We haven't studied it yet, but have the following bookmarked. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Trumpeter_of_Krakow for an overview. http://cfge.wm.edu/navigators/The_Trumpeter_of_Krakow.pdf

Hi Carmen, I have a beginner spelling program available at http://www.lulu.com/hannahw. It can be viewed in its entirety there. I have not completed level 2 as things have got really busy around here (I work morning) and something 'clicked' with my dd and she does not need as much directed instruction. We moved on to dictation from Spelling Wisdom.

What an amazing performance! She is an incredible artist. Thanks for posting this Bill. World War II (called the Great Patriotic War in the Ukraine) resulted in one in four of the population of 42 million being killed in that country. This is from the telegraph.co.uk "She begins by creating a scene showing a couple sitting holding hands on a bench under a starry sky, but then warplanes appear and the happy scene is obliterated. It is replaced by a woman’s face crying, but then a baby arrives and the woman smiles again. Once again war returns and Miss Simonova throws the sand into chaos from which a young woman’s face appears. She quickly becomes an old widow, her face wrinkled and sad, before the image turns into a monument to an Unknown Soldier. This outdoor scene becomes framed by a window as if the viewer is looking out on the monument from within a house. In the final scene, a mother and child appear inside and a man standing outside, with his hands pressed against the glass, saying goodbye.

My dd loves art as well and does a lot on her own. She listens to the music of our "composer of the month", programs on Classics for Kids or the Vox "The story of..." CD's while she draws or paints or does a craft.

I'm not sure how much dd benefitted in Gr1, but now that she is in Gr4, the timeline fascinates her. Together with the memory cards we use, it has helped to cement the "big history picture". I intend leaving the timeline up for our 2nd history rotation (and first with younger daughter) and have elder dd do a timeline book to fill in herself and make her own.

I'm not sure what kind of books you're looking for, but I found this list on Amazon. It may be a good starting point. If you're going to go on a safari, I highly recommend "The Safari Companion" by Richard D. Estes

If you're looking for adult books there are a few available on Southern African trees and wild flowers at at Amazon. For children there are colouring books, but I can only find them on our local book site called Loot.co.za This Wikipedia article lists and links some trees of South Africa. This page has photographs of indigenous plants.

We bought a digital microscope off Ebay for about US$40 (including postage). It has 50x to 200x magnification and has met all our needs thus far.

It seems to be out of stock at Loot.co.za, but you may be able to find it elsewhere and I highly recommend a book called "All About South Africa" by Brian Barker-Johnson. There's a limited preview at Google Books. It is probably for older students than grade 2, but has a good overview of various aspects of South Africa (history, wildlife, culture, etc.). We use it as the spine for our history studies. For study of animals try My first book of Southern African Mammals and this one for birds. If you don't mind the price, then you can buy a complete literature based curriculum from Footprints on Our Land. The Little Footprints series is sold for ages 4-8 and uses mostly picture books. Unit studies are built around each book - along the lines of FIAR. The Footprints on our Land series is for primary school and uses many of the same books I've listed in the files of the Yahoo group that Paige referred to (thanks for the reference!). Most are out of print and the Footprints people have had them re-printed with plain covers. Your mom might be able to find out how many of the books are available at her local library. You can also look at Bookchat for recommendations on South African children's books. Hope you have a great trip "home"! Please ask if you need more info.

We are halfway through SOTW3 and from the start have done a "History Club" one afternoon a week with two other families. We read the SOTW chapter, do narrations/summaries/worksheets, additional reading, colouring and mapwork at home according to each families schedule and the three Moms prepare the activities. We use the AG or if we don't like what's in the AG, 120 Great History Projects or find something online to substitute. We have an hour and a half set aside each week, so the number of activities depend on how intricate they may be. Doing it together benefits the children as each Mom has different craft skills and something one enjoys the other might not. It also keeps up the standard! All that to say that, depending on your skills and interests, you may enjoy doing a suggested activity that another person may find daunting.

I signed up for this when when my eldest dd was 5 (and I have to say it was a lot cheaper then than it is now) and used the phonics program to teach her to read. I liked it because - its all available online (postage costs are always a killer for us) - it has lesssons for the teacher and worksheets for the child that systematically go through the phonemes. - as soon as the child has mastered blending and a few letters, she can start reading the booklets.

I'm totally impressed with the planning (and perfect execution) that must have taken!! Do they have boys as well?

I would definitely go for a more proficient use of 1 language. As far as motivation, I think being proficient in a second language will open doors for him in whatever career he chooses in the future. He will have knowledge that others don't and that will create opporunities for him.

I googled history timeline and Classical Conversations hand motions and found a couple of Youtube videos of people doing the classical conversations sentences with hand motions. http://www.youtube.com/user/TheContrerasFamily http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBw6a9fq7hk Is the chant your daughter learned anything like the ones above? I'm not very creative, but I think $99 is rather pricey for something one could probably put together oneself. Any takers to collaborate on motions to go with the following sentences (from SOTW1)? You could change or add to the sentences as you'd like. • Sumerian Cuneiform was the earliest known writing developed around 3200 BC • King Narmer unified upper and lower Egypt in 3000BC. • Huang Di - The Yellow Emperor reigned in China from 2698 to 2599 BC. • Cheops built the Great Pyramids at Giza in 2500BC. • Sargon the Great of Akkad began the conquest of Sumer and found the Akkadian empire in 2360BC. • The Minoans lived on the island of Crete around 2200 BC. • Abraham is considered the founder of the Hebrews and lived in 2100BC. • Mohenjo-daro was a city of the Indus Valley civilization in India around 2000BC. • Hammurabi became the leader of Babylon and produced a code of laws in 1790BC. • The Hyksos conquered Egypt about 1640 BC. • The Mycenaeans lived in Peloponnesus, the southern peninsula of Greece, between 1900 – 1100 BC. • Queen Hatshepsut of Egypt reigned during the New Kingdom around 1480BC. • Amenhotep IV worshiped the god Atena and abolished the other gods Egyptians worshipped in 1350BC. • Tuthankhamen, the boy pharaoh, reigned Egypt during the New Kingdom around 1333BC. • The Exodus: Moses and the Israelites left Egypt in 1270BC. • The Phoenicians were the best sailors in the Ancient world and were famous for their war-ships. 1000BC. • Homer’s composed his poems the Iliad and the Odyssey in 800BC. • Rome was founded in 753 BC. • Ashurbanipal was the last king of Assyria and reigned from 668 to 627 BC. • King Nebuchadnezzar built the hanging gardens of Babylon, one of the seven wonders of the Ancient World in 580 BC. • Prince Siddhartha Gautama of India later became known as the Buddha – meaning the “Awakened One.” He taught meditation & mindfulness as a way to enlightenment. • Cyrus the Great was the founder of the Persian Empire and reigned from 559 to 525 BC. • Confucius in China was born in 551 BC. He taught his followers to be peaceful, honest and kind. • The Peloponnesian Wars were between Sparta and Athens and lasted 60 years. • Alexander the Great who lived from 356-323 BC, built an empire from Greece to India. • The Punic Wars were fought between Rome and Cartage from 250-150 BC. • Shih Huang Ti, known as the “First Emperor” unified China for the first time. During his Chin Dynasty he began constructing the Great Wall of China in 221 BC. • Julius of Caesar, who established the Roman Empire, died in 44BC. • Octavian declared himself Emperor Caesar Augustus, marking the birth of Imperial Rome in 30 BC. • Jesus Christ was born in Bethlehem in 4BC. There are memory cards and timeline to go with these at the files section of this Yahoo Group. I've also done some for SOTW2 and pictures and cards for SOTW3.

Thanks for sharing Dawn!

I am too! We can get 5 books each for two weeks at a time, so 20 books per family. Our library has no audio or DVD. It serves a community of about 40 000 and it had an official budget of US$ 1500 for all new purchases last year. It supplemented this with donations. The staff is paid by the local municipality. I was about to whine some more about how poor our library is until I read this. We're fortunate!! Although there is little money for new books there are many good ones from the 70's and 80's when it still had money for purchases. The classics are all there.

1. Computer. 2. Coffee. I just don't function without that first cup. And have more during the day. 3. Books. We have a serious shelving problem! Many books are bargains that I picked up 2nd hand and will be used for school in the years ahead. I walk around with booklists in my purse. 4. Bookmooch (and adding to my wishlist) ties in with 1 and 3 above. 5. Chocolate!! Dh's 1. Work 2. Books. Unlike me, he reads what he buys! We're not packrats in general, but we're both contributing to the shelving problem.

I think she's so used to fulfilling her duties in our house that she slipped into her known role even though it was outside of her working hours. She's a fantastic au pair and we're extremely happy with her. I think talking to our neighbour might be a good place to start. If that doesn't work, then I'll have to talk to her. I feel awkward telling her directly that I don't like her visiting us because we all do like her and I wouldn't like to hurt her feelings, but will have to if the visiting continues.

Thanks for your advice! I'll have to work up the courage to speak to him, even though he may take it personally. He’s leaving again for a few weeks abroad, so there's a bit of time.

I have to admit that I took a double take when I saw it the first time!

We were very close to an elderly neighbour from a few houses down who passed away three years ago. Her son (in his fourties) inherited the house and we extended our friendship to him. He uses the house over weekends and keeps an apartment in the city. He works all over the world, so we’d see his girlfriend and him every few weeks. Her son would come over to play with our daughter. At the beginning of the year he split up with his girlfriend and we’d see more of him while he was here. I’ve always been friendly and would offer coffee and cake when he popped in (always unannounced and uninvited) and enjoy his stories of his travels. Over the months, he started spending more time here and would sit and watch sport with my husband and help me with small chores. He was starting to overstay his welcome a bit, but we put up with him, feeling sorry for him being lonely. In May, he met our au pair at my younger daughter’s birthday party. She is 26 yo, lives with her parents in town and for the last 4.5 years, has cared for and helped my older dd with homeschooling while I work mornings. The neighbour and au pair started dating and are now a couple. The problem is that he now brings our au pair along with him when he comes over (still uninvited). Yesterday, they were here twice. The first time I offered coffee and sat down with them. Dh was preparing food for dinner guests and continued with what he was doing. We have an open-plan living area, so he was part of the conversation. After an hour when I said I needed to leave to drop elder dd off at her riding lesson, they said they were on their way to town anyway and would drop her off. Before they went, our au pair helped her with her hair. They dropped in again two hours later on the way back from town! This time, younger dd and I were playing with dough, so the au pair joined us in this activity. She then went upstairs with dd to help her get something (as she’d do while on duty). They then sat down with dh who was watching a rugby game. I sat with them for a while, but then announced that I didn’t care to watch and needed to continue with cleaning a chair, which I then did. I feel bad about being rude to them (well, not sitting down and entertaining them), but at the same time, I don’t like that they just come around so unannounced and so often. And other than children’s birthday parties, I’m also not very comfortable with having a social relationship with our au pair. We’ve always got on well, she’s absolutely wonderful with my children who love her dearly and she is a lovely person, but she’s still my employee. I’m hoping that my rude behaviour put them off, but I expect that we’ll see them again later today and I really don’t know how to deal with the situation. Your thoughts?

I've seen neither of these lists before and they're both great - thanks for posting Meryl! I have found great ideas just by googling Grade 'X' (or Year 'Y' for the UK) reading list and finding the lists that come up for various schools. For the same aged child, the UK years are one ahead of the USA grades (i.e. Year 5 = Grade 4, Year 6 = Grade 5).

I have three hours alone at home this afternoon!! The first time in years. I'm going to sit on the coach, watch trashy TV, drink good coffee, eat bon-bons and try to ignore the to-do list completely!

You can try Storynory.

Around here it is more common as a surname. As are the other months of the year.