Read-Aloud Thursday: Biographies

We've read two very good biographies this week that I'd like to share with you.    The first, Alexander the Great: Ruler of the Ancient World, was a book I ordered simply by searching for books on this topic on Amazon.    It got very good reviews, and I knew we wanted to go a little more in depth with Alexander than Volume 1 of Story of The World goes.... this book was just perfect!    I'd recommend it if you're studying Alexander the Great.   


I got a wonderful idea last year from Heather at Blog, She Wrote.  She suggests leaving books you'd like the children to read just setting around your home in prominent places.   I left this one sitting on our kitchen island (hey, they have to go there for meals and snacks, so eventually they'd see the book) and my daughter picked it up and started reading.  At that point I invited the children to the sofa and we read it together - perfect!!   


The second book was given to us by a retired woman in our church.  She loves my children and brought me a bag of things for me to use with them.  She had bought this book at a museum in Atlanta when a Georgia O'Keeffe exhibit was in town.   I have to tell you - I've fallen in love with O'Keeffe's works and would like to learn even more myself.  My Name is Georgia is a beautiful, simple story told through the artist's eyes.   This point of view really intrigued my children.    We read the book out loud on the way home from church and by the time we were in the door we had to Google some of her works.    I need to see if our museum in Atlanta has some of her works because I would love to see them.  

Photo credit

I hadn't planned an artist study for this week, but this one was thrown in my lap, so we ran with it.  I found this great activity which we will do this week on fun Friday.  


General read-alouds this week include dad finishing Shiloh Season (kids are loving this!), mom reading The Adventures of Pinocchio with GMan, and we are still reading The Bronze Bow - oh, that is a marvelous book!    Our book on CD is nearly finished - Peter Pan - we are thoroughly enjoying that as well.   


What are you reading aloud this week?    Visit Amy, at Hope is The Word to link your post!  

Not Back to School Blog Hop - Our School Room

Last year at this time, I blogged about our new school room!  Unlike most things in my life, this area has remained virtually unchanged in the past year... it has worked quite well for us to have a room dedicated to our learning.   We are fortunate enough to have a bonus room which serves as the "stopping point" for all things school.   

Notice I say a "stopping point".   We do not officially "do school" in this room.   Most often we are downstairs at the kitchen or dining room table, or wherever our fancy strikes.    I found it really stifled our spirit to be sitting in one place all day.   This setup worked for about a week, and then we were ALL going nuts.


This is what our homeschool room is used for:

* a place to store all of our wonderful materials
* a place to display artwork, maps, etc...   

* a place where mom has her computer and printer and plans all of the lessons

* a quiet place if someone needs to get away to work on a project in peace/or has an art project that needs to stay spread out for a few days.

* a guest bedroom (we have a sleeper sofa in this room, too!)

*when dad works from home (which isn't all that often); it is his "office" -- the computer is here and he can close the door and work without hearing the rest of the house.

I dedicated a full closet to our supplies:  

This is the opposite side of the room... with a bookshelf for all of the teacher's resources, and also an entertainment center.   The room also doubles as a guest bedroom and the Wii is hidden behind those doors.    Those doors remain CLOSED during the week and only open on the Wii-kends!   We may use the television if we want to watch something on Netflix streaming, and we also have a DVD/VCR for watching educational movies.  

In the past year I have added a small system of shelving underneath one of the windows to hold our ever-growing library!   I have countless books in boxes in our attic, too, which I rotate through the shelves.   I love that these shelves are adjustable and can fit anything from our Magic Treehouse and Boxcar Children books, to larger reference books.   You can also configure them any way you would like.    

My favorite things are still the metal bins I purchased at Target to hold books current to specific subjects.  

The longer we homeschool, the more I realize that school takes place EVERYWHERE, not just in one room of the house.  It is an attitude and a lifestyle that certainly can't be contained to one room in your home.   

You can have school by the fireplace when it's cold outside: 

You can also enjoy a cool, Fall morning reading on the deck!

Or, you can birdwatch from the comfort of your family room!

  

This post is linked to the the Not Back to School Blog Hop!  It's School Room Week!

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