MyLittleWonders
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Posts posted by MyLittleWonders
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I am so very sorry. :grouphug: :grouphug: :grouphug:
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MLW do you have similar Catholic rec's for Middle Ages? I tried "The Catholic Faith Comes to America" a few years back but I personally found it boring. Anyway, this year I'm leaning towards the Middle Ages. I need to keep a look out for Teaching the Classics as I think it would be helpful for me.
The Old World's Gifts to the New covers the Middle Ages under these topics: Gifts of the Germanic Tribes (approximately 55 pages), How the People Lived in the Middle Ages (approximately 40 pages), What the Church Did for the People of the Middle Ages (approximately 60 pages), and then it goes into early modern with the Great Awakening and discovering America.
The Old World and America has units on The Triumph of the Church, The People of the Middle Ages, The Ideals of the Middle Ages, The Age o f New Interests, and The Age of Change.
Here is Cathy Duffy's review of The Old World's Gifts. Here is her review of The Old World and America.
Both have questions/activities after each unit/chapter. Just browsing, I think the activities are more varied and have more hands-on options in The Old World and America (for instance, carve a column using a bar of soap), but I have only browsed as we are still in Mesopotamia in the K12 book and won't really get into either of these two until we get more into Greece and Rome.
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I'm so sorry. :grouphug:
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We've been Feingold (though now I just read labels and know what we can/can't eat) for over 6 years. We saw big improvements in our older two kids (the youngest boy was an infant when we started). Our middle son is affected the most, but even our oldest son was helped (it's been so long it is hard to remember the specifics for him). I haven't heard any anecdotes of it not working, and personally, we don't tell the doctor as we're used to the party line of "what you eat doesn't affect how you behave". For the record, we are also gluten and dairy free, which each also helped tremendously in different ways for each of us.
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Something that has worked for me is "listing", instead of "gridding". I mean, I sit down with my spine and resources and make a list, in order, of what I want to cover. Then we start at the beginning of the list and just...progress through it. I don't worry about how many pages on each specific day. We can add or subtract things from the list as we go without needing to revamp an entire planner, and every 6-8 weeks I can evaluate where we are, deciding whether to accelerate, slow down, or stay the course. It is also easier to adjust for "rabbit trails". This works well or me for science and history. For literature, I do the same thing--Ds has 1 hr of reading time daily, during which he must read an assigned book. Sometimes it is history related, sometimes science related, sometimes just good literature. After each day's reading I have him narrate orally, and we discuss anything that comes up. When he finishes a book, we just go on to the next one. I don't worry too much about keeping the history books exactly in line with our spine readings, but if you wanted to you could just add or skip books to keep things aligned. The only drawback is making sure I have supplies (science) when I need them. I tend to buy everything for at least the next few months and keep it on hand in a special box, ready to go when needed.
ETA: Have you watched the new Kern YouTube video someone recently linked? I thought it was very thought provoking on the subject of teaching literature. I am on my iPad, let's see if I can do this...
This is very similar to what I do. After years of trying to plan it all out, only to be side-lined by illness or distracted by life, I decided lists are good. So, I went through our history spine (for my olders, we are using K12's Human Odyssey; if they were younger, I would have just used either The Old World & America or The Old World's Gifts to the New (both Catholic - I do plan on reading from them too, but they aren't quite as meaty as I'd like alone for late elementary-middle school), wrote out the chapters and topics covered, found similar activities/maps/assignments in History Odyssey (already had level 1 and bought level 2 for Ancients) and made a list. We are further "behind" than where I wanted to be right now, but that's okay. We just keep reading as we have time (I aim for 1-2 times a week - I read to all of them and then we discuss/narrate), and are making our way through without the angst of not keeping up with my schedule.
Literature is the same way. I made a list of the books I wanted to read this year, prioritized, divvied out to dh what he wanted to read at bedtime, and just started reading. We won't make it quite through the list (the boys LOVE the Little House series and made me read through The Long Winter; I finally wised up and got Little Town on the Prairie on audio for breakfast LOL), but we'll just finish next year while adding the next set of books to the list. I have a couple MP's literature guides, but I found them too much busy work. I bought and LOVE Teaching the Classics. I am slowly teaching them how to analyze literature while also doing what BraveWriter recommends - pointing out quality writing as we read and discussing why it's good and how it enhances the story. Sometimes they give oral narrations and sometimes they do something written. Again, I'm reading to them all (they read silently on their own at other times of the day).
For full disclosure, I have to say that I have never had one subject in any year that I have homeschooled that I actually completed the chosen curriculum by the end of the school year. We just plug away and pick it back up after our break (I do try to get to logical stopping points in math). We do school year-round so it's easier as our summer break is only about six weeks and we try to do very light school a few days each week of summer). So, lists work well here as I'm not concerned about finishing something/everything in 36 weeks.
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I'm so sorry Little Nyssa. :grouphug:
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Can someone else considering conversion or undergoing conversion PM me for a less public conversation about it? Thanks!
I converted last year, so I don't know if I can be of help, but if you need, you can feel free to PM me.
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OMG. Where is the eye rolling emoticon? I've got a soap box of my own, as someone who patiently (aka idiotically) waited for RSO Physics level 1 to be released as "promised" until I went gray...
Whatever though. I gave up on them. I bought CPO Life and Earth, full sets, used for less than RSO.
Where did you find them used? I looked at CPO but it is expensive on their website.
Wow! I wonder if the ebook will be a lot cheaper ~ no need to include the "cost to print" in that. I may have to rethink our plans for next year :(
Me too. :(
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We do outline occasionally from th KFH encyclopedia, but I type one or two paragraphs from the original spread and walk the boys through it. We also only do it once every other week or so (typically we will do one for history and one for science each month - I want them to learn outlining but it can become drudgery very quickly, at least the rate at which HO seems to schedule outlining).
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A quick follow up on Lent for us: as a family, the girls and I are reading the daily saint together and the daily Mass readings and discussing them. It has really been a nice focus to our day.
My 6th grader, who struggles some academically, is doing the Friendly Defender cards with me twice a week, and it is making a big difference for her. We read the card, and she tries to answer. Then we read the answer and look up the reference verses.
She is doing the OT this year for Bible history, so she is gaining context there. But many Catholic kids are just not familiar with the actual Bible. We use the missal at Church, and she knew the readings, but I think it is very important that we teach them how to look things up in the Bible. It is just a skill I grew up with as a protestant that I have had to intentionally teach my cradle Catholic kids.
What a great idea for using the Friendly Defender cards. I think I will start doing that with the boys. I completely agree with the need to be able to find things in the Bible. Using the cards seems like a very natural way of going about teaching them that skill.
What are you using for your 11 year old for studying the OT this year?
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We are using Ancients level 2 this year but I know we will never use it the way it is written. We read from K12's Human Odyssey and SoTW and then we do the map work that corresponds to whatever we just read (I went through and found what lessons of History Odyssey went with which chapters of Human Odyssey and SoTW and aligned it that way - Hisotyr Odyssey, as expensive as it was is just a supplement for us). We also do some of the writing assignments or the vocabulary assignments. But we don't read any of the supplemental books as we just don't have the time to make our day history-centric. I do really like the map work in HO and I also appreciate the suggestions for the writing assignments, so I do use it, but I think we would all go crazy if we used it exactly as written.
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We do our Bible reading first thing in our school day. We read a story from the children's Bible and we talk about. Usually that brings up something and I pull out one of the regular Bibles to read to them directly from that book/chapter/verse. We also read from a catechism book once a week (I debated for a while doing one for each kid at their grade level, but I ditched that plan and now just read the next grade level after we finish the previous one; it works well as we are all relatively new to the RC church, so they are all young in their faith). We also work in whatever we are memorizing from the Bible (right now that is Psalm 23). And typically there's a saint story thrown in there. In all, we take at least thirty minutes for all of this, including opening prayers, and then we move on. There are no tests or anything though we do discuss and I'll often have them narrate something to keep them focused. But otherwise, this time is only to enrich us all and help set the tone for the rest of the day (which doesn't always work very well but maybe it will one day :lol: ).
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Dh wants the boys to do Alg 1/Alg 2 altogether over the course of two school years, so the plan is 8th grade Alg 1 and 9th grade Alg 2 and then 10th grade Geometry. I'm not sure what we'll use, but it may be the same text dh uses at work and will include proofs and constructions (something dh and I both believe strongly in for a complete Geometry course). From there we aren't sure yet, but probably something along the lines of trig/linear algebra/pre calculus before hitting 12th grade calculus.
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We have a strong literature focus to our days. I do not tie it to any historical time period, but rather read the books I want (and I use lists like the "Good Books" list from the Great Books Academy site). In a day to day basis, that ends up being two novels (I'm reading one during the day and dh reads one at bedtime), fairy & folk tales, and stories from Shakespeare.
At other times of the day I read other things as well - religion/Saint stories, geography (using BF's geography units), science, and history. But those are all content subjects for us and aside from the religion reading, only happen once or twice a week. Literature, though, is at least a five day a week thing here. That is our anchor.
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Since no one in the real world will understand,I wanted to share with you ladies.DH and I had the opportunity to attend the Stations of the Cross last night.We really did not know anything about it,but since our RCIA leader asked,we decided to give it a try.It was one of the most amazing and powerful hours. I have never experienced anything like this in the protestant world.I'm getting so excited for Easter Vigil.
Robin
The Vigil is absolutely amazing. I entered at last year's Vigil and since my baptism was many years ago at our old protestant church, I will forever consider the Easter Vigil my Catholic birthday. :) I still get weepy thinking about it all. (Bring tissues!!! Heck, I'll need tissues this year even though I don't know anyone entering the Church. Then again, I could usually use a tissue or two at any point in time during regular Sunday Mass. ;) ) Next year, God willing, I will be a blubbering mess as my oldest two will enter the Church at the Vigil (youngest ds will make his FHC a month or so after his brothers enter the Church).
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We are studying the Pentateuch in Bible study this year and we just discussed Moses on Mt. Sinai for forty days. Someone asked our Sr. about the significance of the number forty - Noah, Moses, the Israelites, Elijah, Jesus - and she talked about gestation. During that time period of forty, God is creating something only we can't yet see it (much like pregnancy; it wasn't until very recently that we could "see" what was happening in the womb). Then she spoke of how after the forty days of gestation during Lent, the new converts are "born again" in the waters of baptisms. :)
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Curious question regarding song lyrics. At Christmas, my SIL gave dh and I a couple "mixed tapes" of some new-to-us Christian music (we listen to all types of music; one day we were talking to her about different CCM artists and we hadn't heard of the ones she liked ... sorry for the backstory). So, this one comes up every now and then and has a nice sound. But then I started listening to the lyrics and it started to bother me. But, then I thought maybe I was reading too much into it and thought I'd ask here:
There's a place where religion finally diesThere's a place that I lose my selfish pride
Dancin’ with my Father God in fields of grace
There's not much to the song, but the "there's a place where religion finally dies" is repeated a few times in the song. And it dawned on me (but again, maybe I'm bringing too much baggage to the song?) - religion has to die for us to find the grace of God. It felt, to me, a definitely anti-Catholic (or anti-liturgical church) song, kind of along the lines of the whole YouTube "Why I hate religion but love Jesus". I'm debating removing it from the playlists as I don't want the kids thinking religion (Church) has to die in order to be with God in His Grace. But, I thought I'd get some opinions here because my past (with the evangelical side as well as with SIL might be clouding things - she is evangelical and also not very pro-Catholic in her beliefs, though she doesn't show us any animosity and I don't want to think she added this song purposely to try to make a theological point, if that makes sense).
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So I was feeling pretty good about how I had approached today's fast ... I ate only one egg at breakfast (that's easy when I feed dd off my plate - she eats all the eggs!) and then just a pb&j for lunch until it hit me ... I put ham in our scrambled eggs!!! :svengo: I wasn't even thinking! We usually cut up ham for our scrambled eggs and I was just in automatic mode, just wanting to make sure to make a non-sweet breakfast. Oy! Not like I don't already need to go to confession. :ph34r:
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In the Catholic Church are fasts not set then? It's not no oil, meat, wine for X days, wine on these days is OK, fish is OK here-it's more open to the individual?
I had been studying/attending an Eastern Orthodox Church until several months ago, so forgive any questions that seem obvious.
Someone please correct me if I am wrong, but what I have been taught is this:
Ash Wednesday and Good Friday: Fasting is eating only one regular size meal plus two smaller meals, the sum of which cannot equal a full meal (so more like snack size meals)
All Fridays during Lent (though we are to abstain year round, but I have read that if we do eat meat on Fridays outside of Lent we are to serve a different penance): We abstain from eating meat, though fish/seafood is okay, as are things like broth made from meat.
Other than that, I do not believe we have the proscribed fasts like the EO church does. Did I get that right?
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Last year I was nursing a one year old almost around the clock and did not fast (though I abstained from meat on Fridays). This year I am nursing a two year old not quite around the clock. But, also am border-line hypoglycemic and I'm not sure what I should do. I would like to try to observe the fasts (and am fascinated with the idea of making a Lenten-long fast), but I'm not sure how my body would handle that situation. Hmm ... maybe the idea of no sweets/snacks/seconds would work. That way I can make sure I don't spike/crash with my blood sugar and yet can limit food. Anyone else have hypoglycemia issues (or issues where you need regular meals, well, regularly) and have been able to observe a modified fast?
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I just picked one up. I think it'll help us all in the house (somehow being the only full-blown Catholic in the house - dh isn't and the kids have yet to make their FHC - everyone thinks I always have all the answers ;) ).
I was so good all of January not spending anything extra except court shoes for the older two for tennis. Now, in the span of one day, I have spent a small fortune on Amazon. :lol:
I'm not sure if anyone saw this from Elizabeth Foss: A Papal Notebook. I love the idea. I saved the PDFs to the desktop to print later and ordered some of the books to read. I think I'll have the kids focus on this and our memory verses for Lent in their religion composition books between now and Easter. God willing, we'll have a new pope to add to the "notebook" by Easter! :)
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I found his Creation book (series of homilies) very deep as well. Not sure if I would be better served choosing something a little easier for the start of Lent and then graduating to one of those you mentioned.
Does anyone have a"lighter" reflective book to start Lent?
I have the Magnificat Lenten 2013 booklet that I'm hoping to make a nightly reading event. It was only $0.99 for the Kindle (I uploaded it to the Kindle app on the iPad). What about a book about or by a saint? Sometime this year I want to read St. Terese's Story of a Soul and from what I've read/heard, it would be a fantastic book for reflection/meditation.
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So, dh and I finalized Lent. Now I just need to put it on our little calendar print-out and post it on the chalkboard. :) And if anyone is interested, these are the verses we are memorizing over Lent as a family (either from the RSV 2nd Catholic Ed. or the NAB Revised Ed.):
Numbers 6:24-26
Psalm 23 (all of it)
Psalm 118:24
Psalm 143:8
Matthew 22:36-40
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
There are many others we will do eventually, but for reasons I cannot even remember right now, we narrowed in on those. :lol: Seriously, two Bibles and "The Catholic Child's Teaching Bible" between the two of us, verses were flying left and right. I think I'll table John 1:1-4 that the boys and I just begun and maybe make it the first one we work on after Easter. I also eventually want us to memorize some good apologetics verses, but for now we are focusing on ones that help shape us as God followers and ones that can bring comfort, reassurance, and strengthen us.
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My parents always sat in the front pew. Always. Even when we were on vacation at a strange church. As a teenager I was mortified :eek:
As a parent I ALWAYS sit in the front :lol: Except for on vacation----then I remember my teenaged self and sit us somewhere in the front third of the church :D
Actually, it's really hard for me to sit in the front at our church. I keep seeing my parents with us (we would meet for Mass and go to breakfast after starting when DS was born)----and Mom died in November 2009, Dad in October 2011. Sometimes I make it all the way through the Eucharistic Prayer before I start to cry. So hard.
:grouphug:
Hello all-
I'm very sorry for the news about Pope Benedict. I was stunned when I read the headlines this morning.
I hope you don't mind my asking an off topic question...
I have been exploring Catholism since the Fall and though I can't participate in the eucharist I've been attending mass regularly;
which has been lovely though unexpected for me (I come from a born again/non-denominationall background).
Anyhow, I'm wondering with Ash Wed. coming up if I am able to participate in receiving the ashes. And is it done at the ame time as going up to receive communion or is it separate? I'd love to know more of what to expect.
Thanks!
Yes, you can receive ashes. Last year was our first Ash Wednesday mass (and it was just the kids and I as we went during the day and dd - 1 at the time - spit up on the pew when we stood at some part and the woman behind me had to point it out before I sat back down and then she - dd not the woman behind me - kicked off her shoe under the pew and the same woman picked it up for me; I guess I have a couple embarrassing stories of my own!). All of us received ashes. Dh is going with us this year though he's not sure if he will go up for ashes or not, though I've explained to him that it's completely okay for him to do so.
Many blessings to you on your journey! :)
I read the Pope's book on Creation, which I believe was written before he was Pope. What would you recommend next? And did he write any books while Pope?
I'm sure I could try looking it up, but your book suggestions are so wonderful! :)
I'm reading his Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives right now; I'm almost done and have really enjoyed the book. I know I'll eventually have to reread it a few times to really grasp it all. I am debating getting his book on the Holy Week to read during Lent. I find his writing very approachable yet very deep.
Crossing the Tiber - The Master Thread
in The Chat Board
Posted
We watched this morning, starting with the wait for him to emerge from the Apostolic Palace to the arrival at Castel Gandolfo. His blessing to the people in the square was so touching. But nothing really hit until the closing of the gate. It still brings a bit of a tear to my eye thinking about it. I think it was the finality of it all that the gates represented.
I agree with both of you. I don't like this feeling of limbo and feel much more settled as well when we see that white smoke. I guess the only upside is we don't have to wait the customary 15 days for the conclave to begin.