Faces of History and Break Activities

Hi Essentials Parents!

On Week 12, we discussed our Faces of History Project. For this project, each student chooses one historical figure (preferably from the Medieval Period) and writes a 5-paragraph essay about that person's life.  It is fine to pick someone for your report who is not on this list. Once your child chooses someone, email me your choice. We will try to not double-up on figures. 

Once you have chosen a person, think about 3 topics you want to focus on. Ideas are: childhood, family, skills, battles, education, discoveries, writings, and beliefs. Was he/she a ruler? What were some accomplishments and hardships? How did he/she die? What do people think of him/her today or do we still use their ideas today? Etc....

You will need 3 different sources, so start finding them now. Timeline cards, children’s storybooks, and reference books from the library are good resources. You may use one Internet source with parent approval.

Moms, please read page 169-170 in the student’s IEW book for a brief overview of the 5-paragraph essay. We will spend plenty of time working together on this project in class and at home over the coming weeks. This Faces of History project will begin on Week 13 and will conclude on Week 24 with your presentation to the class. When your report is all finished, you may choose to dress up as your historical person and read to our CC Community at our final banquet (April 25).

Faces of History Ideas for Cycle 2 
Eric the Red
Leif Ericsson
St. Francis of Assisi
Theodoric the Ostrogoth
St. Benedict
Pope Gregory I (Gregory the Great) 
Clovis
Justinian
Harun al-Rashid
Egbert the Saxon
Rollo the Viking
Henry the Fowler
Canute the Great
El Cid
Edward the Confessor
Peter the Hermit
William Tell
Tamerlane
Frederick Barbarossa
St. Dominic
Edward the Black Prince
Louis IX
Geoffrey Chaucer
Thomas Becket
Thomas Aquinas
Erasmus
Jan Hus
John Wycliffe
Fra Angelico

The poet Dante
Joan of Arc - Caroline Vermilyea's choice
King Richard the Lion-Hearted 
Eleanor of Aquitaine
Henry II
Genghis Khan
Kublai Khan
Marco Polo
Prince Henry the Navigator Magellan
Christopher Columbus
King Ferdinand of Spain 
Queen Isabella of Spain 
Suleiman the Magnificent 
King Alfred (the Great)
Mansa Musa
English King John
Gutenberg
William the Conqueror 
Martin Luther  - Carl Barber's choice
Bartolomeu Dias
John Cabot
Vasco Da Gama
Czar Ivan the Great
Charles Martel
Pepin the Short
William Wallace
Robert the Bruce

Shakespeare 
Michaelangelo 
Donatello
Leonardo Da Vinci 
Nicolaus Copernicus 
Saladin
William of Ockham (Occam) 
Roger Bacon
Muhammed
Pope Urban II
Pope Innocent III 
Francesco Petrarch 
Mehmet the Conqueror 
Theodora
Lorenzo de Medici 
Vlad the Impaler 
Maimonides
Averroes ibn Rushd 
Brunelleschi
Edward I (Longshanks) 
Otto the Great Godfrey of Bouillon 
Saint Ludmilla

Osman I
Shen Kuo
Pope Leo IX (1002-1054) 
Charles the Wise
Henry V
Duns Scotus
Boethius
Guy de Chauliac
Giovanni Boccaccio 
Hildegard of Bingen
Pope Pius II
Margaret of Anjou 
Brunhilde
Catherine of Siena 
Empress Adelaide
Richard III
Elizabeth of York
Charles VII
Hrotsvitha of Gandersheim 
Julian of Norwich
Margery Kempe

I also wanted to give you some ideas of how you could brush up on your grammar and writing skills over the break. Here are some fun ideasI found online:

One review game is called Wipe Out. Look through your EEL guide and write some of the terms on a whiteboard. Have your child give definitions or examples of each one and erase them as you go. You might set a timer and see how many she can get erased in three minutes. You can blindfold her, spin her a few times, and have her stick a post-it note on the board to choose one. 

Or how about some Jenga? You can find all the definitions on the Essentials tier of CC Connected. Just print them off, cut them up and tape them on the blocks. 

Of course, Bingo is an easy game to put together. Print a blank bingo card and write the answers to any kind of questions that you think would help reinforce the material. I like to call it VINCO (I conquer) just to throw in some Latin. 

Another way we review the parts of speech while also working on writing skills is by narrating, or telling back, a short section of something you're reading aloud. The Schneitmans do a lot of narrating. It can be anything! Then hand them the book and have them identify different parts of speech. You could also brainstorm for quality adjectives and -ly words. 

One of the ways we have worked with the sentence patterns was by choosing one of our favorite photos and writing sentences incorporating the first four patterns that we are learning. I printed them out and then she parsed, diagrammed, and wrote down the pattern. This was fun.

Another way to think about the sentence patterns and actually write them is for your child to make some up about what she's currently reading. This is a higher thinking skill because not only is she recognizing the pattern, she is putting what she knows into practice. As you can see, she doesn't always get them correct. But she's learning!

To develop excellent writing skills, excellent literature needs to be read. Why not take some time over the holidays to read a few great books together?  By becoming familiar with different great authors and various genres, we increase vocabulary and recognize different styles and techniques. I'm all about using what we read as the jumping off point for writing assignments. 




I also take every opportunity to mix in picture study. Pick-a-Stick lets the child create unique sentences about a particular work of art using dress-ups and stylistic techniques. There are numerous sites where famous artworks are available to download for free. The sticks can have prompts written on them to guide the sentence creations. I love this game; it may be my favorite.

I like to teach punctuation as we read. I think it makes much more sense when seen in the context of a book. Project Gutenberg has all the old classics available to download making it possible to print sections of books. I look up some literature that we are reading and print out a favorite selection. We read it, look and circle all the punctuation; discussing punctuation rules as we go. I then print it again, removing all the punctuation. We work together to replace all of it. I let her do the ones she knows on her own; always adding a new one following Pudewa's EZ+1 motto.



And using a whiteboard always makes everything a little more enjoyable.

Listening to audible books is a great family activity. You can do this while baking cookies or cuddling up by the fire with hot chocolate. We are currently listening to Swiss Family Robinson. Free audiobooks are available with the Librivox app or at Librivox.org. Some Librivox audiobooks are on You Tube. Audible.com also has affordable audiobooks. 


Select a few paragraphs to practice keyword outlining as demonstrated in Units 1 and 2. Take a story from history or an Aesop's fable and retell it using the structure of Unit 3. You can also help your child write a short report, Unit 4, about something related to one of the science sentences memorized so far. Practicing this assignment will help as we move on to our research papers and Faces of History papers.


I encourage you to spend some time over the break to pour over Andrew Pudewa's thoughts in the writing curriculum (Teaching Writing: Structure and Style). He's got great stuff and remember, you paid for all this curriculum so take advantage of it. There is also great info at IEW.com including great podcasts you can listen to while making dinner. 


I love how the Classical model invites us to be creative and tailor the curriculum to meet our individual child's needs. Enjoy the break and make learning English grammar and writing a natural part of each day. If you need anything, please let me know. 


-Jenna