What is Morning Time and Why Bother?

Day 2~

 

Over the years I have become suspect of grand schemes especially when it comes to homeschooling. How many times have you read a glowing review of a new product only to find that the family had only just started using it or even worse mom was just planning on using it? How many times have you heard moms talk about quitting something after using it for only 2 weeks?

In our home Morning Time gradually grew out of my own reading and thinking. It is closely tied to a Charlotte Mason education because it grew out of my reading of For the Children's Sake: Foundations of Education for Home and School. Later when Ambleside Online was born I seamlessly incorporated their suggestions into what I was already doing in Morning Time. That was an instance where a product, albiet a free one, and a philosophy met perfectly because they had both grown from the same seed.

But while many of the suggestions on Ambleside Online fit into the puzzle of our lives many, many other suggestions and ideas from other sources did not. This often perplexed me. Moms were glowing about the next new thing and I was plugging away at my daily liturgy called Morning Time. I could try the new thing but then I would have to quit Morning Time. I sometimes spent the summer months trying to work out the puzzle so that I could fit in the new thing or co-op or unit study with Morning Time. Guess what? I never could.

In all my years of homeschooling, I only quit having Morning Time once. The next summer I found out I had life-threatening cancer. I immediately knew one thing: Morning Time was the only part of our school that mattered. To this day, in spite of the many very bad academic years of school, the only real regret I have is the year without Morning Time (MT).

All of this was a matter of faith without sight. I was trusting my instincts, and Charlotte Mason's, while all around me moms were trying this and that and being tossed about by every wind of change. I was tossed too but MT saved me from making too many bad decisions.

And so minute by minute the years piled up along with the poems and Bible passages, the read-alouds, the discussions, and the collective family consciousness.

That is what MT is. It is the daily collection of little grains of time that add up to a lifetime of learning.  It is the daily sowing of the seeds of learning for the long haul. MT is not about reaping a quick harvest of spinach or lettuce after a few cool weeks. MT is about faithfully tending an orchard over long, long years knowing that the future harvest will be far more valuable than any quick crop. Maybe it isn't even an orchard-this is homeschool carbon which will produce a harvest of diamonds for those who have the patience and the courage to go for the long prize.

I don't walk by faith about MT anymore. Faith has become sight. I know it works. Now that my days are numbered and my time is short I love waking up every morning to spend time with Alex and Andrew-reading and talking and singing and memorizing.

Over the years, MT has kept the same structure but it can also be fluid as to categories. I think it is a great place to put all those categories which fall outside the usual school routine: composer study, artists, Plutarch and Shakespeare, even nature notebooks are each perfect for MT because these are the important things that often get squeezed out of the traditional school day. We may even find when we scoot over just a couple minutes a day to make room for these easily neglected areas the connections the mind begins to make start circuits for our children which far surpass the mundane teaching of subjects.

Tomorrow I will publish a list of possible Morning Time categories to help you get a picture of what MT looks like.

Suggestion of the Day for Morning Time Memory:

Here is a poem for young and old. My husband loves to say this one at this time of year.

The Mist and All

by Dixie Willson

I like the fall
The mist and all
I like the night owl’s lonely call
And wailing sound
Of wind around

I like the gray
November day
And dead, bare boughs that coldly sway
Against my pane

I like the rain

I like to sit
And laugh at it
And tend my cozy fire a bit
I like the fall
The mist and all

Morning Time-A Liturgy of Love

Day 1~

Morning Time? 

Longtime readers know that this is the name of the liturgy of love our family fell into 25 years ago. 

The unique thing, I think, is that we just kept plodding along all of these years until one day I realized, because the children started telling me, that Morning Time was where most of the learning took place during their childhoods.

Just this morning, as I talked over Skype to my oldest son in Japan he told me how he planned to start videotaping his own Morning Time for his 4 little boys to use while he is deployed and then he began to recite "If you can keep your head..." and when he faltered I joined in with the missing words and when I paused my youngest yelled to us from another room with the missing words and we ended together, "You'll be a man, my son,"  and there they were my son, the man, planning his own liturgy of love, and my son, the little boy, giving joy and purpose to our continuing liturgy.

My oldest and my youngest about 7 years ago.

For the next 31 days I hope to carefully spell out how you can create this lasting liturgy in your home. I hope this series will be fresh-with illustrations from my family, past and present, and even a bit of hope for the future.

Suggestion of the Day for Morning Time Memory:

IF 

By

Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you   

    Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,   

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

    But make allowance for their doubting too;   

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

    Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

    And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;   

    If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;   

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

    And treat those two impostors just the same;   

If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken

    Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

    And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

    And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

    And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

    To serve your turn long after they are gone,   

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

    Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,   

    Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

    If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

    With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,   

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,   

    And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

You can find many, many more 31 Days posts at The Nesting Place
You can also read :
Mystie's 31 Days of Homeschool Organization 
Cheryl's 31 Days of Home Celebration
Brandy will also be joining in.

Hanging Angels By Neill Edward Calabro

Hanging Angels By Neill Edward Calabro

I grew up in the South in the 1960s and 70s. I moved to Central Florida during the time of busing. I remember going to school for the first time and being asked, “Are you a Yankee or a Rebel?”  I didn’t have a clue.  I am not exactly sure what busing accomplished in the South. Before busing I walked to a mixed race school, in fact I walked to school with two children, a brother and a sister, and they were black.  After busing, I could no longer walk to school. School was now far away.

My mother made my brother and me ride the bus to make a point.  I didn’t know that at the time. I didn’t notice that we were the only white children on the bus. Not sure her point was made. We have two hilarious family photos of my brother. One of him as the only little white boy, and he was as white and blond as possible, at a black child’s birthday party and the other with the reverse. 

All that to say that I enjoy the genre that explores that not so long ago, tumultuous time period.

I love southern literature. I love Faulkner who captures the people so well. I love Harper Lee and her Book. I love Walker Percy, Zora Neale Hurston, Margaret Mitchell, Pat Conroy,and even Fannie Flagg. 

In fact, If you like any of these you may also like the new novel about the south in the 1960s and before: Hanging Angels by Neill Edward Calabro.

This is a book full of the rich imagery of the times. In fact, it had its start as a movie script and that explains much of the rich imagery that has you seeing the book as you read. It is full of scattered diamonds of prose, and some truly inspiring originality. How did the author come up with these ideas?

“With a willowy seasonal change in the landscape, moving the calendar to another month, an ominous magnolia tree sits at the edge of an acre by crossing dirt roads.”  Ominous, indeed! In some ways this novel is the story of what happened at that ominous tree.

It is a truly unique look at racism which asks the question, and leaves you with the question: What if we couldn’t tell what color someone was?

Because for the white Pine family race is going insert itself into their lives without their permission and we are going to find out just what kind of man Jefferson Pine is. It begins with a little boy(white? black?) with a scar around his neck and ends 30 years later with a courtroom drama.

It has moments of darkness reminding me of Flannery O’Connor and moments of whimsy reminding me of Walker Percy. 

Hanging Angels is a new novel in the southern Gothic tradition reminding us that color is not always so easy to discern.

Documents and Speeches for Memorization

Documents Memorized

The Declaration of Independence (Through “He has…”)

The Bill of Rights

Gettysburg Address

The War Inevitable by Patrick Henry

We Shall Fight by Winston Churchill

The Apostles Creed

The Nicene Creed

The Heidelberg Catechism Question 1

Contemplate by Sam Adams

These Are the Times that Try by Thomas Paine

States and Capitals

Planets

Presidents

Continents and Oceans Song

Heidelberg Catechism question #1 “What is your only comfort…?”

West Point Cadet’s Prayer

U.S. Oath of Citizenship

Term 1 Ambleside Selections 2012

Term 1: August-November 2012

Composer Study:

Claude Debussy (1910)

Prelude to the Afternoon of the Faun

    La Mer

    Nocturnes for Orchestra

    Suite Bergamasqe (includes Claire de Lune)

    Children's Corner

    Jeux ("Games"); a "danced poem" intended to accompany a ballet

        Note: Where is The Girl with the Flaxen Hair? Look at Preludes

Artist:

Pierre-Auguste Renoir (French, 1841-1919) 

   1. La Grenouilliere, 1869

 

   2. Les Grands Boulevards, 1875

 

   3. La Loge, 1874

 

   4. Girl with a Watering Can

 

Auguste Rodin (French, 1840-1917)

   5. Monument to Balzac

 

   6. The Thinker

 

Shakespeare: Henry VI, Part II and III

Plutarch: Solon

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.