A High School Plan

A friend of mine started Ambleside Online late and is trying to "catch up" with her daughter, who's in high school. She's done a couple of Years with AO, mixing and matching to try and use what her daughter missed from previous Years, but that was getting too complicated as she started the high school years. So we sat down and went through the various AO/HEO booklists, and this is what we came up with. Her daughter loves Shakespeare, so it's heavy in that area. :)

(For another look at a high school plan, see AO's "Plan B" - a lightened load of AO books for students who need less books. Year 7, Year 8, Year 9 and Year 10 are available, and each has a 36-week schedule. This is what I plan to use with J. Keola, my middle son. Year 11 will be done after T. Kekoa, my oldest son, finishes year 11's books in June 2007.)

high school credit system (21 credits) [click here]

Ninth Grade
2005-2006 (Revolution) Look at Year 4/9 for more book options
US History - Continue on with TCOO until completed at the end of next year
World History - Story of Mankind by Van Loon ch 44-52 (Religious Warfare-French Revolution)
Biography - Abigail Adams Witness to a Revolution
Poor Richard by James Daugherty
Literature - Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes?
Age of Fable (mythology)
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Irving
Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving
Poetry - Phyllis Wheatley 1753-1784, the slave poet, Alexander Pope, William Cowper 1731- 1800, important as the voice of the Evangelical revival, Lord Byron
Shakespeare - Twelfth Night, Macbeth, Pericles Prince of Tyre, Richard II, Hamlet Prince of Denmark
Geography - The Complete Book of Marvels
Nature - Wild Animals I Have Known by Ernest Thompson Seton
Economics - Whatever Happened to Penny Candy by Richard Maybury
Worldview - C.S. Lewis: Mere Christianity
Add math, science (Apologia), Foreign language

Tenth Grade
2006-2007 (1800's) Look at year 5/10 for more book options
US History - This Country of Ours ch 64-99
World History - Story of Mankind ch 53-71 (Napoleon-WWI)
Biography - Booker T. Washington's Up From Slavery
The Story of My Life by Helen Keller
Literature - Carry On, Mr. Bowditch by Jean Lee Latham?
Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
Silas Marner by George Eliot
Poetry - Samuel Coleridge, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Robert Browning, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Walt Whitman, Percy Bysse Shelly, Thomas Hood
Shakespeare - Henry V, Merchant of Venice, Winter's Tale, Comedy of Errors, Richard III
Geography - Eothen, by Alexander Kinglake
Nature - Walden by Henry David Thoreau
Economics - Are You Liberal, Conservative, Confused? by Richard Maybury AND Essays by Jane Haldimand Marcet (online)
Worldview - The Deadliest Monster by Jeff Baldwin
Add math, science (Apologia), Foreign language

Eleventh Grade
2007-2008 Look at Year 6/11 for more book options (WWII and Modern era, and a term of ancient history)
World History - Story of Mankind ch 62-end
Third term - Story of the Greeks by H. A. Guerber
Third term - Story of the Romans by H. A. Guerber OR, possibly do Tales of Troy
Biography - Galileo and the Magic Numbers by Sidney Rosen
Literature - I Promessi Sposi (The Betrothed) by Alessandro Manzoni
Poetry - Edna St. Vincent Millay, Carl Sandburg, WH Auden?
Shakespeare - King Henry VIII, Merry Wives of Windsor, Triolus and Cressida, Timon of Athens, Cymbelline
Grammar - Grammar: Our Mother Tongue: An Introductory Guide to English Grammar by Nancy Wilson
Geography - The World: Travels 1950-2000 by Jan Morris
Nature - The Sea Around Us by Rachael Carson
Economics - Whatever Happened to Justice, by Richard Maybury AND I, Pencil, a short essay by Leonard Read (online)
Worldview - Seven Men Who Rule the World from the Grave by David Breese
Add math, science (Apologia), Foreign language

Twelfth Grade
2009-2010 Look at Year 2/7 for more book options (Middle Ages)
World History - need a book
Biography - The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey
Joan of Arc by Mark Twain?
Literature - Watership Down by Richard Adams
The Once and Future King by T. H. White, ONLY Books 1 and 2
Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott
A Taste of Chaucer by Anne Malcolmson
add any free reading books from Year 7
Poetry - anyone who was missed from previous lists, OR use an anthology
Language Arts/Writing - The Elements of Style, by Strunk and White?
Shakespeare - Coriolanus, Love's Labor Lost, Julius Caesar, Two Gentlemen of Verona, King Lear, Romeo and Juliet
Geography - The Brendan Voyage by Tim Severin AND How the Heather Looks by Joan Bodger
Nature - The Life of the Spider by Fabre
Economics - Evaluating Books: What Would Thomas Jefferson Think About This? by Richard Maybury
Worldview - choose from AO/HEO years 9-12
Add math, science (Apologia), Foreign language

What Do I Need?

My best friend is in town, so I'm not spending much time at the computer. We met online and we had lots more in common than the list topic. Our friendship has outlasted our interest in that list. We stayed up late one night eating sushi and cake, listening to a new Jackson Browne CD for the first time together, but talked through it and never really heard it. We shopped for books, threw a party, sewed a cloak, took a late walk under a full moon with all four of my kids. In fact, we saw a falling star on that walk. We all saw it. I guess you could say I'm doing more doing than blogging! But I saw this and thought it looked fun:

Stealing from BetsyPage's blog... Google "" needs" and see what comes up...

I did google in my name, I didn't google in "Tim's Mom. But since that's how I post, I'll type that in place of My name.

(Tim's mom) needs to poke Thomas but will not have a chance before the business meeting
(Tim's mom) needs a family with a strong support network
(Tim's mom) needs to take another look.
(Tim's mom) needs people like you to do some meaningful
all (Tim's mom) needs is love and support
(Tim's mom) needs a one or two parent family
(Tim's mom) Needs to Hear it
(Tim's mom) needs to find a place in Paula's life where she does

I don't know why, but I find those really funny!

Things I've Learned Recently

Socks come out of the laundry in odd numbers.

You shouldn't recite Shakespeare while riding the lawnmower unless you actually want to be hoarse for the next two days.

Reading until 3:00 a.m. produces undesirable effects the next morning.

Writing until 3:00 a.m. produces similarly undesireable effects.

If there's a bad guy, shoot him. (Courtesy of Bonanza.)

My brother and I are on different sides. I root for the Greeks and he roots for the Trojans.

No matter how much foam there is on the PVC lightsaber, if it hits your knuckles, IT HURTS!

There are three necessities for prop-making: PVC, duct tape, and superglue. Cardboard and dowel are pluses.

There are three necessities for driving with a baby: juice, cookies, and crackers. And cereal is never amiss.

When you are trying get a poem written, the best thing you can do is sit down and write. You will never get anything written otherwise.

And finally, once you have sat down to write said poetry, do not get distracted and write a blog post.

I'm Kanga

Take the 100 Acre Personality Quiz!

Does the Constitution Create a Wall of Separation?

I've been wrestling with the question of "the separation clause" today. I looked at a few different websites, but the most notable ones were:

http://members.tripod.com/~candst/art4piii.htm
This one got me thinking. They maintain that the spirit of separation is alluded to all over the Constitution even if the words themselves aren't there. At first glance, it looked pretty convincing, but when I read it more closely, the very quotes from the letters and documents displayed to prove an original intent to keep church and state separate, seemed weak. If anything, the letters showed that removing any vestige of religion from the government was surely never the intent of the writers.

http://razorskiss.net/wp/index.php?p=17
This is a legaliese word study of the Constitution. I braced myself for some new insights that would convincingly prove that separation was always the intent, but I got through a portion of it and their arguments seemed really weak, they were making a better case for the other side . . . and then it slowly dawned on me as I was reading that the website wasn't trying to prove separation, but was trying to show that it's impossible to read separation into the First Amendment as it's written. Oh well, I guess I can say I saw both sides.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/707590/posts
This is the comment section of a conservative site. I'm guessing it's a conservative site, I didn't look at any page except the comments, which turned into a back-and-forth bickering about whether the wall of separation is legitimate or not. Near the bottom is an interesting post that says it doesn't matter what the Constitution says because, in 1804, Chief Justice John Marshall changed the US from a Constitutional Republic to a Judicial Fiat in the Marbury vs Madison case. That means that the Constitution says whatever the judges say it says, the document is meaningless because it's only the fluid, living document in the minds of the judges that counts. I plan to think a little more about that one.

Anyway, that's how I spent my Saturday. I can think of a few other things I'd rather have been doing besides reading about politics.

And my conclusion? That whatever preconceived conclusion you bring into this issue can be proved pretty convincingly either way, although the straight data taken by itself indicates more strongly that removing religion was the last thing on the minds of the writers of the Constitution. But if you want to believe that it was intended, there's a good case to be made. Too good to be convinced otherwise by arguments from the other side.

Sibling Rivalry

For anyone expecting a second child, the Headmistress at the Common Room has a nice post about avoiding sibling rivalry with a new baby. Like her post about dealing with doctors who want to use their status as an authority figure to pressure moms about non-medical parenting, this deserves to be widely read.

And, while I'm at it, I might as well link to her post about general parenting, too. :)

And one about socialization.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

I've been reading along in this book with Tim as he does it with his Year 10 Ambleside Online school schedule. I got halfway through it and then stayed up til 2am last night to see how it ended up.

Was it worth it? Was it great? Not a disappointment?

Yes, it was worth it. It's a great book, I think. I know nothing of literary devices, but it seemed to me that this book used them all well, I enjoyed getting to know the characters (except Simon Legree) and the story was an interesting and effective vehicle to get the author's opinions across. I was not disappointed (and you won't be either, Miss Roxie. :)

I knew that Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote the book as a platform to have her say about the institution of slavery. I expected the book to be a thin disguise for her political opinions. I didn't expect a really good story with unforgettable characters. I didn't expect it to be really good literature. But it was! (at least, to my uneducated mind.) I don't understand why the book isn't read more widely any more, it's politically correct and not a difficult read. I can only assume that it has too much Christianity (and maybe old fashioned sentiment?) to be considered useful today. Just a guess.

It reminded me a little bit of parts of A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, where Mark Twain makes you see slavery from the eyes of the oppressed.

(Does that answer your question?)

Wasn't That Sweet?

Last week we had some friends over and I heated up some canned vegetarian baked beans for dinner. All the excitement of playing, though, made the kids not very hungry, which meant all those beans didn't get eaten.

This afternoon, I decided to use up those beans by having them tonight. I told the boys we'd be having baked beans instead of the other thing I had originally planned and they were all for it. But then they got hungry before I was quite ready to get dinner together. In a rare moment of self-initiated service, one son decided to be supremely helpful and get dinner started all by himself. So he got out some dishes and the bread and butter . . . and opened up a can of beans!

LOL! So we still have leftover baked beans in the fridge.

My Dragon

I've started my "Final Project" for creative writing class, which for me is a book of poetry. I should be writing four or five poems a week for the next six weeks. Some of them will probably end up here; I'll see how it goes. As for this poem...what can I say, I like the idea. Dragons and beds and microscopes make an interesting combination.


I found a dragon yesterday.
It shone like emerald where it lay,
sunning on my comforter.

I picked it up with careful touch
and stared at it. It didn't care much,
quiet while I fingered it.

I got a microscope to see
it closer, what its shape might be:
such a little dragonet!

But oh--tis not a dragon 't all!
only a bit of moss let fall--
a little bit of moss, that's all--
my disillusioned dragonlet!

Cool Intellectualism

Fa-So-La-La of the Beehive blog said (commenting on this post) that it's much easier to be intellectual in cold weather. I agree, and I have found more proof.

The book is Uncle Tom's Cabin, the scene is a southern mansion. Miss Ophelia, a Very Proper Lady brought up in the North, is trying to get her languid cousin Auguste St. Clare, brought up in the South, to discuss slavery with her.

"But this is a serious subject, my boy, Auguste," said Miss Ophelia, laying her hand on his forehead.

"Dismally so," said he; "and I--well, I never want to talk seriously in hot weather. What with the mosquitos and all, a fellow can't get himself up to any very sublime moral flights; and I believe," said St. Clare, suddenly rousing himself up, "there's a theory, now! I understand why northern nations are always more virtuous than southern ones,--I see into that whole subject."