Author Archives: Lisa @ Me & My House

Online Books – The Current Standings

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To wrap up my discussion of online books, I’ll give you a bit of what I’ve come up with in our past 2+ weeks of lessons. Here is a list of the resources we are using and whether the texts are available online or not. I believe I am getting better results than may be normal, because of the topic we are studying, but perhaps not.

Of course, there are other books online that you could use instead of my choices that aren’t online, but I base my choices on the ideas presented in the books, not just the topic of the book. (Same reason why I don’t just trek down to the public library and pick up, for free, any ol’ book on the topic we are studying.)

Spine books:

  • Building the Nation by Charles Coffins – available online (not available through us, out of print)
  • Sketches from Church History – NOT available online, and I haven’t found a preferable substitute online. If you know of a REALLY good one, written at an introductory or child’s level that is online, please let me know.
  • Another Spine option was From Sea to Shining Sea and From Sea to Shining Sea for Children –  (but we aren’t using it this time around) – NOT available online

Missionary Biographies:

  • The ones we chose are NOT available online, but suitable substitutes may be, perhaps even autobiographies of better quality, but perhaps not at the children’s individual levels.

History/Literature:

Youth – History and Government:

  • Universal History in Perspective – NOT available online (out of print), her Abridged History of the United States is available online, if you don’t want the perspective of Universal History in this study.
  • A Basic History of the United States – NOT available online (or from us, but is in print, available through the publisher)
  • Democracy in America – available online part 1 – part 2

I’ll just briefly mention some of our other areas of study tied in, such as the arts. Our Music studies are mainly from The Gift of Music (classical) (and a lot of CD’s) and the Mr. Pipes series (hymns) (and a lot of playing and singing). We have added some internet resources in. I mentioned some of the hymn sites we use in a past post – here. There are many sites with Classical music info, but I haven’t researched them out well enough to know what would be most helpful in studies based on biblical principles.

Our Art studies are mainly from StoneBridge Art Guide, God and the History of Art. I’ve also added in some selections (biographical sketches) from The Christian History of the American Revolution, and a few websites. The internet is super for finding pictures of art pieces.

Our Poetry studies for this study are mainly from American History in Verse. We also use Favorite Poems: Old and New, and various book by individual poets (mainly Dover publications). But I have also found some things online

So… enough for today. There’s a brief synopsis of our “current standings” as to whether our family’s home education could be done for “free” with online resources. To some degree, Yes. But I am very thankful that (except for a few obscure resources) I don’t have to rely on doing that.

 

“Too Hard” Books

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Have you ever run across the “perfect resource”, perhaps a primary source document, but knew it was just “too hard” for the ages/reading levels of your children? You search and search for something “on their level”, but you just can’t find anything that conveys the ideas like “this” resource. What’s a mom to do?

Well, what we don’t have to do is give up and use an inferior resource. We especially don’t have to resort to “twaddle”, just to get “on their level”. We have at least 2 options. Which one to use depends on how “too hard” the book is and our children’s own learning levels.

The first and best option is to Read it to the children. It is easier to understand difficult writings when they are read to us by someone who does understand them, and can read them more fluently and coherantly. If you aren’t able to do this with your resource, can you find it in an audio format that you can all listen to together? The other advantage to this option is you can explain the vocabulary to the children as you go along, if it is still not understood in context. And it will help increase your children’s abilities to understand “hard” books.

The second option that can be helpful, if even reading it to the children is still way over their heads, is to Narrate it to the children. Read the resource yourself and then tell the story of it to your children. It may not be the same “quality” of literature as the original, but it will help you develop your storytelling skills, and will ensure that your children are getting the great ideas that you chose that resource for.

 

Henty’s Living Literature

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I’ve become a convert. We’ve owned many “Hentys”, books written by G.A. Henty, for many years. The girls and I attempted to read some many years ago, and I’ve dabble a bit in the past, but they always seemed slow moving to me, too detailed in interests that were more “boy stuff”. None of the girls ever got into them.

Well, I decided to take up Henty once more, this time through some audios I had bought, mostly through a going out of business sale, (so VERY cheap,) and others with credits I had accumulated at audible.com, or through our CBD links. In listening I immediately recognized my holdback, I want the “real history” story and NOW, rather than to have it slowly woven through the fictional story. That’s just the way I am. I read VERY little fiction. It just isn’t worth the time to me. But recognizing this, helped my to relax, get caught up in and enjoy the story, (as long as I could listen while I was going to bed or getting up, so I wasn’t using time I could be doing something else,) knowing that in the end I would have a good deal of “real history” learned.

Henty has been praised far and wide as the great writer of “boy’s” stories. I knew I couldn’t shun him, but neither was I personally caught up in him. I now know his place – here anyhow.

Although I won’t allow fiction to take the place of “purer” history through source documents, I’ve always advocated literature of the time period to go along with that. I believe Hentys can have a strong place in that position. And I plan to utilize them more in that place. I’m hoping that my boys “catch on” and enjoy them more than the girls did. I may have to hook them with the audio versions too.

P.S. For those of you who want those online books to download – here’s a link at Project Gutenberg, scroll down to Henty.

 

Using Free Online Books

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My conclusions from my “Free Lunch?” posts Parts One and Two.

Yesterday brought frustration. I had the Conclusion to this series on “Free Lunch?” done and ready to post. Along came a “low battery” shut-down, (my old computer just went to sleep, not complete shut down) causing the loss of the entire article. So today I will try to quickly reconstruct my thoughts, which have since moved on to other topics.

This may surprise you after reading Parts 1 and 2 of this series, but I am REALLY grateful for online books. I download MANY of them. One of the reasons is because I LOVE old books. Well, I love BOOKS, but particularly believe that in general it is easier to find GREAT old books, than new books. I have some of those too, but old books have stood the test of time as to their worthiness.

When I hear an old book being recommended, I usually check online to see if it is in “electronic print” there for me to take a look at. I usually read several pages to see if it is something that is worth getting as a  “real” (physical) book. (I have difficulty in, and choose not to, read long books off the computer screen.) Then I begin the search process, both through online “old book” searches, and antique book stores as I’m able, to look for those I particularly am interested in.

If I am unable to find a “real” book of one I really want, (or find a copy I can afford) then I will print it off, knowing that the paper and ink and time are worth it, even though it will not be of “heirloom” quality.

I haven’t done this yet, but I believe if the book is in a “public domain” format, I should be able to have a print service make a hard bound copy for me. Then I will have a more worthy keepsake, though not “heirloom”.

So in conclusion, I have had to eat some of my words, and have realized that many of the books I like to use in our education are indeed available online for free. (Though many also are not.) And you can provide at least a portion of a biblically principled education that is designed for excellency and coherent completeness with “free” resources. But “free” resources are not really free. Are the costs for what you get a worthwhile investment? Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

I am SUPER GRATEFUL to have these resources available. But it is not my goal to base our entire curriculum around only what I am able to find available “for free” online, especially just because it is “free” and easy to find. I will continue to plan our curriculum based on excellent living books and biblical principles. And I will use online books as they fit into that, knowing now that more, in the areas I desire, is available than I had previously thought.

But just like as in the “real” world I don’t generally find most of our resources at the “popular” (currently “in”) home school places, neither will/do I find all the online resources we use at all the “coolest home school hangouts”.

Thank you HL for challenging me in this. I have grown through my researching it out. And no longer will I say that a biblically principled education based on excellence cannot be done, at least in part, using many “free” online resources, for those that choose to use those types of resources (filling in with inter-library loan and a few choice purchases). And for those of you whose library building is a slow process, online books can help you decide which books to buy as the finances allow, and which are worth using, at least for now, in a print out form.

 

Free Lunch? Part 2

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Continuing my “Free Lunch” post …

In choosing my very specific books, planning our latest studies, I came across an old book I really wanted to use that is no longer available. It is part of a series that I love, and have all the others up to that point, but has now gone back out of print. I decided to check my ebook sites that are bookmarked. I found it! I also decided, since my time was already stretched to the max – so why not spend more time :-/, to look for other books we are using this year, just to see if they are available for free online. I found many of them (disclaimer – for this study, in these areas. I’m not vouching for my complete curriculum.)

I still hold that many of the foundational books we use, books that are key to our studies and therefore I’d not give up, can not be found “free on the internet”. Perhaps many (probably not all) of these could be ordered through Interlibrary loan, if necessary.

Probably my great question about a “free” education this way is, “Is it really?” I won’t even factor in the cost of the Internet, but will say I can teach my children wholly without it, the “old fashioned” way, with books. But we’ll allow it as a given since it will probably be an expense incurred even outside of education. If your “reason” for having the Internet IS education, then begin the cost of education at approx. $400-500 per year for Internet. I won’t include the computer itself into the cost either, but did you buy a computer “for school”? Need a second one for the kids, for school? These are costs that aren’t part of our “education” – so I’ll allow them as “no added cost”, although if you have several children and they are all reading all their lessons off a compter, you probably have had to buy an extra one or more – or are printing all the books, (see below). Books – I’ll also count them as “Free”. (I’ll allow the possibility that you can find ALL the books you want to use on the Internet for “free”. Although in reality I don’t believe this to be true. Although it MAY be somehow possible, I doubt that it is wholly realistic for a complete, coherent, bibical principles basced education to find EVERY resource for “free”. If someone can prove me wrong, it is an area in which I would be happy to eat my words.)

So here’s the cost. Are you going to print out all of those books you find or read them on the screen? Reading on the screen is “free” (fi you didn’t buy extra computers). But at what cost to your eyesight? Reading onscreen for many hours a day is not really a good choice for children (or adults). The cost may be your vision. That’s a high price to pay.

The other alternative is to print out your books. Have you totaled the costs of ink and paper? I’m told that the way to go is a laser printer, far cheaper per page for large amounts of printing – but a big initial investment. And not usually what you have at home already connected to your computer. Did you add that laser printer into your cost of “free” education?

What about the end result? Say you’ve printed off all these books. How did you bind them? Put them in a 3 prong folder? Use brads and duct tape? A 3 ring binder? Comb/spiral binding? All of these have various costs, granted some negligible. But what quality of “book” do you have? Not an heirloom to pass on or even a cheap paperback to resell.

But the greatest “cost” factor I see, is that your children don’t see the value of books. They are just something we print out, and possibly throw away when we’re done. They don’t see books as worthy property, worth sacrificing for. So is education really worth much?

As my children learned early on in Economics, TANSTAAFL – There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. [unrelated article on TANSTAAFL]

Conclusion? Stay tuned… You may really be surprised!
Read it here.

 

Looking for a Free Lunch?

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I wonder how that title will come up in search engines. But I don’t write for search engines, I write my thoughts – to provoke you to think. This post is on how someone else provoked me to think. And how I am in the process of eating my words – at least to some degree.

In corresponding on a home school elist, I stated that I didn’t know that how I plan our studies could be done “free”, that we use specific books and that I am very careful about the books we use, and that in general we look for books written from a biblical (or at least not ANTI-biblical) viewpoint.

I admit, before going on, that I have something others may not have – a love for great books. If you don’t have one, you should begin to cultivate one. It’s truly necessary, espeically for an educator and parent. I have been collecting good books all my life, since I was a child. I truly agree with Erasmus that, “When I get a little money, I buy books. If there is any left over I buy food and clothes.” Obviously this is hyperbole, but building a great library is a love of mine, inherited from my dad. I own thousands of books and am constantly weeding out things that don’t fit the highest of standards to make room for more truly great books. (I don’t buy or keep twaddle. If there is a “just ok” or “twaddley” book we want to read, we’ll borrow it from the public library.) I will also say I am a major bargain shopper and my library has cost FAR less than it is worth. Never pay full price for anything if you can in anyway get it legitimately for less!

On the other side, and the reason that prompted my reply to the elist, I see many home educators “now-a-days” that are just looking for how to home school for FREE. The quality doesn’t matter, the content doesn’t matter, all that matters is that it is FREE – and for some, another qualification is a “heap o’ fun”! Although I thoroughly believe learning should be one of the greatest joys of life, “fun” and “free” aren’t my qualifying prerogatives in providing my children an excellent education. I have nothing against either, they just aren’t my goals. A good education is worth sacrificing for, not a free add-on; and education requires labor, not just fun and games.

Back to my “lunch” story. We use some great newer books, some/many are not ones you find at home school curriculum fairs or on swap lists. We also use some great old books, again not always the popular reprints. It obviously takes (has taken) time to come up with the curriculum I write for our children and the book lists I put together. I have to admit I was thinking in terms of my already stretched to the limit time constraints. Is that really “free”?

But she did get me to thinking, could what we do be done by those who truly had no ability to build a library?

To be continued … here.

 

States Study

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I’m not doing a 50 States study, but I do have a friend planning one. (Our state study is more ongoing, integrated throughout our history studies.) She asked me about this book – which I don’t have (and haven’t seen) but is a good way to approach this – by reading real books from each state. (We somewat do this as we go along.) I’m not vouching for their book choices, since I haven’t seen them, but I like the idea of having a pre-put-together book list for this purpose, and I think they provide several to choose from.

From a couple of homeschool-publisher-internet-friends I know of  2 resources that may be a help to go with this. (One I have, the other I have “part” of.) These are both what I consider “enrichment” type resources. (See my last post – we don’t teach for the sake of information, but for understanding ideas. Information is definitely a by-product though, as ideas always apply to information.) But these present a more enjoyable way of “getting” the information part you may want them to remember – after you’ve presented and they understand the ideas.

The first, State Study Notebooking Pages, is from NotebookingPages.com. It is a set of Notebooking pages for each of the States. That is, a separate set for each State, not a generic set to apply to all. AND at a great price for the whole set. You don’t have to search for each state flag and bird and seal and flower and tree and song, etc. She has them all right there for you! Oh, and they are on sale for the next couple days too!

The second from Homeschool with Index Cards. 50 States Card Set is a set of index cards for learning the states, capitals, abbreviations and flags. Use them for making a game or as flashcards. Dirt cheap, so it isn’t worth making your own.

Both are available by download, so you can have them TODAY!

A few other resources we have used include:

96709: Map of the United States Sticker Picture Map of the United States Sticker Picture
By Pat Stewart / Dover PublicationsYour Children can add the state sticker to the map when you study each state.

United States Coloring Book (also by Dover, but not available through us)  This one includes the flower, bird, tree, nickname, on the page. Just one page per state. Dover also has a State Birds and Flowers Coloring Book and a National Parks Coloring Book.

States & Capitals, Activity Book & CD
By Homeschool / Twin Sisters Productions“It’s been shown that singing something helps kids remember facts better than rote memorization. …” My children like these types of songs for learning info.

I also have an old cassette of a Patriotic musical our church did for the community many years ago with many songs that I still remember, including the names of all the states. I think it was called, “Liberty.” It’s been over 22 years.

Enough for today. For us this all is used in expanding our Geography Foundations within our HisStory studies. Which I’ll tell more about some other day.

 

Ideas or Information?

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Which is the basis of your education? What do your goals generally look like? Are they to learn the names and dates of Presidents and Kings or are they to understand the ways men govern and how man’s character affects his governing? Are they to memorize the parts of speech and list of prepositions or are they to communicate clearly God’s message they have to share? Rather than going on with examples I’ll just ask, do you think the goal of education is to memorize reams of information? Do you think little children can’t learn ideas such as these?

Surely you’ve heard the old adage, “Great people talk about ideas. Small people talk about other people.” (I’ve seen it attributed to Tobias Gibson.) Think about what people talk about in society – the weather and other trivial facts, other people, themselves (the smallest of people surely fit here), and ideas. Can you not see that the adage is true?

Yes, religion and politics can bring disagreement in discussion, but they are the seedbed of ideas. All of life goes back to the core questions all of man has, whether he seeks their answers or seeks to avoid them, “Who is God?” and “Who is man?” and “What has God done?” and “How then is man to live?” You cannot escape religion and government in discussing ideas, because these are core to life itself. It is in the discussion of ideas that the mind grows – that society grows. And in discussing ideas, a child and a child’s mind grows.

There are educational philosophies that believe in teaching the great ideas, but — only in the later years of education. They spend the early years filling the child with facts to memorize. They believe the child will have something to think on and understand later, if he is full of facts first.

I respectfully disagree. A young child truly can reason and understand. Granted, not at the level of an adult, we grow in wisdom and understanding. But a child wants ideas; he longs for ideas; he continually asks “Why?” We’ve given a child a false misconception of value by granting our exuberant praise for rattling off a list he has memorized, rather than for his question of “Why?” Do we not see that a child who asks “Why?” has a hunger for learning. He desires growth. A child trained to rattle off information for praise has a hunger for self-acclamation. Knowledge truly puffs up. Surely we desire our children to hunger for growth in life and character more than self-acclaim and pride.

Does our basis of ideas mean we do not teach facts? Of course not! That would be impossible. As a Christian growth (not education) seminar I attended years ago taught, “Knowledge does not lead to wisdom. Wisdom always leads to knowledge.” It fits perfectly in our style of education. Information does not of itself lead to anything but parroting of knowledge. Ideas always apply to information. They are studied out in their very applications.

Learning ideas is our goal. We teach information within the context of ideas to give the information meaning. Learning is not just “knowledge.” It is wisdom, understanding, and knowledge – the proper understanding of knowledge and application of truth. As God’s Word teaches, “knowledge puffs up.” Men are “ever increasing in knowledge but never coming to the truth.” Yet, the “Lord gives wisdom, from His mouth come knowledge and understanding.” “Add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge….” In my words, teach information within the context of ideas, with the understanding and application of the ideas being the goal of the lesson. That is, above all teach Biblical ideas (principles) as the foundation of all of education and life.

 

God and Government

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One of our favorite governments resources, for parents planning lessons and/or teens studying independently, is God and Government by Gary DeMar. This course, containing 3 books [updated in 2013 to 1 hardback covering all], presents the foundations of all governments – not just the civil government that most people think of, but also home and church governments. By presenting “foundations” I don’t mean just introductory basic facts, but foundational principles, thinking through and reasoning how Biblical governments should operate and why.

There are 10 lessons in each of the 3 books, so at one lesson per week the course can be completed in a year. For a teen working through this, there is nothing you need to prepare to teach or for the lessons. Each lesson has a short introduction to read that will establish the context, then discussion questions to answer, mainly by looking up Scripture and reasoning the answer from it. Other resources are noted if needed, such as sections of the Constitution. Then a short summary is given to focus you on the main theme. Then comprehensive answers to the discussion questions are given.

It is best if you can set a bit of time to discuss with the student – or students with each other – once each week. I believe this is true in any learning, a student should have a place to share what he’s learning. This can even be over the dinner table. You don’t have to do all the research for the lesson yourself to discuss it, (unless you have time and want to). You can just use the provided answers. And they don’t expect students to come to such thorough answers on their own.

I really like their perspective, that the studies should not go on and on. “It is best for the student to want more than for them to say that they have had enough.”!! They encourage applying the principles learned to current events – especially issues that arise in elections – and constructing “biblical solutions that can replace humanistic policies and programs.”

If the student is interested in learning more about a topic, in the back of the book it lists further suggested reading by topics. Additional reading can either be left to the student himself to pursue according to his interest in various topics, or assigned.

If you want your student to write more in-depth essays on certain topics you can always assign those after your discussions, asking him to do further research and write out his reasoning through the topic Biblically.

There are a couple other resources that we like particularly for American Civil Government – one for pre-teens and one for upper teens. Hopefully I will complete our Governments Resources and Recommendations page soon with reviews of them.

 

HisStory Plans – 1800’s Part 2

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Continuing our HisStory plans for the 1800’s.

In addition to the primary resources we will use for our study, we will also utilize biographies and other living histories, some from the Sower series, some from CLP, some from the Leaders in Action series – see our HisStory Biographies Resources & Recommendations for more links. Others may be from the “Christian Heroes” and “Heroes” of History series by Janet and Geoff Benge, as well as a few old originals I’ve picked up. Other links on our HisStory Resources & Recommendations pages for the 1800’s.

The children will each choose different ones to read. We will obviously not cover all of these. These will cover People (listed in no particular order) such as Robert E Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Lewis and Clark, Noah Webster, Adoniram Judson, Francis Scott Key, Daniel Webster, Daniel Boone, Davy Crockett, Samuel F.B. Morse, Johnny Appleseed, Jed Smith, Marcus and Narcissa Whitman, Abraham Lincoln, J.E.B. Stuart, Clara Barton, Harriet Tubman, Booker T Washington, David Livegstone, George Washington Carver, Matthew Fontaine Maury, William Carey, Hudson Taylor, George Mueller, Amy Carmichael, Florence Nightingale, Dwight Moody, Charles Spurgeon, Fanny Crosby – and I haven’t even listed the scientists and other important names such as Robert Fulton, Louis Pasteur, Helen Keller,  Louis Braille and I could go on and on. (Yes, I really do have biographies on all of these and others, some of them more than one.)

There are just a few I want to look at in more depth. We will probably read those aloud. Others we will just read short biographical sketches. Others the children will choose and read on their own.

Living histories we will include as read alouds are:

  • Of Courge Undaunted by James Daugherty
  • Our Flag Was Still There by Tracy Leininger
  • The Alamo, the California Gold Rush, and the Pioneers will be studied through living histories – perhaps not full books unless time allows.
  • Boys of ’61 by Charles Coffin may be more detailed than we choose to pursue on the war itself. But we will use parts of it.
  • Christ in the Camp by J. William Jones – may not use all of this either and it will probably be used by high schoolers.
  • Oliver Optic’s fictional works from this time period are loved by our children.
  • With Lee in Virginia will probably be listened to since we have that on audio.
  • Democracy in America by Tocqueville and other primary source documents will be included too, mainly by high schoolers.

Videos we’ll watch/ audio we’ll listen to include:

We plan to spend more time on the Civil War and “Reconstruction” than any other thing in this time period, looking at the causes and effects.

Literature is the “handmaiden of history”. It shows us the Ideas of the times. We have far more Literature we’d like to read from this time period than we will get to. Some prominent authors we’ll choose from include, Dickens, Eliot, Austin, Wilder, Twain, Cather, Optic, London, and a few others, as well as poets. Many of our favorite Lamplighter Publishing “Rare Collectors Series” are from this time period. I’ll list some of these resources we choose at another time.

Also we will include science, the arts, music, architecture, etc. from the time period.