Classic Literature and a Disney Trip

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When we decided we were going to Disney World, I knew I wanted to incorporate it into our schooling leading up to the trip. I wanted real, authentic, learning that would also keep them excited about the trip and help them make connections along the way. I decided to focus on literature tie-ins with Disney. There are some obvious choices like the fairy tale stories of the various princesses, but I wanted to interest a thirteen-year-old boy, a twelve-year-old girl, and a five-year-old boy so I was looking for something a little different. We decided to focus on some of the literature classics that Disney had turned into both movies and theme park attractions.

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Conveniently, my daughter’s literature curriculum already had her reading Tom Sawyer. My older son had previously read the book, but decided to listen to the audio book as a refresher. Once we were at the parks, they loved the opportunity to explore ‘Tom Sawyer’s Island’ in the Magic Kingdom. They had the chance to go down into ‘mine tunnels’, cross barrel bridges, explore a fort, and check out an old windmill. In addition to Tom Sawyer, you could choose some other Mark Twain inspired attractions. Twain is featured on the steamboat ride, the American Adventure in Epcot and more.

I decided thatPeter Pan would be a great choice for the whole family. We purchased this one on audio bookand began listening before we left for our trip and listened a bit while we were traveling. I do want to note that we used an unabridged version of the book and there were several instances of inappropriate language ( I have found this to be fairly common in older British literature). We enjoyed the Peter Pan’s Flight ride in Magic Kingdom and look forward to using the Disney movie for a family movie night soon!

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We had listened toAlice in Wonderland earlier in the year prior to watching a play based on the book. The story can get a bit crazy but the children enjoyed it and The Mad Tea Party ride was one of their favorites! We managed to ride that one three or four times while we were there. We did not try them but they even have themed snacks at the restaurant next door to the ride.

With my five-year-old in mind, but knowing we would all enjoy it, we also listening to the House at Pooh Corner. This was a great choice because it was a fun and easy story and there were lots of connections to be made. We rode the Pooh Corner ride and had dinner with Pooh, Eeyore, Piglet, and Tigger. We also had the chance to meet Pooh over in the England section of Epcot.

Our final selection was Swiss Family Robinson. This book is such a fun classic tale of adventure that all of my children enjoyed. Disney has an awesome replica of the tree house that you can walk through and enjoy seeing the various rooms as described in the book. Even better, there was no wait time for this attraction so it was a great way to take a break from the lines and enjoy a more leisurely pace in the shade.

There are lots of ways to incorporate learning into your Disney trip, but we really enjoyed making the connections with literature. It also kept the children entertained as we listened on the long road trip down to Florida. There are many options that we didn’t have time to cover that could be used for a variety of aged and interests. What is your favorite book that has a Disney connection?

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If you are looking to add some new electives or switch up some of your classes, SchoolhouseTeachers.comis having a great sale and you can get a whole year for $99, that is over 400 courses to use with all of your children for one low price.

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Smartick (check out our full review here) is offering a 25% off discount if you use this referral link! Elizabeth is still loving this program.

A Peek Into Our Morning Basket

We finished up a few of our morning basket activities from last semester and realized that a few others, while great resources, were not working with our current dynamics. Therefore, I spent some time streamlining and revamping our plans for this semester to make sure that we could successfully accomplish our morning time without overwhelming me.

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First I considered my priorities. I knew Bible was the most important so I put that in place. Then I determined what other items I really wanted to include and could include without overwhelming us.

I knew that Bible time together was my primary goal; it was the one thing I wanted to do each day even if we couldn’t get to anything else. Our church was starting a study using the book Core 52 and we decided to use that for our morning time Bible study. We are only one week in, but so far it is a great fit.

Our MorninG Basket

We all enjoy our hymn study time, but sometimes we have finished studying the hymn of the month and I was struggling to remember to find other options. This semester, I am choosing one hymn each month for our hymn study but my son is choosing one hymn or praise song each week to share with us. In this way, we can go in-depth into one song but also learn three or four other songs in just a couple minutes each day.

We will be using read aloud time to cover a variety of topics from missionary biographies, Shakespeare, economics (Tuttle Twins), and poetry. Instead of trying to cover multiple subjects in a day or even a week, we are going to have all of the books for the semester in a basket and read one at a time. We will read for a few minutes each day until we are done with that book and then choose the next book.

We will be continuing to do art with Nana over at ChalkPastel.com but have decided that it fits better in our afternoon time than our morning basket time. We are going to read about some artists during our read aloud time. Also, I am considering adding a bit of Simply Charlotte Mason picture study to our morning basket, but I want us to get in a good routine of Bible, music, and read aloud each morning before I add anything else to the mix.

I have included a list of the resources we are using this semester below and I would love to hear what you are using for your morning basket. Please share in the comments!

Morning Time Resources:

Core 52

Who Was Walt Disney

Tuttle Twins

The Father Brown Reader

Tales From Shakespeare (Wordsmith Children’s Classics)

Better Together (a great book for moms to help you organize your morning time or get renewed inspiration)

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Little Women is only .99 on kindle right now! (Amazon prices subject to change always check before purchasing.)

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All About Learning has released the best deal of the day: A FREE Snowman Pack with reading and spelling activities for a variety of ages.

Free Makeover Your Morning 5 Day Challenge! This is a great way to help re-focus and get your day off on the right foot.

Harry The Happy Mouse (Free on Kindle)

Illustrated Would You Rather Book (Free on Kindle)

Free Help Your Child’s Memory Book from All About Learning Press!

Smartick (check out our full review here) is offering a 25% off discount if you use this referral link! Elizabeth is still loving this program.

Fabulous Four Morning Routine (Free Printable)

Between a toddler who like to rise early, a five year old that loves attention, teens who don’t like going to bed early, homeschooling, and blogging, I often feel like my time is not my own and I can get frustrated when I do not accomplish all of my goals for the day. It is so easy for the urgent (screaming toddler or ringing phone) to side track me from the important (Bible Time). In an effort to be realistic about what I can accomplish each day, move me closer to my goals, and stay focused on my priorities I created a little program I am calling the fabulous four.

These are four things I will accomplish each day. For me, three of those things will remain the same each day: devotional/Bible time, morning time, and physical activity. I want to make sure that I get a personal devotional time each day. Ideally, I do this early in the morning but even if it waits until afternoon nap time, the prayer and Bible reading is important and beneficial. Our family loves morning time together as a way to start our school day and encourage family learning. However, lately I have not been as consistent as I should and I really want to refocus on that time even amidst the interruptions of the toddler. I need physical activity each day for both my mental and physical health. I have plans to walk several days a week with a neighbor and hope to either walk or do Fit2B workouts (with or without the children) on the other days. The fourth will be the whatever item on my to-do list is most important for the day. Hopefully, I will accomplish many other items on my list that day, but this will help me prioritize and give me a good reminder that I can’t do everything.

morning devotion

I chose those first three items because they are things that are important to me and areas where I desire to be more consistent. You may have other areas that you would like to focus on such as, a particular chore, dinner prep, read aloud time, etc. I think the important thing is to have a reminder of what you want to accomplish to help you stay on track. I hope that this concept helps me to be more consistent with those habits that I want to focus on and encourages me to remember the important tasks even in the midst of the ‘urgent’.

I have included a free printable of the Fabulous Four Morning Checklist that I am using. You could print them out for each day and put them in a binder, but my plan is to put a copy into a plastic sleeve so that I can use a dry erase marker each day to track my accomplishments. I would love to know what habits or tasks you are trying to be more consistent with and how you plan to focus on those this year.

Fabulous Four Morning Checklist

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Deals and Freebies

$10 off $10 coupon for Evan-Moor Books makes for some great deals or maybe even a freebie!

Little Women is only .99 on kindle right now! (Amazon prices subject to change always check before purchasing.)

FREE Baby Yoda Art Lesson from Nana!

All About Learning has released the best deal of the day: A FREE Snowman Pack with reading and spelling activities for a variety of ages.

Apologia has a new FREE Christmas/Advent E-book!

Free Makeover Your Morning 5 Day Challenge! This is a great way to help re-focus and get your day off on the right foot.

Harry The Happy Mouse (Free on Kindle)

Illustrated Would You Rather Book (Free on Kindle)

Free Help Your Child’s Memory Book from All About Learning Press!

Smartick (check out our full review here) is offering a 25% off discount if you use this referral link! Elizabeth is still loving this program.

Hymn Study: He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands

Another childhood favorite! I remember singing this song in Sunday School and how comforting it was to know that we were in God’s hands. I remember visualizing God literally holding the world in the palm of his hands. Though the lyrics are short and simple it holds a powerful message. We can trust God because he is in control.

He's Got The Whole World In His Hands Picture

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While I was very familiar with the lyrics of the song, I knew nothing about the background of the song. My research revealed that this was an African-American spiritual. The song would have first been passed down orally and had multiple variations both in the text and the tune. However, as the song began being printed in various hymn books it became more standardized.

4 He’s got you and me, brother, in his hands. . . .
He’s got the whole world in his hands.

The repetitive nature of this song makes it a very easy one for children to memorize and sing along with. It also lends itself really well to hand motions. We always enjoyed using our fingers to symbolize rain or pretending to rock a ‘little bitty baby’ in our arms when we sang this song growing up.

This song lends itself well to adding a bit of nature study by talking about the Earth or the wind and rain. You could even add extra verses to the song about other things that we know God has ‘in his hands’.

If you want to add a little art to this study, you can check out the He’s Got The Whole World In His Hands lesson with Nana from You Are An Artist Chalk Pastels.This is a fun way to engage your little artists in hymn study or your musicians in art. You have access to this lesson if you are an You Are An Artist Clubhouse Member You can also have them draw what they see in their minds as they listen to the song. For young children you might trace their hands and do some type of hand print art work.

I hope that you have enjoyed this study and join us each month for a new hymn study!

Hymn Study Resources:

Lyrics and Background

He’s Got The Whole World in His Hands (sung by kids w/ scrolling lyrics)

He’s Got The Whole World in His Hands (Mahalia Jackson)

He’s Got The Whole World in His Hands (Choir)

Song with video (Laurie London)

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Hymn Study Fact Sheet

He’s Got The Whole World Copywork

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Deals and Freebies

$10 off $10 coupon for Evan-Moor Books makes for some great deals or maybe even a freebie!

Little Women is only .99 on kindle right now! (Amazon prices subject to change always check before purchasing.)

FREE Baby Yoda Art Lesson from Nana!

All About Learning has released the best deal of the day: A FREE Snowman Pack with reading and spelling activities for a variety of ages.

Apologia has a new FREE Christmas/Advent E-book!

Free Makeover Your Morning 5 Day Challenge! This is a great way to help re-focus and get your day off on the right foot.

Harry The Happy Mouse (Free on Kindle)

Illustrated Would You Rather Book (Free on Kindle)

Free Help Your Child’s Memory Book from All About Learning Press!

Smartick (check out our full review here) is offering a 25% off discount if you use this referral link! Elizabeth is still loving this program.

A Christmas Journey and Activity Book (Review)

*I received a free copy of this product in exchange for my honest review. I am not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions expressed are my own. I am disclosing this according to FTC regulations.*

We often use a Jesse Tree style Advent plan with the children in December but I wanted to change it up a bit this year. I was blessed to receive a copy of Kayla Jarmon’s A Christmas Journey with the accompanying activity book to review.

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We read the book together (it has nine chapters and discussion questions for each chapter) over the course of a couple of days. If my children had gotten their way, it would have all been read in one session! They were really enjoying the story of dog, deer, opossum, and all of their woodland friends. The story was written in rhyming verse with cute illustrations sprinkled throughout the pages. While it is a fictitious story of how woodlands creatures help a lost dog find its new owner for Christmas, it teaches real lessons about friendship, doing the right thing, and working together. I would recommend it for preschool and elementary-age children but my middle school children enjoyed listening along as I read it aloud.

inside book

The activity book consists of 24 days of activities, with each one having a short devotional thought, a scripture, a Christmas song suggestion, and a family activity. For example, day six talks about faith and then gives several scripture readings, including Acts 7 and 1 Corinthians 15. The song for that day is Hark! The Herald Angels Sing and the activity is to take turns leading family members blindfolded around the house. This gives a simple demonstration of faith, as they must follow the directions in faith. The website provides links to the song’s lyrics as well as other resources to help with the activities.

We continue working through the activity book, but the children enjoy it! We have made paper chains and angel wings. We did a cookie experiment with salt and sugar and are working on friendship bread. Each day discusses a new topic, including faith, forgiveness, God’s Sovereignty, and more.

Overall, this is a simple but engaging way to do our Advent study this year. We spend about twenty to thirty minutes a day working on it as a family. I highly encourage you to check it out at Kayla Jarmon’s website or Amazon.

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Hymn Study: Away in a Manger

Away in a Manger Pinterst

Earlier this week I shared about a hymn study on Silent Night. Normally we focus on one hymn each month, however, since we alter our schedule in December to focus on holiday studies I wanted to do a second hymn study. Away in a Manger is a fun song that is easy for even young children to learn.

Some folks attribute this carol to Martin Luther but most modern scholars agree that it was not Martin Luther that wrote the hymn. No one is sure exactly who did write the hymn, but it is believed to have been written for children and is thought to have probably originated in the United States.

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Away in a manger, no crib for a bed,
the little Lord Jesus laid down His sweet head;
the stars in the heavens looked down where He lay,
the little Lord Jesus asleep on the hay.

I work with the preschool age children at our church and we enjoy learning this song each year with simple hand motions. They will point to the sky for stars, lay their head on their hands when we talk about the baby sleeping, and hold their arms across their chests and rock like they are rocking a baby when it says no crib for a bed. You could come up with your own motions to help young children learn the words.

If you have a hands on learner, they might enjoy this simple nativity craft. We simply took graham crackers and “glued” them together with a bit of icing. Then he decorated them with colored sugar to make our stable. There are also a variety of more complex versions on Pinterest that include various figures if you wanted something more detailed.

If you want to add a little art to this study, you can check out the Away in a Manger lesson with Nana from You Are An Artist Chalk Pastels.This is a fun way to engage your little artists in hymn study or your musicians in art. You have access to this lesson if you are an You Are An Artist Clubhouse Member or you can get that lesson through the Christmas Course. (This course and all of her courses excluding the membership are on sale this week.) You can also have them draw what they see in their minds as they listen to the song. What do they envision that long ago night to look like?

I hope that you have enjoyed this study and that you take some time to enjoy a variety of hymns during this wonderful season!

Hymn Study Resources:

Hymn Lyrics and Sheet Music

Away in a Manger (Casting Crowns)

Away in a Manger (Kids Version)

Away in a Manger (Pentatonix)

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Hymn Study Fact Sheet

Away in a Manger Copywork

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Deals and Freebies

Evan-Moor: 20% off Holiday Gifts/Activity Books/Flashcards

Apologia has a new FREE Christmas/Advent E-book!

You Are an Artist: 20% off All courses and bundles (except membership) 11/25-12/2

Crystal Paine is offering 50% off all of her courses!Whether you want to Makeover Your Mornings, Save Money on Groceries, or Start a Blog she has you covered with some great courses.

Free Makeover Your Morning 5 Day Challenge! This is a great way to help re-focus and get your day off on the right foot.

Harry The Happy Mouse (Free on Kindle)

Illustrated Would You Rather Book (Free on Kindle)

Enrichment Studies has a great free fine arts memory match game this month!

Free Help Your Child’s Memory Book from All About Learning Press!

Christmas School 2019

Somehow November seems to have flown by, it is hard to believe that Sunday will be December 1st. I have been taking a little bit of time today to gather my thoughts and plan out our December school schedule and activities. Each December, I like to change things up a bit and do ‘Christmas School’. It is such an exciting and wonderful time of year and we like to incorporate the holidays as much as possible into our school days. This helps us enjoy the holiday even more by allowing us to do more of the fun activities. Also, by not trying to do all of our regular school and the Christmas activities, we can help avoid burnout and overwhelm.

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As my children have gotten older, I do have them continue with some of their regular studies. My Kindergartner will be doing Christmas math from a variety of fun resources but my sixth and eighth graders will continue with their regular math curricula. One of the math activities that my son is very excited about is Christmas pattern blocks from our Crafty Classroom pack. For history, we will continue to study North Carolina history but make a point to focus on holiday traditions of the time period.

For reading, we are going to focus on lots of fun Christmas books. We will be reading aloud some of our favorite picture books, listening to Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, and reading aloud The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. There are so many good books that we can never get through them all and we always add at least one new (or new to us) book to our collection each year. This year we added Christmas with Anne and Merry Christmas Strega Nona. Cranberry Christmas is a family favorite that we make sure to bring out every year. You can check our more of our favorite books at A Cozy, Book Filled December.

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I am also very excited to be doing two new advent activities. First, I was blessed to receive a copy of Kayla Jarmon’s A Christmas Journey to review. We are looking forward to reading the book together (it has nine chapters and discussion questions for each chapter) as well as completing the activity book. The activity book consists of 24 days of activities, with each one having a short devotional thought, a scripture, a Christmas song suggestion, and a family activity. For example, day six talks about faith and then gives several scriptures including Acts 7 and 1 Corinthians 15. The song for that day is Hark! The Herald Angels Sing and the activity is to take turns leading family members blindfolded around the house. This gives a simple demonstration of faith as they must follow the directions in faith. As we get started with this program, I plan to write a full review but I wanted to go ahead and share a little bit so that you would have time to check it out and get it before Advent starts!

The second activity we are going to try is called The Traveling Wisemen: A Christmas ADVENTure. Years ago, when my older two children were younger, we tried the whole “Elf on a Shelf’ thing. The children loved it but I was tired of finding places for him to hide and honestly, I felt like it put way to much emphasis on the wrong part of Christmas. I know it works for some families, but it wasn’t working for us. So we stopped using the elf but this year my daughter really wanted to bring the elf back for the younger kids because she remembered having lots of fun trying to find him each morning. I did not want to bring back the elf, but I was open to an alternative that allowed them to enjoy the hunt but with a different focus. There are many options available but we are excited to try The Traveling Wisemen: A Christmas ADVENTure. With this program, you purchase the book and use your own wise men to hide each day. The children will know that they aren’t magical but will still have the fun of finding them and seeing what silly antics they have done overnight. My daughter has agreed to take on responsibility for hiding the wise men each night. You can use your own ideas of they have this website with some suggestions. I am hopeful that this allows us to have the fun of the elf but with a focus on Christ (and the best part for me is that I am not responsible for remembering to move them each night.)

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I love using this time of year to get in a bit of extra art time. We will be using a variety of lessons from Nana at Chalk Pastel’s Christmas Video Art Lessons and Nutcracker Lessons. The Christmas lessons also go along very well with our hymn studies. In addition, because we have a clubhouse membership we can enjoy some lessons that coordinate with Handel’s Messiah to add in some music to our studies. We will also be doing various crafts and projects to give as Christmas gifts. My daughter is working on weaving some items for her dad and brother, knitting a hat for our youngest, and sewing some adorable fairy pillows for a few cousins. If time allows she may also make some ornaments using the lesson in Gifts to Make and Give. In addition, I am using some of the plans from The Activity Room with Hands on As We Grow to set up some fun art projects for my youngest two children.

My daughter has been working on learning how to play Silent Night on her violin so that she can play at the nursing home. The song was one that was recommended by her violin teacher and she has been really enjoying learning how to play. I decided that we should expand that learning with a hymn study. You can join us for this free hymn study: Hymn Study: Silent Night. In addition, we love the song Away in a Manger and I am putting the finishing touches on an Away in a Manger hymn study which will be published later this week. Last year we did December Hymn Study: O Holy Night.

Finally, I plan to include some of the fun videos and lessons from SchoolhouseTeachers.com. Their Christmas corner has lots of great videos, lesson plans, copywork, and poetry for Christmas and Hanukkah and we look forward to fitting in several of those each week. They are having a great sale this week and it is a wonderful time to give this program a try! We use a variety of courses from them each year and enjoy the flexibility.

I hope this gives you a few new ideas for incorporating Christmas activities into your December schedule. I would love to hear more about what activities your family loves! Share your ideas and plans in the comments.

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Deals and Freebies

Evan-Moor: 20% off Holiday Gifts/Activity Books/Flashcards

Apologia has a new FREE Christmas/Advent E-book!

You Are an Artist: 20% off All courses and bundles (except membership) 11/25-12/2

Crystal Paine is offering 50% off all of her courses!Whether you want to Makeover Your Mornings, Save Money on Groceries, or Start a Blog she has you covered with some great courses.

Free Makeover Your Morning 5 Day Challenge! This is a great way to help re-focus and get your day off on the right foot.

Harry The Happy Mouse (Free on Kindle)

Illustrated Would You Rather Book (Free on Kindle)

Enrichment Studies has a great free fine arts memory match game this month!

Free Help Your Child’s Memory Book from All About Learning Press!

Hymn Study: Silent Night

Christmas Carols are among my favorite songs! I love the hope and joy of the season and the lyrics of the carols provide precious reminders of the reason we celebrate. I am excited to be sharing about Silent Night today because it is one that I have sang since my childhood.

In learning more about the origins of this song, a couple of things stuck out to me as being really interested. The first, is that the song and accompanying music was written in just a few hours on a Christmas Eve night in 1818. The second interesting fact I learned was that the words were originally accompanied by guitar music. We typically think of pianos and hymns being the accompaniment during that time period but this song was first sung with a guitar.

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Silent night! Holy night!
All is calm, all is bright
’round yon virgin mother and child.
Holy infant, so tender and mild,
sleep in heavenly peace,
sleep in heavenly peace.

Silent Night was written as a poem by Joseph Franz Mohr who then asked his friend Franz Xaver Gruber to write the music to accompany the lyrics. They then performed it that night in a little Austrian chapel with the choir. The song took many years to rise to popularity but it is now considered a national treasure in Austria and cannot be sung publicly prior to Christmas Eve each year. ( I encourage you to read more about this history of the hymn.)

My daughter has been learning to play Silent Night on her violin and is planning to perform for some residents at a local nursing home. We are going to use the copywork pages for this song as well as listen to a variety of different versions of the song. For something a little different, I think we may sit on the porch one evening with a little cocoa or cider and listen to the song, before sitting quietly and watching the stars. I think this would be a great chance to slow down and really think about what it must have been like that night so long ago.

If you want to add a little art to this study, you can check out the Christmas Star lesson with Nana from You Are An Artist Chalk Pastels. (There is even a 20% off sale this week on her courses.) This is a fun way to engage your little artists in hymn study or your musicians in art. You have access to this lesson if you are an You Are An Artist Clubhouse Member or you can get that lesson through the Christmas Course. You can also have them draw what they see in their minds as they listen to the song. What do they envision that long ago night to look like?

I hope that you have enjoyed this study and that you take some time to enjoy a variety of hymns during this wonderful season!

Hymn Study Resources:

Hymn Lyrics and Sheet Music

Hymn Story

Silent Night (with lyrics)

Silent Night (Alan Jackson)

Silent Night (Kelly Clarkson)

Silent Night (Classical/Choir Style)

Download Your Freebies Below!

Hymn Study Fact Sheet

Silent Night Copywork

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Deals and Freebies

Evan-Moor: 20% off Holiday Gifts/Activity Books/Flashcards

Apologia has a new FREE Christmas/Advent E-book!

You Are an Artist: 20% off All courses and bundles (except membership) 11/25-12/2

Crystal Paine is offering 50% off all of her courses!Whether you want to Makeover Your Mornings, Save Money on Groceries, or Start a Blog she has you covered with some great courses.

Free Makeover Your Morning 5 Day Challenge! This is a great way to help re-focus and get your day off on the right foot.

Harry The Happy Mouse (Free on Kindle)

Illustrated Would You Rather Book (Free on Kindle)

Enrichment Studies has a great free fine arts memory match game this month!

Free Help Your Child’s Memory Book from All About Learning Press!

LitWits Kits Review

I have not been this excited about a literature unit study in a long time! LitWits was generous enough to give us four of their LitWits Kits to review. We love to read and we have used and enjoyed a variety of studies but this one fit our family perfectly. While I personally think it is important for students to occasionally analyze literature and learn how to really break it apart, I think it is far more important that they learn to enjoy reading and making connections with what they read. These kits did just that and as an added bonus to this busy mom, they were super easy to implement.

We were able to choose which titles we wanted from the 46 available titles. I was having a hard time choosing because there were so many wonderful titles, I ended up choose two and allowing my 6th and 8th graders to each choose a title. We chose The House of Sixty Fathers, My Side of the Mountain, From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E Frankweiler, and All Creatures Great and Small.

LitWit3

We got started by using My Side of the Mountain as a family. I purchased the audio version of the book and we listened to it together before completing the activities that went along with the book. We had the extra benefit of listening to this on our way to a short family vacation in the mountains which tied in beautifully (but is certainly not required to make this unit study wonderful.) The study suggested that you use props to help the children connect to the story. I thought the actual mountain camp site made a great prop and loved how they were making connections to Sam’s adventures. They found Hemlock trees like he used to make his home, rocks for fire starting, wild edibles, a stream, and more. Then we adapted the prop process when we got home and I had them find and collect props that went with the story and share them with the family. They found some of our homemade jam to represent the jam that Sam made, rocks, leaves, sticks, and more. Even the five-year-old was excited to participate.

“Here’s one critical thing we do – or rather, don’t do – to make great books fun for kids: We don’t ask kids to read with assignments in mind.” From LitWit e-mail

Next, there were a list of hands on projects that could be completed to go along with the book. There was an idea for a poster to advertise the tree he lived in, an opportunity to make a clay pot, sketching on bark, and a play demonstrating the character of Sam. I decided to allow each of my older children to decide which of these projects they wanted to complete. My son and daughter both chose to make a pot like Sam made for his jam.

Then, together we made breakfast using their ideas that were based off of the book. We had cornmeal pancakes with blueberry jam and watered-down root beer that served as sassafras tea. I loved that they were not all that fond of the watered-down root beer but they realized that if they were not used to having so much sugar, it might taste better. It was a really fun way to connect with the book.

The LitWits Kits also contained a great list of links to help you take your study of topics from the book further. For example, there were links to falcon videos because of Sam’s falcon, links about some of the other animals he encountered, music links, and even links about the author. There were also downloadable worksheets that you could use to assess understanding of story line, vocabulary, and other aspects of the book. We chose not to use them with this book but may use them for some of the other titles.

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All of these components combined to make a fun and enjoyable book study. Sometimes, when a study over analysis a book it can leave a student ready to be done with the book and move on. These fun and engaging activities had my children talking about the book and making connections throughout their day.

The kits for the other titles are set up in a very similar fashion. I am choosing to have my children independently do the title that they chose and then, after the holidays, I plan to use All Creatures Great and Small as a family study. I am excited about learning more about some of the veterinary topics as well as English culture and I know that my daughter will enjoy the chance to make hot tea and Yorkshire pudding.

LitWits Kits can make a great independent literature study but I think they are even more amazing as a family study. The opportunity for us all to share the same wonderful story and a variety of fun activities really fits into what I want our homeschool days to look like. I wish I had known about these kits years ago! be sure to click on the graphic below to check out the other titles reviewed by Crew Members!

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Gift Ideas For Your Budding…Naturalist

What do you get for that child that loves to be outdoors? The one that watches the birds, listens for the squirrels, and hunts for flowers and leaves as you walk. All of my children love to be outside but my five-year-old is particularly interested in studying the various things he finds when we go on ‘adventures’ into the back yard, hiking in the park, or just walking down our road to the river. I love encouraging him to be observant of the world around him and help him learn about the plants and animals.

*Some of the links in my posts may be affiliate links see below for more information. *

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The ideas here can help a student learn more about the natural world and encourage exploratory play. You could easily create a wonderful gift basic with a few of these ideas to encourage hours of outdoor adventures. I believe that when we encourage these young naturalists to learn more, we are also encouraging them to appreciate and respect all of God’s creations. As a bonus, they think they are playing and exploring and you get to mark science off the list for the day.

Gift Ideas For Your Budding… Naturalist

Preschool

Magnifying glass
Bug House
Fairy Garden
Bird House
Explorer Kit
Explorer Vest (My son always felt so official and he could store his treasures in the pockets.)

Elementary Ages

Peterson’s First Guides (These are shorter and a bit easier to use than the larger field guides. The wildflower one is a personal favorite but they are all wonderful.)
Pets in a Jar (We bought this book five years ago and my children have all enjoyed it!)
Nest for Celeste (fun book about Audubon for older elementary and middle grade students. We are getting the sequel this year for my son.)
Window Bird Feeder
Nature Journal (When they are young, we have ours draw the pictures and then dictate to us what to write. As they get older they do the writing themselves.)
Ant Farm
Butterfly Kit (This was a favorite with my older children and we are planning to do it again in the spring with my kindergartner.
Garden Tools
Seeds
Bird Song Book
Pressed Flower Art
Humming Bird Feeders (This was a big hit for us this summer and fall.)

Middle School/High School

Audubon Books
Edible Wild Food Cards (My children love these!)
Compass
Hiking Bag
Binoculars (at the time of posting their is a 20% off coupon for this pair.)
Nature Journal for Recording Observations
Handbook of Nature Study (can also be used to help guide younger students.)
Walking Stick (or work with them to make their own)

I have really enjoyed writing these posts this week and gotten most of my Christmas shopping taken care of! If there are other interests or ideas that you have, please feel free to share them and I will be happy to add another post to the list. You can also check out Educational Christmas Ideas (that don’t feel like school supplies), Clutter Free Christmas Ideas, and Twelve Christmas Adventures for clutter free Christmas ideas. If you have other interests or hobbies that you would like to see included, please share in the comments.

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Deals and Freebies

The Old Schoolhouse is running a great special on their magazine! $19 for a year’s subscription and some fun digital curriculum as a bonus.

Sally Clarkson just launched her newest book, a devotional for moms! You can purchase it at Amazon now .

Free Makeover Your Morning 5 Day Challenge! This is a great way to help re-focus and get your day off on the right foot.

Harry The Happy Mouse (Free on Kindle)

Illustrated Would You Rather Book (Free on Kindle)

Enrichment Studies has a great free fine arts memory match game this month!

Free Help Your Child’s Memory Book from All About Learning Press!