HS Comments on the Fly

According to a recent article, Flying Point Press has started printing a nonfiction series for boys aged 10-15. It has pulled a few of its titles from the critically acclaimed Landmark series (my review).

Here are the first fifteen titles:

• The Stout-Hearted Seven: Orphaned on the Oregon Trail by Neta Lohnes Frazier
• Lawrence of Arabia by Alistair MacLean*
• Geronimo: Wolf of the Warpath by Ralph Moody*
• General George Patton: Old Blood & Guts by Alden Hatch
• The Sinking of the Bismarck: The Deadly Hunt by William L. Shirer*
• John Paul Jones: The Pirate Patriot by Armstrong Sperry*
• George Washington: Frontier Colonel by Sterling North*
• The Barbary Pirates by C. S. Forester*
• Teddy Roosevelt: American Rough Rider by John Garraty
• Behind Enemy Lines: A Young Pilot’s Story by H. R. DaMallie
• Ben Franklin: Inventing America by Thomas Fleming
• Admiral Richard Byrd: Alone in the Antarctic by Paul Rink
• Path to the Pacific: The Story of Sacagawea by Neta Lohnes Frazier
• Amelia Earhart: Flying Solo by John Burke
• Alexander the Great by John Gunther*

It looks like these books would be fine for girls also if you ask me.

My son really enjoyed Lawrence of Arabia when he was about 14 or 15. I imagine most boys that age would, considering it was written by the successful and talented author Alistair MacLean. Here’s a little more info about it that I tried to decipher from the dustjacket:

“[Lawrence of Arabia’s] passions affected the outcome of a world war and helped determine the future of the Middle East.

This is the story of how one man, a young British officer, fell in love with the mystery and romance of Arabia, and how he helped build a mighty army out of scattered Arab tribes. His tale is filled with impossible marches through waterless deserts, ambushes of Turkish troop trains, blinding sandstorms and blizzards, and fierce battles on camelback.

Alistair MacLean uses his remarkable storytelling skills to bring to life an army of colorful characters in Arabia: British officers, Turkish soldiers, and Bedouin warriors. With amazing details of bloody battles and desert treks, MacLean gives us an important insight into the origins of the Middle East as we know it today.”

We listened to The Stout-Hearted Seven way back when and thoroughly enjoyed it. I imagine that many children would be inspired by the Sager story. I remember my teacher reading to our class about the Sager children.

Anyway, Landmark Books have long been a staple in homeschools. We have quite a few still on our shelves, and I intend to keep them for the grandkids. Some are just so helpful, but others can be a bit dry. It just depends. There’s a list of the “World Landmarks” and the “US Landmarks” on this page near the bottom.

I’m not sure that buying a book and handing it to a teen is always the best way for the student to enjoy the book. For us, it sometimes worked better if we read the book together as a way to wind down to the school day. Sometimes the student will ask to read the book on his/her own after getting a couple of chapters finished, and I often went along with that and still read it aloud to the other. But sometimes, we just read it all together, taking turns and folding clothes. Sometimes we’d play “Stump the Smart-Aleck Mom.” Sometimes the book was a dud, but usually not. Sometimes I had to leave a new book on the coffee table and hope for the best. I ended up just buying books (mostly from thrift shops or I’d have gone broke) and then letting the kids take their pick out of a pile or off the shelf. You know, “Go read something from the Colonial Period.” Sure, I have lots of books that my children never read, but they did read a lot and so did I. So, I can’t say I regret overbuying. And now I’m just blathering on … blah, blah, blah.

hat tip: Farm School

*part of the original Landmark series

While paging through Around the World in 180 Days, I saw this question and answer:

What is the official language of Australia?

English (with a mixture of British and Aborigine terms)

????? Can you see me squinting and trying to figure out why the answer would be written that way?

English with a mixture of British terms … that’s a odd way to put it if you ask me. Why isn’t something like “Australian English” the proper answer?

Okay, so I went and looked it up at Wikipedia and Australian English is the proper answer. I found the answer in the article titled “List of dialects of the English Language.”

My daughter and I are reading For the Love of Venice together separately. I got it just for the Venice info, but it has some info on the MOSE project, which is a bonus.

In case you don’t happen to be familiar with the MOSE project (which I wasn’t until we recently saw a Discovery Channel show), it has as its goal the saving of the lagoon that surrounds Venice, Italy, by the strategic placement of barrier walls and floodgates. I think this paper, in .pdf format, probably explains the problem and the proposed solution the best — and with some illustrations.

I’m on page 72 of For the Love of Venice and so far we’ve got

• a main character who is high school boy (a senior) w/younger brother, mom, dad
• a main character who is a U.S. citizen visiting Venice for summer
• a dad who is a civil engineer working on the MOSE project
• a mother who is spacey artist
• a short discussion of subsidence of Venice and floodgates
• a short discussion of pollution of the lagoon
• description of life in Venice
• a girl in ice cream store who is probable romantic interest
• some graffiti and intrigue

So far, I think For the Love of Venice is fairly good. If you’ve got a trip to Venice in your future or you need an interesting novel to help with geography class, your children might enjoy it. It definitely gives the reader a feel for the place, and if you have a guidebook handy, you can look the places up on a map.

Playright, George Bernard Shaw turned this place into Heartbreak Homeschool for the past three days as we slogged our way through Heartbreak House. (Heartbreak House at Wikipedia and at Gutenberg)

Oh, the misery he caused us. True, we could’ve turned the show off at any time — and we often did — but we felt we must give it a fair shake by watching it all. We are slated to watch an acting company perform Heartbreak House soon; hence our watching now to familiarize ourselves with it. As a result, though, I’m re-thinking things.

It’s a play with a message. The message overpowers the entertainment value. Plus, I was expecting a comedy, but it just wasn’t all that funny. So part of the reason I didn’t like it was expectations. But it also seemed like there was just too much whining about the opposite sex and stuff. So, it just wasn’t as much fun as I was hoping for. (review)

The bright spot in the whole play was Sir John Gielgud, a true master. I first became familiar with him by name when he stole the show in Arthur. I know … shame on me for not knowing of him sooner. Watching him in Heartbreak House cemented my respect for his talent. I’m not sure why he’s so captivating, but he is.

Is it just me or does Britain turn out more good actors than the rest of the world? (Rickman, Branagh, Kitchen, Rush, Harris, etc.)

I’ve been recently trying to get a quilt put together and onto a frame, so that when I do sit down and watch something on TV, I won’t feel like such a slacker. I’ll be trying to get 8-10 stitches per inch while I prick my middle finger into hamburger. (quilter’s joke - ha) Yes, that will be much better than just sitting there.

So while I’ve been sewing on the borders, basting, and such, I’ve had shows on. Yes, multiple shows because I’m a novice quilter and I’m slow! One show that I enjoyed was misnamed King Arthur’s Britain. I haven’t the foggiest notion why it was titled that because the appellation (not, Appalachian) is not apt. It must have been some sort of ill-thought-out marketing scheme. So if you watch it, don’t expect an in-depth analysis of King Arthur’s rule.

Here’s what the back of the case states:

… British archaeologist … Francis Pryor disputes the belief that Britain reverted to anarchy after the Romans left in 410 A.D., sinking into the Dark Ages until the Anglo-Saxon invaders restored order. The truth he says is far more complicated.

In this three-part series, he uncovers the continuous culture that was not destroyed by outside invaders but rather strengthened by them. Travel with him as he makes ancient history come alive at the scenes of bloody battles and key archaeological sites that reveal the clues to this new view of early Britain.

So, you see, it’s about that time between the years A.D. 410 and A.D. 597 which is considered the Dark Ages in Britain, when history closes its doors and permits no peeping Toms. But Francis Pryor (since he’s not named Tom) dares to question the historical powers that be and decides that “These were not the Dark Ages.” I think Francis Pryor does quite a good job of it.

I know that when we were studying Rome and Early Britain (at multiple different times through out the years of homeschooling, mind you) that I often called it the Dark Ages and said things like, “The Romans picked up their toys and went home, leaving the early Brits without anything to prop their society up with.” But Francis Pryor basically puts that myth to rest and says, “It’s time to start re-writing the history books.”

That’s a big deal — particularly if he’s correct. Pryor gives example after example of Roman society in Britain going on after A.D. 410. Yes, he believes that the British had a Roman society after the Romans left because that’s what everyone was — Roman. The locals had been Romanized during the years of Roman rule.

Pryor travels from Cornwall (extreme southwest) up to Hadrian’s Wall (up north, near border with Scotland) and points in between, showing us all sorts of examples of life during the 5th and 6th centuries in England. He shows us sites and then the artists come in and do a visual reconstruction for us showing us how it would have looked during Roman times. This happens a number of times and is fascinating. Pryor also takes us to an area where the Lady in the Lake may have had influence and describes a system of warrior traditions which included throwing swords into the lakes. He also travels to Sutton Hoo and tramps around a bit there. If anyone is interested in “Dark Ages” Britain, this DVD is worth a watch. Netflix lends it out or you can buy it through Amazon.

I would guess that this is a DVD for parents who will be teaching Roman Britain — so that they may adjust their views of Roman and Dark Ages Britain if they feel the need to do so. It would also be a good addition to a high school world history course or British history course if the student enjoys this era. The visuals are really well done; this is an entertaining DVD.

Considerations: These ideas are only one man’s point of view. His views on the Anglo-Saxon invasions, for lack of a better term, are not as convincing to me as his anti-Dark Ages argument is. But at the high school level, this type of DVD can lead to further study or make for good discussion.

Our current motto is “So easy a homeschooled can do it,” which was inspired by our friends the Geico Cavemen.

Today, though, Amy over at Inside the Foil Hat Blog is linking to Link and Rhett who warn folks to “Beware the homeschoolers.” It’s an excellent sentiment, so it’s imperative that it be adopted as our new homeschool motto. It’s part of Rhett and Link’s Viral Boom.

I’ve tried Amy’s soap. Its suds are thick and creamy. I got the Rosemary Mint w/Dead Sea Mud. She’s got all sorts of different soaps, pots of fragrant shea butter, and other spa goodies. Go check ‘em out!

Okay, so maybe Rosetta Stone seems cheap to you at $200+. But there is another program out there in case you just think that Rosetta Stone is couldn’t possibly be worth what they’re charging.

We were using Triple Play Plus years ago when Rosetta Stone first came out … or when we first heard of it anyway. Around 2000 we got the free disk to try out Rosetta Stone — before we bought it. But it was so similar to Triple Play Plus, that I wasn’t ever sure that Triple Play Plus wouldn’t serve our needs just fine. The result was that we never bought Rosetta Stone.

Even now, I’m not convinced that Rosetta Stone is better. Oh, I know it could be and probably is. But Triple Play Plus gives us enough practice that I figure we’ll be fine without Rosetta Stone. We still haven’t gotten to the end of Triple Play Plus in French, Italian, or Spanish.

But if you’re wanting something to supplement Rosetta Stone, you know, something for review, Triple Play Plus (TPP) would be handy. Also, if you’re saving up for Rosetta Stone, you can get Triple Play Plus right now and use it until you can afford Rosetta Stone.

Triple Play Plus can be used by students aged 8 to adult. There aren’t as many languages choices as Rosetta Stone, so that can be a drawback. There’s Italian, French, Spanish, German, Hebrew, Japanese, and possibly others. That’s all I saw listed online. Info on Triple Play Plus is severely limited because the company got bought out and then soon afterward went out of business. So even the software is a little old and, depending on when it was published, wonky.

You can still buy it sometimes on www.ebay.com really, really cheap — for like about $5 - $8 plus shipping. I think I bought our copies of French and Spanish for $50 or so each at Costco. TPP auctions are infrequent, but you just have to go to eBay and use “My eBay” to have notices of when Triple Play Plus goes up for auction sent to your email. I think you do this through “All Favorites” and then “Searches” — at least that how I do it.

Oh, and don’t tell your friends. There aren’t that many copies of TPP out there. Not too many people read this blog, so there are no worries there.

We got the Spanish and the Italian programs to work with Vista by fiddling with the compatability features of Vista. We also have the programs currently running with a little tweaking on XP, but use at your own risk. No guarantees.

And yes, we really like it. No English is used; it’s pictures and a native speaker. 3 levels: Aural, Text, and Voice Recognition. And there are also different levels of progression in those sections, though I’ve not used the Voice Recognition too much.

Funny story: Back in the mid-late 90s, when I had little kids, I was friends with another mom who had lived in France. She had little ones also. So she came over to my house, and my husband and kids went over to hers. I don’t think that’s clear, so I’ll try again. Our husbands took care of the little people at her house, and we ladies got a night off … to goof around with the French Triple Play Plus. Oh, yes, what a wild life I lead.

Actually, though, we were trying to put TPP through its paces. She thought the speaker/announcer was quite good. So we blended ourselves some margaritas and sat down to play one of the games for two people. Fine. It was fun. We heard many, “Félicitations!” and other French words of delight when we clicked on the correct pictures, etc. We were so proud of ourselves.

Then we started the voice recognition stuff with our frozen tongues. We did fairly well, but there was one phrase that we must have tried 30 - 50 times. I am not kidding. We’d say it in French, but the program just kept responding with the French words for “Not quite right. Try again.” It felt like the announcer was only mocking us, though. Being mocked by the French … could that be a little irritating?

We kept repeating something like, “La souris est sous la chaise” over and over again. (The mouse is under the chair.) We knew we could get it correct. We were stubborn persistent, but we did finally give up with some words of disgust like, “This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen. And I hate it.” And as the microphone was tossed to the side, the program cheerfully said, “Formidable!” Roughly translated that means, “Finally you got it right, you idiot Americans.” Anyway, we laughed so hard we about fell over.

So, we’re still reading Virginia’s General by Marrin. It’s about General Lee. No, not Bo and Luke Duke’s car, but its namesake. This book was out of print for a while, and the price went a little high — that was when I bought my copy. But now this book is priced reasonably because a homeschool publisher re-published it and a few of Marrin’s other books.

The other day we read about the Union and Confederate soldiers making contact with each other during the war. In this case, it was when they were camped on opposite sides of the Rappahannock River. At these times, pickets (lookouts) would holler at each other for trades. The South could trade their tobacco since they had plenty of it. The North might send over some sugar or coffee, which the South had a difficult time getting its hand on. Little sailboats were used to complete the trades.

Here’s a quote from the book:

[Lee’s] only objection was to a trade in Southern newspapers, which foolishly printed articles about his positions and troop movements. He, like his Northern foes, believed freedom of the press must be limited in time of war. (p.106)

This book is full of interesting little tidbits. Without them, I can find non-fiction history books a little too facty. A little more personal slant on things spices things up — that’s what I like about Marrin’s books. He manages to research and find personal accounts or other source documents that often give us a more realistic view of history, full of little-known tidbits. I wrote a long review of Marrin’s Sea King (Sir Francis Drake) a whopping eight years ago; it describes how Marrin’s writes (but embarrassingly shows my ignorance of a few things).

I saw that a movie titled Duma was on this morning. Thinking it might be about Russia and the last czar, I decided to check it out. Imagine my surprise when I found out that it’s a movie about a young African boy’s journey to release his pet cheetah, named Duma, into the wild. The sounds that the cheetah makes are intriguing. Though I’d been right up next to one at the St. Louis Zoo, I’d never heard one until this morning.

Based on a true story, Xan ends up with a baby cheetah, raises it, then is told by his father that he can’t keep it forever. Eventually the boy heads off alone on a motorbike with Duma in the side car. He runs out of petrol and soon afterward forges a shaky alliance with a wanderer. Hippos, cape buffalo, giraffes, crocs, lions, etc., are seen, along with the stunning landscape that southern Africa is famous for. Without trying to tell too much, the wanderer has friends that he meets up with, who Xan meets also. Duma makes the transition to the wild, and Xan goes home.

So, since we watched this during the day, my daughter will now be making up a bit of time this evening with her algebra. If she were 10, we’d count it for school. But there’s just not enough there for a high schooler. I’m glad I could dig out my atlas and look at it and also work on a quilt because, while it’s a nice movie, it’s for the younger set.

I suspect that we may be the last of the homeschoolers to find out about this movie — it did come out in 2005 — but I think it would be a great addition to a study of southern Africa. I wouldn’t say that it’s a necessary resource, but grades 3 to 6 would probably enjoy it quite well.

I’m glad we homeschool so that we could properly commemorate Groundhog Day.

I wanted to skip it this year, but my daughter chirped, “But it’s tradition.”

And she is right. We watch it every year. Even though today I would have rather just stuck with the schedule, which makes me feel like we’re on the right track.

So we watched Bill Murray and Andie MacDowell in the eternal classic Groundhog Day. We got it out of the way early.

This, of course, leads us right into our “Quote for Homeschooling Use.” You see, any time anyone says, “I’ll finish it (algebra, writing, science) tomorrow,” any family member can reply,

Well, what if there is no tomorrow? There wasn’t one today.

~ Phil in Groundhog Day

It’s not quite a movie for the very young — too many suicide attempts which would likely be confusing, plus there’s other objectional stuff. But for those of us who can stomach some of the bad, like when Phil just hauls off and punches Ned, Ned Ryerson, it ends up being a touching story.