Update: This is what I did back in 2011, it’s 2013 today and I still have my own way of mixing things up – though we aren’t doing the notebooks exactly this way this year. Still good tips!
My big homeschooling plan of attack this year is to teach my boys from a “world-wide” perspective.
I plan to cover Geography, History, Government, some Art, some Science, some Handwriting/copywork (and whatever else) within these 7 continental themes: North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia, and Antartica.
As we do worksheets such as coloring animal pages, handwriting on relevant content, maps, flags and other things I will stick them in the appropriate continent section. Having these maps of the world hanging on the living room wall (bought at the dollar store) is a big help too.
Each boy has/will have a notebook divided into seven sections (one for each continent) with additional dividers for math, art, bible, etc at my choosing.
How I’m making this work as a Unit Study.
This week we’ve been focusing on Mammals & India (in the continent of Asia). We’ve watched a couple dvd videos I borrowed from the library: Jeff Corwin: Tigers & Lions in India and the video Mammals by EyeWitness. (Below are some other videos we are going to use in this study over the next few days).
Tip #1 – Use the library, alot!
To go with the dvd topics I’ve printed off coloring/labeling pages of some Mammals from Currclick on Natural Study of Mammals. {Earlier this week we did a short lesson on Peacocks, also from Asia.}
Tip #2 – Use awesome, affordable resources created by others!
I believe everything Currclick sells (product-wise) is in digital format meaning you download it to your computer and print off for use at your convenience.
The Currclick set I’m using to teach on Mammals has 583 notebooking pages covering 67 different mammals from around the world! This is a great set to have as you have a wide variety of coloring pages of Mammals, pages with lines both for younger and older student handwriting needs.
As of today, I saw the price was only $1.99 (on sale from $15.00)! Awesome deal!
You can learn more about or buy this set of Natural Study of Mammals here.
Currclick also has a FREE section. You’ll see the big FREE in the left sidebar. Grab what you want and download it to your computer.
Tip #3 – Do your homework. Use the internet!
So to find information to work with in my Unit Study I turn to books or I search the internet. Today I chose the following links to check out more information on Mammals. Plus, of course, the dvds will help here too.
That wasn’t so hard, was it?
*Note: We are a Christian family who believes that God created everything the bible says he did during six literal 24 hour days. Most of what I find at the library is evolutionary in teaching. However, I don’t shy away from exposing my kids to some of what the world teaches because they need to know there are two sides to the story and which one is true (God created) and which one is false (evolution). For the record, evolution requires faith to believe because it is not proven, nor can it be. We put our faith in God and His word.
Our local librarian located Ken Ham’s 2 part dvd set for kids: Dinosaur’s, Genesis and the Gospel from another library and had it delivered to them so I could borrow it. Use that inter-library loan system, folks! Your local librarians can get you things from places you probably never thought they could. 🙂
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