that Emma Thompson made to the story (that sounds disrespectful to Jane Austen, but if she saw the move adaptation of S&S, I think she'd probably agree with me that it's better.)
I've seen one version of Northanger Abbey on video and it was horrible! It didn't follow the book, and I felt like I was watching some 80's B-movie the entire time.
Good luck with Jane!
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