2011-2012 Ambleside Selections

Ambleside Selections 2011-2012

Read Aloud Hopefuls:

Roll of Thunder Hear my Cry

Chopin By Opal Wheeler

In Search of the Source

Miracles of Maple Hill

Cheaper by the Dozen

Amos Fortune, Free Man

Little Britches

The Story of Albrecht Durer by Joyce McPherson

George Washington’s World

Freckles

Term 1:August-November

See Ambleside Online for original selections 


I am using Spotify this year to make up my music lists

Music/composer:

Frederic Chopin (1840) (Romantic)
Listening selections for this term:
    Op 09 no 2 Nocturne in E flat maj
    Op 10 no 3 Etude in E-maj
    Op 10 no 12 Revolutionary Etude in C minor
    Op 21 Piano Concerto number 2 in f minor
    Op 28 Preludes no's 15, 20 and either 16 or 17
    Op 53 Polonaise in A flat, Heroic

Artist:

Albrecht Durer (1471-1528) Italian Renaissance

   1. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, 1498, woodcut.
   2. Self-Portrait in a Fur Coat, 1500, lime panel, Pinakothek, Munich
   3. A Young Hare, 1502. Watercolour and gouache on paper. Vienna, Austria
   4. Altarpiece of the Rose Garlands, or here, 1506, oil on panel, Národní Galerie, Prague
   5. Praying Hands, 1508, brush and ink, Vienna
   6. The Knight, Death, and The Devil, or here, 1513-14, engraving

Shakespeare: Richard III

Plutarch: Lycurgus

Term 2: January-March

Music/ Composer:

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (early classical)
Listening selections for this term:
    Eine Kleine Nacht Musik
    Requiem [A Vocal work]
    Symphony no. 41 in C major (Jupiter)
    Sinfonia Concertante
    Piano Concerto no. 21 in C major (K.467) 

Artist:

Caravaggio (1571-1610) Italian Baroque

   1. Rest During the Flight into Egypt, or here, c.1595, Rome
   2. The Sacrifice of Isaac, 1598-1599. Oil on canvas. Princeton, NJ
   3. The Calling of St. Matthew, or here, 1599-1600 San Luigi dei Francesi, Rome
   4. The Conversion on the Way to Damascus, or here, 1600-1601 Rome
   5. Supper in Emmaus, or here, 1606. Oil on canvas, Milan
   6. The Adoration of the Shepherds, 1608-1609. Oil on canvas. Messina, Italy

Shakespeare: Much Ado About Nothing

Plutarch: Numas

Term 3:April-June

Music/Composer:

Felix Mendelssohn (1840) (Romantic)
Listening selections for this term:
    Songs without words
    Violin Concerto in E minor
    Symphony no. 4 in A major (Italian) (4 weeks)
    Octet in E-flat major
    Fingal's Cave ("Hebrides") Overture

Artist:

Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) Romantic self-portrait

   1. Liberty Leading the People, 1830, oil on canvas, Paris
      or, this more modest option, The Entry of the Crusaders into Constantinople, 1840, oil on canvas, Paris
   2. Portrait of Frederic Chopin, 1838, oil on canvas, Paris
   3. Hamlet and Horatio in the Graveyard, 1839. Oil on canvas. Louvre, Paris ("Alas, poor Yorick!")
   4. The Sultan of Morocco and his Entourage, 1845, oil on canvas, Toulouse
   5. Arab Horses Fighting in a Stable, 1860, oil on canvas, Paris
   6. The Lion Hunt, 1861. Oil on canvas. The Art Institute of Chicago

Shakespeare: The Merchant of Venice

Plutarch: Caesar

Morning Time September 2011

Artist: Durer

We have been reading Joyce McPherson's excellent children's biography of Durer, Artist of the Reformation.

This week, Alex and Andrew each picked out 5 Durer works for their notebooks.

Here is one of Alex's picks:

Here is one of Andrew's pics:

I printed them from the Internet.

Composer: Chopin

As soon as we finish the Durer book we will begin Opal Wheeler's childhood biography of Chopin. In the meantime we just have a Chopin play list on Spotify.

Shakespeare:  I have canceled, maybe, Richard III and we are trying to decide which play to do next. 

Plutarch: Lycurgus  This is turning out to be a relevant and interesting 'Life.' Lycurgus was called the Lawgiver of Sparta but it sounds like he was basically a Marxist or maybe I should say the Marx was a Lycurgusist. Much food for thought. I will not claim that the children love Plutarch, but it is really not something I would ever want to skip. We just read small sections at a time since the ideas are dense and we stop and discuss vocabulary frequently.

Mother Tongue II: The children are all doing separate grammar programs this year but I am continuing our oral working through this book. Some of you may have noticed that it is going on 3 years. Little drops of grammar make the mighty man. The reason this approach is valuable is something that I have just stumbled upon and has greatly encouraged me as a teacher. Between small amounts (Remember Charlotte Mason's short lessons?) of written grammar daily, Latin, oral discussion and written narrations corrected, each only a tiny bit at a time, a symbiosis is created which increases retention far beyond the use of any one method or workbook or text.

Bible: Right now we are reading with discussion through the Epistles. This is a departure from our usual readings of Proverbs but it is going very well. 

Review this week: The 12 Tribes of Israel, Psalm 100, Phil 4:4-8, Psalm 104

Poetry: Just finished, finally, Sea Fever, a poem I highly recommend. Not sure what we are doing next. I want to concentrate on the Preamble to the Constitution for a while.  We also are continuing to read through the poems in 101 Famous Poems. We read and discussed Hamlet's Soliloquy today.

Review this week: The Destruction of Sennacharib, A Little Brother Follows Me, Breathes by Walter Scott, King Alfred's War Song, Recessional by Rudyard Kipling.

Misc:Continuing through the Civics Question of the Day. There are all sorts of wonderful, easy to use Civics resources on the naturalization site. Today we discussed question 64: What special group advises the President?  Answer: The Cabinet. I also moved on to questions 65 and asked, "Which President is called the 'Father of our Country'?"  Alex, in spite of the fact that we are reading George Washington's World, said tentatively, "George W Bush?" and then quickly seeing my face, "God?" 

Review: Preamble(Daily), Amendments 1-5 this week.

Reading Aloud:

George Washington's World by Genevieve Foster

The above mentions bio of Durer.

And we are finishing from last year and really loving, The Marsh King by Walter Hodges, a story of King Alfred, a book I highly recommend for boys. It is a bit slow going at first but it gets better.

We were working on our 13th school day of the year and we have completed 11 Morning Times. Yesterday we didn't even get started until 12:00 because of various interruptions.

Morning Time: January 2011

There is something gloriously wonderful about getting back on schedule after a long break. Our first week after the break we did not do MT. To be truthful the holidays are anything but a break for me. I love them but when the steady stream of company leaves I am exhausted. I need a real break but January is not the time. January is the time for making time. So we take one week to just get up and get our lists done and then we add in MT the next week.

In making out this sheet I got pretty excited. New composer: Vivaldi. I love Vivaldi. I mean I LOVE Vivaldi. New artist: Durer. I was tempted to stay on Monet but hey, I like Durer a lot and he is an artist the boys can appreciate:

New Plutarch: Romulus It has been a while. A long while.
Shakespeare: Hamlet. Hamlet is important and the children are beginning to be familiar with the play. There are lots of options to watch it from Mel Gibson to David Tennant

Bible: Continue working on I Peter 5:5-11
Read 1 Proverb daily and discuss
Shorter Catechism Question of the Day

Review:
Books of the OT
Books of the NT
Romans 6
Psalm 15
I Corinthians 13

Hymns:
Review
The Star-Spangled Banner
These Things are True of You
To God be the Glory
Trust and Obey
Unbounded Grace

Poetry:
Sea Fever by John Masefield
I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

By John Masefield (1878-1967).
(English Poet Laureate, 1930-1967.)

Review:
Keep a Goin'
Be Strong
Trees
How Did You Die?

Opportunity by Edward Sill
(Which I must share in full every time I mention it since it is superb.)

HIS I beheld, or dreamed it in a dream:--
There spread a cloud of dust along a plain;
And underneath the cloud, or in it, raged
A furious battle, and men yelled, and swords
Shocked upon swords and shields. A prince's banner
Wavered, then staggered backward, hemmed by foes.
A craven hung along the battle's edge,
And thought, "Had I a sword of keener steel--
That blue blade that the king's son bears, -- but this
Blunt thing--!" he snapped and flung it from his hand,
And lowering crept away and left the field.
Then came the king's son, wounded, sore bestead,
And weaponless, and saw the broken sword,
Hilt-buried in the dry and trodden sand,
And ran and snatched it, and with battle shout
Lifted afresh he hewed his enemy down,
And saved a great cause that heroic day.

Misc. Memory:
Civics Question of the Day

Review:
Presidents Bee
Bill of Rights 6-9

Read Alouds:
America Moves Forward
Johnny Tremain


The Marsh King by Walter Hodges

Ambleside Selections for 2010-2011

Ambleside Selection 2010-2011

TERM 1 (August- October)

Music/Composer:

 Ludwig von Beethoven (1810) (Classical/Romantic)
    Listening selections for this term:
    Piano Sonata 8 (Pathetique) Opus 13
    Piano Sonata 14 (Moonlight) Op 27
    Symphony No. 3 (Erocia-meaning 'heroic') Opus 55
    String Quartets opus 59, no.1-3 (Razumovsky Quartets)
    Piano Concerto 5 (Emporer) Op 73
    Symphony No. 9 (the one with Ode to Joy at the end) Opus 125

Artist:

Claude Monet (1840-1926) French Impressionist (Biography or here)
   1. Terrace at St. Adresse, 1866, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
   2. Women in the Garden, 1866, Musee d'Orsay, Paris
   3. Jean Monet on His Hobby Horse, 1872, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
   4. Woman with a Parasol: Madame Monet and Her Son, 1875, National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. (see slso here)
   5. Tulip Fields in Holland, 1886, Musee d'Orsay, Paris
   6. The Waterlily Pond, 1899, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey (more here)

Shakespeare: Finish Coriolanus.

Plutarch: Finish Coriolanus

TERM 2 (November-February)

Music/Composer:

Antonio Vivaldi (1730) (Baroque)
Listening selections for this term:
    Gloria (choral work);
    The Four Seasons;
    Trio Sonata in C major, RV.82;
    plus 3 concerti - Maybe one for violin, one for guitar and
    one for a woodwind instrument such as oboe or bassoon.

Artist:

Albrecht Durer (1471-1528)

Shakespeare: The Tempest

Plutarch: Cato the Censor

TERM 3 (March-May)

Music/Composer:

Frederic Chopin (1840) (Romantic)
Listening selections for this term:
    Op 09 no 2 Nocturne in E flat maj
    Op 10 no 3 Etude in E-maj
    Op 10 no 12 Revolutionary Etude in C minor
    Op 21 Piano Concerto number 2 in f minor
    Op 28 Preludes no's 15, 20 and either 16 or 17
    Op 53 Polonaise in A flat, Heroic

Artist:

John Singer Sargent (1856-1925) American (Biography)
   1. Oyster Gatherers of Cancale, 1878, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington DC
   2. The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit, 1882, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
   3. (Violet Sargent at) The Breakfast Table, 1884, Fogg Museum of Art (Harvard, Cambridge, MA). Violet was Sargent's younger sister; he himself never married or had children.
   4. Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose, 1885-6, Tate Gallery, London, England (see also here")
   5. An Artist in his Studio, 1904, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
   6. Lady Agnew of Lochnaw, 1892-3, National Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh
      Singer Sargent also painted Theodore Roosevelt, 1903, The White House, Washington, D.C.
      and Robert Louis Stevenson and his Wife, 1885, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, AK

Shakepeare:  Hamlet

Plutarch: Romulus

Morning Time: March 2010

                      MORNING TIME PLANS FOR :
                         Week 1 March 2010


Ambleside Selections: 


Artist:

Raphael

                                         The School of Athens

Composer:
Grieg (Peer Gynt’s Suite)


Folk Song:
 (We are completely behind on these this year.)

The Old Oaken Bucket


The Jam on Gerry’s Rock

Shakespeare:

Coriolanus

Plutarch:

Coriolanus

Grammar Time:

Mother Tongue II



Bible Time:

Prayer Requests


NT: Read and discuss Matthew

Review:

Books of the NT
Books of the OT
Deuteronomy  6:4-9
Matthew 6:19-34
Deuteronomy 28:1-17


Read Aloud from Worldliness edited by CJ Mahaney




Hymn Singing:
New:
Jesus’ Name
 (I am not related to these children in anyway but they do sound better tahn we do.)

Review:

Fairest Lord Jesus

Faithful Men Twila Paris

Oh, For a Thousand Tongues to Sing

Glorious is Thy Name

God Leads Us Along

Poetry: 

Read and discuss one poem from 101 Famous Poems


New:
Breathes by Walter Scott

Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burn'd,
As home his footsteps he hath turn'd,
From wandering on a foreign strand!
If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no Minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim;
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust, from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonour'd, and unsung.


Review:

St Crispin’s Day speech from Henry V:



I am the Very Model of a Modern Major General:





Horatius at the Bridge 
 ( This is the first part of the poem, it may help with pronunciation although I am not convinced the guys pronunciation is right.)  This poem is often taught abridged. Guess what? Why not just go for the whole thing??

The Second Coming Yeats:

Where the Boats Go RLS

DARK brown is the river.
Golden is the sand.
It flows along for ever,
With trees on either hand.
Green leaves a-floating,
Castles of the foam,
Boats of mine a-boating—
Where will all come home?
On goes the river
And out past the mill,
Away down the valley,
Away down the hill.
Away down the river,
A hundred miles or more,
Other little children
Shall bring my boats ashore

Misc. Memory:
Presidents Bee
Bill of Rights 4
Bill of Rights 5
Bill of Rights 6
Bill of Rights 7


Reading Aloud: 

The Silver Chair



America Grows Up

The Light Beyond the Forest

Using MT to Promote Discussion

Yesterday, very late, 10:45, I finally called everyone together for MT. We began with prayer concentrating on Nathaniel who is apprenticing in a nuclear plant this month.

Because Christopher, my senior, needs to get the show on the road, I decided to go straight to grammar after prayer.  I pulled out my vintage Mother Tongue II and we discussed transitive and intransitive verbs. We orally analyzed several sentences together and then individually.  Then I let Christopher leave to finish up That Hideous Strength by CS Lewis.

One of the reasons I skipped several items during the morning is that I had been away last week, and I just wanted to reassert things slowly. Therefore, we did not sing. We sound terrible, so it is always a temptation not to sing but I am determined that we WILL sing on most days. Today we will sing 2 songs. Yesterday's Coram Deo by Judy Rogers and today's Crown Him with Many Crowns.

Then I read EX 20:1-17 as our review passage.  Plenty of fodder for the mill in that. We first discussed the idea of taking God's name in vain and how God will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. We also discussed covetousness.

 Then we headed over to review and relearn Gen 1:1-5.
Which reminded me of my Morning and Evening devotional so I pulled that out and read it.  It was based on the verse Ezekial 34:26  "I will cause the shower to come down in his season: there shall be showers of blessing."  I used this as a socratic jumping off spot and we defined the terms in the verse. Everyone participating. We defined Cause, Season, Showers and Blessings.  In the end we concluded that since we are not God and cannot control the weather, it was a sin to complain about the weather but maybe not a sin to be disappointed in the weather. My real goal was to stop the baseball players in the family from being dramatic weather watchers for the next few months. Weather can wreck havoc on a baseball season and I just wanted to establish where it came from. By the way, Christopher was not far off reading and he participated in this discussion.

We then went on to read Worldliness edited by CJ Mahaney. We are on the end chapters on modesty so it is more pointed at Emily. Not too fun for her, so I make sure that I make connections to masculine modesty also.

I am continuing to read through 101 Famous Poems with the children. We discuss one poem a day and the poem we discussed yesterday was:


Abraham Lincoln Walks at Night (In Springfield, Illinois)  by Vachel Lindsay

We are not huge Lincoln fans here so I wasn't sure how the poem would go over but it turned out to be an excellent poem in which to discuss modernity which is the time period my high school students are studying. 

We concentrated on these three verses from the perspective of the time period the poem was written in which was 1914. Significant. We discussed Lincoln, the Civil War, the beginnings of WWI,  The League of Nations and mostly all that was meant by :The Workers' Earth. We discussed 'The little man" the "working man" etc. We discussed socialism at great length noting that we know more about it now than they did in 1914. We were able to bring most of this discussion down to a simple concept that Alex could understand. We ended our discussion on the topic of self-government.

The sins of all the war-lords burn his heart.

He sees the dreadnaughts scouring every main.

He carries on his shawl-wrapped shoulders now

The bitterness, the folly and the pain. 

He cannot rest until a spirit-dawn

Shall come:--the shining hope of Europe free:

The league of sober folk, the Workers' Earth,

Bringing long peace to Cornland, Alp and Sea. 

It breaks his heart that kings must murder still,

That all his hours of travail here for men

Seem yet in vain. And who will bring white peace

That he may sleep upon his hill again?    

At this point the remaining High-schoolers were dismissed, after I decided that we would not read Coriolanus in either Shakespeare or Plutarch during the morning.

Alex and Andrew and I continued reviewing All the World's a Stage and I had Alex act out the 7 seasons as we read. He balked at sighing like a lover.

We also reviewed Breathes by Walter Scott which we are relearning.

I reviewed the US Oath of Citizenship which they mostly know and told them to write it out for their narration for 2 days and then Friday I would test them on it by having them write it from memory.

We reviewed the 1st Amendment and discussed the 5 rights guaranteed by it.  We also discussed the Constitution and what the Bill of Rights actually were. This came in handy as while we were reading aloud America Grows Up we learned about the 1st Continental Congress. We decided that it would be fun to visit Mount Vernon on our trip to Washington this summer.

We then went on to read aloud The Light Beyond the Forest which details the search for the Holy Grail.

America Grows Up which I already mentioned and:

The Silver Chair (Narnia)  by CS Lewis

I hope you can see the richness of having these sorts of discussions every single day. The thing I absolutely love about it is that the younger students are being stretched while the older students are learning. I let all participate equally and of course, I draw out those who are quiet. We do laugh a lot and our family can be a bit brutal sometimes. We all love to hear what Alex, the youngest, has to say before any concept is defined. Andrew seems to have a better grasp of grammar than my high school students but then again he has had 3 years of Latin at a younger age. I say 3 years of  Latin for Children but we only get through 2/3 of a book a year.

The one other beauty of this method is that it helps children learn how to make connections which is the heart of intuition.

As you can see, I did not let the schedule dictate the time. I dropped things off in order to fully grasp the moments that arose naturally.  Finding this balance is often difficult. If you are the type that must get through the LIST then teach yourself to embrace the moments of discussion that arise. Don't ever rush those until they deteriorate into frivolity which they inevitably do.  That is some part of the art of teaching, I think.

Morning Time November 2009

Shakespeare:
Coriolanus
First up we are going to watch the BBC production which I ordered from Netflix.

Plutarch:
Aristides

Bible:
New:

Proverbs 15:31-33
Read one Daily Proverb with discussion
Worldliness: Resisting the Seduction of a Fallen World
As you may have noticed I am reading this in tiny paragraph sections with lots of discussion.

Review:

Books of the NT


Books of the OT


Habakkuk 3:17-19


12 Tribes of Israel


List of Judges


Hymns:

New:

You are Holy (Prince of Peace)

Review:

Now Thank We All Our God

Come Ye Thankful People Come

Bringing in the Sheaves

We Gather Together




Poetry:
Read and discuss one poem a day from 101 Famous Poems

New:

Finishing up the poem from Cymbeline

Review:

Lullaby of an Infant chief

My Daily Creed

Courtesy for Church

In Flander’s Field

Stopping by the Woods on Snowy

Misc Memory:

New:

Oath of Citizenship:

"I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when required by law; that I will perform noncombatant service in the Armed Forces of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform work of national importance under civilian direction when required by the law; and that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God."

This is a great thing to memorize. The vocabulary alone is worth the effort and the sentence structure is evocative of a more beautiful time.

Review:

Presidents Bee

We Shall Fight

Apostle’s Creed

Continents and Oceans

Heidelberg Ques #1

Reading Aloud:


Mother Tongue II with all children

Little Boys:

We finished The Jungle Book and The Horse and His Boy.
I was going to move into The Silver Chair but decided we better read Alice in Wonderland and Through Looking Glass before the new movie comes out.

The Sword and the Circle: King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table Fabulously written book, if a tiny bit blunt. Not for everyone but excellent all the same.
A History for Peter: America is born, America Grows Up, and America Moves Forward (3 volume set) (Some object to Johnson's editorial viewpoint. I just use his opinions as a way to open discussions with the boys.)


Things get tricky from here until January. The week before Thanksgiving is a hard week for me to stay on track. I consistently end up skipping MT during this week. The thing that keeps me going is knowing that we are going to be singing some of my favorite Thanksgiving hymns. I love Thanksgiving and this year it is going to be special with both grand-babies visiting.

Just think in two weeks our tree will be up and we will be reveling in the advent of Christ with Handel's Messiah.