Week 2 in Review

A pretty no-nonsense week around here, continuing with the usual subjects of math, language arts, science and history.

The older boys took their first vocab quiz for Lord of the Rings chapters 1-3, and did well.   We've been alternating days of listening to a chapter, and then using the next day for discussion and vocabulary review at lunch time.  This has worked well so far, and everyone is enjoying it all.  

 I added in World Religions for the older boys this week, too. I plan on getting to this subject a few times a month, when we can slip it in.  We started with a lesson on Creation Myths that can be found at World History for Us All, Big Era 1, Landscape Unit 1.1 Scroll to the bottom for a link to the lesson, or, a direct link to the PDF lesson is here.  We had some interesting discussions on this topic.

Ben is continuing to work on his amateur radio antenna tuner project, as well as reading Around the World in 80 days.  

Charlie and I finished up reading Ribsy together, and enjoyed it very much.  A simple, sweet story.  Now we're on to Knight's Castle by Edward Eager.  Meatier vocabulary and writing, and quite humorous so far!

Charlie's biosphere project from last week is working out nicely; plants are growing and thriving.  

This week for Charlie's science, we read about Mars, and next week we'll do a lab to make rust, the substance that gives Mars its orange-red color.

I choose an art project from That Artist Woman for Charlie that  used thinned acrylic paint in warm colors, and featured a leafless tree created by blowing paint along the page for fun branching effects.  

Will and I did the first 2 lessons from Unit 1 of Artistic Pursuits grades 6-8 book 1; learning to use space.  We did some quick sketches of an elephant chasing his attendant, at full size and then half-size.  The idea of the lesson was to become comfortable with fitting your subject into a given space.

Will's sketch

my sketch

Well, that's the highlights for this week.  I'm glad it's Friday!  Looking forward to a relaxing weekend!

Some School Stuff 3rd Grade

So, the update is long over-due!  What will we be using around here for our new school year 2013/14?  This post will be about Charlie, because he's the easiest!

Math this year for Charlie will come from Teaching Textbooks.  He had been begging me to let him  do TT like his brothers, and I feel he is finally ready to jump in with level 5. 

 I anticipate that he might get in over his head with some of the concepts he'll encounter further on in the book, and if that is the case, we'll take a break and pick up again with the Life of Fred Elementary series of math books, as well as Horizons Math 3.  

For Science we are using Real Science Odyssey Earth and Space Science level one from Pandia Press.  Fun, easy, completely secular.  We started some units from this in late summer and are looking forward to a study of the planets, sun and moon as we pick up again this fall. 

Language arts will be fairly relaxed again this year.  

We'll pick up reading where we left off with Grammarland, read through a cute series of grammar picture books, and Maybe use Writing With Ease 2 for copywork and narration.  Spelling practice will come from Spelling Power.  I have been very happy with this no-nonsense spelling curriculum over the years for my natural spellers! And as with every year, I'll try to have him do a couple journal entries here and there from Doing the Days.  The older boys and I always enjoy looking back at the questions they mused upon from this book back in the day.  Lastly, there will be the learning of cursive with a Zaner-Bloser workbook.   We'll decide on readers for language arts as we go along, but I do have a few read-alouds lined up to get to, including:

• Ribsy (Beverly Cleary)
• Emil and the Detectives (Erich Castner)
• Knights Castle (Edward Eager)
• Swallows and Amazons (Arthur Ransome)
• Pinocchio: a Classic Illustrated Edition (Carlo Collodi)

History.  While older brothers are working on Modern America and the World this year, with all its difficult topics, Charlie and I will be keeping it simple with many chapter books and lovely picture books that focus on famous Americans and American pioneer and frontier life.  

• Abe Lincoln: The Boy Who Loved Books
• The Boy Who Drew Birds: John James Audubon
• They're Off! The Story Of the Pony Express
• Little House in the Big Woods
• Farmer Boy
• The Book of Indians (Holling) ( Note to self: I need to pre-read this first)
• The Book of Cowboys (Holling)
• Odd Boy Out: Albert Einstein
• John Muir and Stickeen
• To Fly: The Story of the Wright Brothers
• Henry Ford: We'll Race You Henry 

I thought a fun study of World Geography and Cultures would be good for Charlie this year, so I put together my own schedule for some continent hopping.  I will be using the Sassafrass Science Zoology 1 reader as an organizing spine.  Other materials will include:

• How People Live (DK)
• Maps and Globes
• Miss Rumphius
• Africa is Not a Country
• Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain
• One Small Square: Savannah
• Beat the Story Drum
• The Butter Man
• Kids Book of Canada
• The Great Kapok Tree
• A Walk in the Rainforest
• Great Wall of China
• Long is a Dragon
• My Season with the Penguins
• Mr. Popper's Penguins
• Plus other books if time permits, along with various Globe Trekker and You Tube videos

World Religions is on the docket this year too. Probably later in the year as I haven't quite firmed up the resources yet.  Some ideas are:

• The Golden Children's Bible (DK).   This has lots of side-bar photographs with cultural and geographical explanations of topics in the text.
• The Golden Rule by Ilene Cooper.   This lovely picture book shows that "The Golden Rule" can be found at the heart of many religions.

• Demi has some very good books about several religious figures including Muhammad, Jesus, Rumi, and Buddha.

I hope I haven't forgotten anything, but this sure seems like enough!  I'll try to list what the older boys are working on soon, too.

New School Year-Our First Week In Review

We added in more school subjects this week, and officially declared Monkey Island Academy open for the 2013-2014 school year. 

We started our week out with the obligatory and traditional school cones, filled with cocoas, treats, music and art supplies. 

We also took advantage of a beautiful sunny afternoon to go on a short hike and do some apple tasting at one of our local orchards.

This week Ben began his history studies with History Odyssey Modern Times level 2.  He's reading Around the World in 80 Days and doing map work and research into places traveled.  He likes the story thus far.

No formal science at home for Ben this year.  We are concentrating on math instead.  He is however perpetually involved in an electronics project and so I can't exactly say he isn't doing any scientific or technical thinking on a daily basis!  Currently he is programing an amateur radio antenna tuner interface with his Arduino microcontroller. 

Ben is also taking another class at the local high school this year, Principles of Engineering, and thus far is enjoying it.

No formal science for Will this year, either.  He'll just be reading through Joy Hakim's The Story of Science: Newton at the Center.  He began that this week and gives it a thumbs up.

In the language arts department: Will and Charlie are both using Spelling Power again this year, and this week we just did the placement tests.  I hope to start Writing With Skill with William in the coming weeks as well.  Charlie is learning cursive with Zaner Bloser, and has started Writing with Ease for copy work and narration. 

In science, Charlie is continuing with Real Science Odyssey: Earth and Space.  This week he read about planet Earth (You may have heard of it) from an Usborne Encyclopedia and created a tabletop biosphere to represent the perfect conditions for life we have here on Earth.  He planted a small plant in his biosphere as well as adding some grass seeds which we will monitor for growth over the coming days.

We also managed to get a little water color art done to brighten up our walls.  In future weeks I will be getting Will started with Artistic pursuits, and I will be choosing projects for Charlie from Deep Space Sparkle.

But the biggest hit thus far in our home school day is listening to the unabridged audio of Lord of the Rings, and holding discussions afterward with the help of Literary Lessons from Lord of the Rings.  The latter part of this week as been quite dreary and rainy, and it has been wonderful to just hang out and listen to this great story while snuggled in on the couch!

That's all for the first official week.  I'll be adding in more subjects as the weeks progress.

High School Years Wisdom From A Homeschooling Guru

I have long been a fan of Susan Wise Bauer.  I have enjoyed using her history and language arts books on and off through the years, and have also benefited from listening to her various audio lectures.  

Today I watched the latest in her homeschooling  Q&A series, in which she keeps it real while discussing high school, burnout, gap years and more. The things that come out of her mouth always seem so sensible and obvious; why is it that I never think of these things myself?  Perhaps it is that pesky hindsight is 20/20 thing, and one day I too will be a font of wisdom such as she?   One can only hope. Thanks for sharing, SWB!  You're such a Smartie!

Turning The Tide

I'm currently working on a little  lesson re-tooling here at Monkey Island Academy and thought I'd write a bit about it.  I just read a blog post over at Explorations in Learning about her search for "That still elusive balancing point... between rigorous schooling and... unschooling"  Yep. I know how she feels!  I'm not convinced that such a thing (perfect balance) exists for me, at least not in a permanent sense, but still I continue to adjust and adapt our homeschool to get as close as possible to that ideal.  I wouldn't be doing my job if I didn't, right?

Our pendulum tends to swing widely during the course of the year, depending on how busy we are with outside activities and obligations.  We started out this school year using more structured curriculum than I think I have ever used during my 9 previous years of home schooling.  Ben was starting high school, and I was panicked.  I needed hand-holding not only for his subjects, but for Charlie's and Will's as well.  I felt if it were all written down for me, our days would run smoothly.  And really, it did help to get us up and running.  On days I felt completely muddled, I was able to grab the coattails of the schedule and hang on for dear life.  But now that it is getting cold again, and we aren't drawn outdoors quite so often, now that we aren't quite so busy, it feel like we need to relax a bit.  We have accomplished so much since September, and I am glad for it.  I feel less worried about Ben's high school years.  The hand-holding helped.  The structure helped. It truly did.  But now?  Now it's time to cozy up and watch winter from our respective cozy perches on the couch, or from the pillow fort on the floor.  Hibernation, relaxation.  Stacks of good books.  It sounds right, doesn't it?  

How is it that structure and bullet points and each-with- his-own- shiny-curriculum was right from September through November, but the seemingly opposite approach is right December through (probably) June? 

The author of one of the first blogs I started reading  with regularity years ago, Melissa Wiley, came up with a term that actually answers the question above quite well.   That term is Tidal Homeschooling.  Here is a small excerpt from her description of just what that means:

...The truth is, I couldn’t find any label that completely fit my family, so I made up my own. I call us “Tidal Learners” because the ways in which we approach education here change with the tide. Now, this doesn’t mean that we’re flighty or inconsistent, changing direction haphazardly. We aren’t Fiddler Crab Homeschoolers. What I mean is that there is a rhythm to the way learning happens here; there are upbeats and downbeats; there is an ebb and flow...

An ebb and a flow.  I love that.  We certainly are not flaky or inconsistent either, and I remind myself of this concept of the tides and rhythm,  if I ever feel lousy about changing things up year-to-year or mid-year, or 2 weeks in.  

I try to make our changes flow, and base the changes not only upon my feelings, but upon how the kids feel as well.  Often when some subject or another has begun to feel clunky to me, or I feel we have exhausted the usefulness of a book, I ask the kids about it and, more often than not, they will express the same feeling.  Then I know it is time for a change. 

 As for our upcoming changes, we will be staying with the same subjects, but losing the encyclopedias and textbooks.  We will be reading more history together, rather than the current three-way split.  We all miss the discussion and shared experience of read-alouds.  We need that back.  And we'll be starting our days together with a morning basket of books to read together too.  The morning basket is a feature of our home school that got left off the list some time ago, I'm not sure why, but it is time for its return.

I never have felt comfortable with labeling our homeschool as one style or another. Classical, Charlotte Mason, unschooling...we seem to grab a bit from one or the other at different times in different combinations.  Even our school names -Old Oak School and Monkey Island Academy- reflect the differing moods of our studies; are we reciting Latin at Old Oak School today, or swinging from the trees at Monkey Island Academy? Sometimes you don't know which way the day will go. 

 And when we like, we turn the tide. 

Year Ten, Day One

Our Yearly School Cone Tradition

Coffee, cocoa, chocolate, pencils, pens, art supplies...the School Cone holds many treasures...

Chocolate Waffles with whipped cream and strawberries for breakfast, plus peppermint mocha lattes!

Filling out the Favorites/All About Me survey.  We do this on the first day of school as well as  the last day. Everyone enjoys comparing how ideas and tastes change over the course of the year.

After School Cone Excitement and our Huge Yummy Breakfast, we all lazed around talking about schedules and subjects for the school year.  The boys did manage to do a little math for the day, but all-in-all it was quite a laid-back first day.

And I am dumbfounded to realized we are starting our 10th year of homeschooling!!  I feel like I should have some sort of special theme for the year or have a special logo.  Maybe an "Extravaganza" is in order?  What do you think?  How should we commemorate our tenth year of schooling?

Playing With Math

Charlie has finished his Horizons math books for the year, so while we're waiting for some new Life of Fred elementary books to arrive, we'll make good use of all those math games I have languishing on my shelves!

First up is Toss and Tally.  This is a a Discovery Toys game that I picked up a couple years ago from a woman who had a display set up at our local coffee shop.  It is a simple quick-play style game for reinforcing addition and subtraction facts.  

One side is tic-tac-toe style for addition, while the flip-side has you forming a triangle pattern while solving subtraction facts.

Easy-peasy and math is done for the day!

Taking our Time

There is a lot of buzz on the home schooling forums about plans for the coming school year, shiny new curriculum arriving in the mail and even proclamations of  having already begun the first day of lessons.  

Not so here at Monkey Island Academy.  Don't know what we're using next.  

Don't care.  

In fact, we haven't even finished what we had in mind for last school year!  We left off our history investigations sometime in June with the founding of Rome, and just decided to pick it up again.  

We're doing Detectives in Togas as a read-aloud...

and working on cleaning up some ancient Roman coins. 

Scrubbing away the years...

Charlie is looking so serious...and grown up!

We read Detectives in Togas once before, a few years back and it was a family favorite.  A good story and very entertaining!  We also did the Roman coin project last time we studied ancients, and it is like a treasure hunt to clean away  the 2,000-year-old dirt to reveal glimpses of the past!  The kids really get into it (as do the adults!)  I believe we purchased ours from Hands and Hearts.

So, what about you?  Plans for next year?  Still lazily enjoying last year's plans?  Or just enjoying the summer days?

Morning Play Group At The Farm

Last month we started getting together with a home school group that meets about 10 minutes from our house.  This group established themselves last school-year, but I never managed to carve out the time to check it out.  I'm so glad I did this year!  They have a beautiful meeting space at one of the organic farms along the river, so it is a pleasure for the Moms to sit and talk as well as for the kids to enjoy stretching out a bit.  A nice big space allows that to happen.  There is usually a combination of free play/hide-and-seek and tag along with some more directed circle type games to help settle things down before project time.

Burning off some winter kid energy

The point of the group is to just let the kids  be social and to do some sort  of art/craft project together.  Last year the kids even wrote a play based on Elsa Beskow's The Sun Egg.  I hear they made costumes and a set... the works.  

Today's venture in craftiness was a bit less involved than a whole play, however.  The kids got to dig their hands into some papier-mache. For this, we headed downstairs to the work space.  How I wish I had this kind of a set-up for all things messy and crafty!

Stirring the goop

The older kids chose to make bowls...

William's masterpiece in progress

The almost finished product which I very nearly dropped as this photo was being taken

.....while the youngers made snowflakes. 

Charlie's snowflake

It was good tactile fun.

Ben, being the oldest kid present, helped me out by taking photos.  Including this cuuute shot of me and my girlfriend April. 

April and Me

  And after the crafting there was, of course, more running around.

Charlie runs like he means it

During which time Ben reclined on the comfy couches with the moms.   

Ben feels a bit awkward playing circle games and doing crafts with the little kids, of course, but really this group is all about Will and Charlie. Ben has many activities that are only for him, so it is important that I remember that the youngers deserve their own special time as well, just like Ben had when he was their age.   It is fun for me to be a part of this group made up of younger kids, babies and toddlers, which meets early to accommodate nap times, as it puts me in the mind of those early home schooling days when my boys were all little, and everything was all fun and games.  We're looking forward to many more mornings at The Farm.

Monarchs 2010

Every year we enjoy raising monarch butterflies.  A couple weeks ago we went on our annual caterpillar hunt in our yard and found 3 volunteers of varying sizes to to take care of and watch grow.  Last night all three were cocooned in their beautiful jade-colored chrysalides (or chrysalises if you prefer), but early this morning one beautiful female monarch was ready and waiting to begin her life outdoors.

The kids weren't up yet but I didn't want the butterfly to injure itself should it begin to fly around the aquarium we use, so I let her crawl onto my hand and I carried her outside right away.... 

...and got lucky with this great right-place-at-the-right-time shot...

One down, two to go!

Day Two

                                                                                                      
Continuing our prehistory studies today, we visited a cave in France, did more reading from Gombrich and K12's Human Odyssey, and Charlie and I made some salt-dough fossil casts.

Day One

Trusty Ticonderogas in hand, we began our school year today.

I don't know what I was so worried about.  Every year I get all freaked out about the first day of school and then when it comes it is really no big deal.  We pretty much do the same kinds of things we might do on a "non-school" day, except perhaps the day has a bit more directed feel.  In any case, it was a fun first day and we finished up our studies together by lunchtime.  Here are some highlights...

 Nourishment.

 I considered taking the kids out for breakfast this morning but couldn't think of anywhere to go with decent food nearby.  One of the coffee shops might qualify, but they're always too expensive.  Instead we stayed home and I made  some Chocolate Waffles and home-made Strawberry Syrup.  We were not disappointed. 

Tradition.

They love this tradition!

 We start each new school year with some little treats in a school cone.  In Germany, it is a tradition to give each child a "school cone" on their first day of school. A Schultuete (or school cone) is filled with school supplies and treats to help kids through the first day of going away to school. I first heard of this idea from a friend of mine who had done it for her kids (who are older than mine by a few years) and I thought it was such a neat idea that I presented one to Ben when he began homeschooling. Now, to follow the "rules", the kids should only get one at the start of Kindergarten or first grade, but we look forward to it so much that it has become tradition for every year around here. Who needs rules, anyway? The wrapping and contents vary from year to year depending on what kinds of supplies are needed, but there is always a book and always some kind of candy that normally should not be eaten in the AM hours. 

Charlie has the honor of digging in first.

This year there was plenty of candy, some fruit snacks, and granola bars.  Everyone also got a new little notebook to do with as they please, because we all know that everyone likes to write stuff when there are no strings attached.  New pencils, erasers, tape, art supplies, and some random do-dads were also to be found.  I picked up a few things from Target's dollar shop, like Charlie's dinosaur workbook and jumbo bags of Welches fruit snacks, but had the most fun shopping the aisles of Lakeshore Learning.

Also a tradition of ours over the past few years is the "favorites" survey.  We fill out this sheet at the beginning of the school year and then again at the end. It includes questions about favorite color, movies, games, food, songs, where you would like to travel, and others.  We do height and weight as well. Ben is now an inch taller than me. It has been fun for them to see how their opinions change over the course of a few months.

Preview.

 After all the fun and games, we talked a little about our books and schedule for the year.  Thumbs up all around.  Whew.

History. 

Such hard work is the first day of school. Not.

We read the first chapter from E. H. Gombich's A Little History of the World, browsed some Usborne Encyclopedia pages on fossils and evolution, and visited a few quicklinks to view insects in amber and an interactive lesson on understanding geologic time. The boys took some notes on points of interest to put in their history portfolio when Mom gets around to making it. At the Little City Kids History website Charlie and I looked at some pictures of reptiles and discussed how they differ from mammals . Then he narrated some interesting facts back to me which I wrote in his science notebook.  He'll illustrate that at his leisure.  

Kindergarten.

  I got Charlie going on some easy Kindy work today too.  We talked about calendars and I helped him set up a September calendar page with stickers on important days. I printed a set of Dinosaur calendar pages here. He is forever asking me "How many days away is such and such?" or "What day is it tomorrow?", so this will be perfect for him.  It is posted on the fridge.  Also a little handwriting practice and he started working on memorizing our address.  Finally, we read from The Random House Book of Poetry (Me I Am by Jack Prelutsky), and also The Important Book by Margaret Wise Brown-a family favorite since forever.


That was about it for today. It was so nice to have my new daily planner to remind me just what it was I intended to do.  I'm looking forward to tomorrow.

Ready Or Not

Tomorrow is our first day of the new school year. 

Gulp.  I am so not ready!  And just where $%&** did the summer go?  Well, the kids are excited to get started anyway, so that's a good thing.  Hmm...I don't seem to have all my needed curriculum purchased yet, but I don't mean to start everything all in a rush on the first day anyway.  Nor in the first week, so I'm OK with that.  I am very excited that I have my history studies all planned out for the year, complete with projects to do, websites to visit and plenty of good books of course. And it is all neatly outlined in my new home-made daily planner.  I'll make a mental note to share that in another post.  For now, here's a peek at what the kids will be working with this year...

Ben-7th grade (Whaaaaaat?  Junior high?)

• Teaching Textbooks Math 7

• Analytical Grammar, season 1

• Spelling Power

• Bravewriter/Writer's Jungle suggestions, perhaps beginning Writeshop in January for a directed change of pace.

• Cursive copy work from A Journey Through Learning (handwriting practice)

• English From The Roots Up (Greek & Latin roots/Vocab) 
• Spectrum Test Prep 7 (neurotic impulse add-on)

•   Joy Hakim's The Story of Science-Aristotle Leads the Way
• Independent reading will match history topics.

1. Gilgamesh the Hero
2. Riddle of the Rosetta Stone
3. Tales of Ancient Egypt
4. Herodotus and the Road to History
5. Learning Through History Magazine, various issues
6. The Lightening Thief
7. Adventures of the Greek Heroes
8. Alexander The Great
9. Cleopatra 
10. In Search of a Homeland (the Aeneid)
11. Rome in Cross Section
12. Gospel of Matthew plus one other from The Message
13. Select chapters from Oxford Ancient Egypt and K12 The Human Odyssey
14. Reading and outlining from Kingfisher World History (white book)
15. Additional non-history related books TBD

 William-4th grade

• Horizons Math

• All About Spelling levels 1-3 (Spelling/phonics review)

• Writing With Ease level 3

• Bravewriter/Writer's Jungle suggestions)

• Zaner-Bloser cursive (handwriting practice)

• English From the Roots Up (Greek and Latin Roots/Vocab)

•  Delta Science in a Nutshell Rock Origins kit, Geology fieldtrip

• Independent reading will match history topics

1. Gilgamesh the King
2. The Revenge of Ishtar
3. The Last Quest of Gilgamesh
4. Seeker of Knowledge-The Man Who Deciphered Hieroglyphics
5. The Shipwrecked Sailor-Egypt's Oldest Tale
6. The Egyptian Cinderella
7. Exodus by Wildsmith
8. Herodotus and the Road to History
9. Tut's Mummy Lost and Found-Will Reads to Charlie
10. The Lightening Thief
11. d'Aulaires' Greek Myths
12. Pandora
13. The Librarian Who Measured the Earth
14. Alexander the Great
15. Rome in Cross Section
16. The Parables of Jesus- Tomie DePaola
17. Pompeii Lost and Found
18. Usborne World History Encyclopedia, selected pages

 Charlie-Officially a  K'er

• Horizons math K

• Family Math (math games)

• Calendar work with stickers

• Memoria Press Copy Book (handwriting practice, grammar)

• Poetry/memory work-A Child's Garden of Verse by Robert Louis Stevenson

• All About Spelling levels 1 and 2  (in depth phonics)

• Little City Kids History (selected lessons/activities to correlate with big kids studies)
• Elemental Science-Intro to Science K                                                 

• Literature will be childhood favorites/classics

1. The Important Book
2. Blueberries for Sal
3. Johnny Appleseed
4. How to Make an Apple Pie and See the World
5. Stella Luna
6. Roxaboxen
7. The World of Robert McCloskey
8. Miss Rumphius
9. d'Aulaires' Columbus
10. Ox-Cart Man
11. Mike Mulligan and More-A Virginia Lee Burton Treasury
12. Among the Forest People
13. Story of Ferdinand
14. Tapenum's Day
15. Various Winter/Holiday books
16. Owl Moon
17. My Father's Dragon
18. Beatrix Potter Treasury-selected tales
19. Story of Ping
20. Gregory's Shadow 
21. Washington-A Picture Biography Book Biography by James Cross Giblin
22. A House for Hermit Crab
23. The Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Grey Bridge
24. Whatever else we drag home from the library-Charlie's Choice

• Charlie will also read out loud to me a few times a week

1. Little Bear Books
2. Me on the Map
3. Frederick
4. Owl at Home (Arnold Lobel, several short stories)
5. Adventures with Arnold Lobel (several short stories)
6. Billy and Blaze series (6 books or so?)
7. Whatever else we drag home from the library-Charlie's Choice

Whew.  I'm sure only true list lovers stayed around to the end.  There are far too many words in this post so I'll end it up here and continue another day with our "together" work which includes history reading, both informational and historical literature, art, art appreciation, poetry and whatever else it is I am forgetting. Now, off to prepare for tomorrow....

My Odyssey Odyssey

Well, still no decision about which spine to use for our history studies, despite the epic of a post a couple days ago. I have, however, decided upon the books we will read to cover Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. I don't think it is time yet for my 4th or 7th grader to read the originals, so I set out on my own Odyssey to find just the right children's version to introduce it. Surprisingly, there is a wide variety out there! Let's take a look, shall we?


The Children's Homer by Padraic Colum. Fantastic! This book is recommended in all sorts of history programs, and with good reason. Weaving together both tales, Colum relates the story to us as it is told to Telemachus, son of Odysseus, while he awaits his father's return. Charming line illustrations. We are listening to this one on audio book in the car. I'd say it is best for about 6th-8th grade, as there are many "stories within stories" to this version. Complex, beautiful language and a good preparation for reading the real thing in a few years. Since we are listening to this right now, we won't use it again in the fall. My final pick is yet to be revealed!


The Trojan War-Olivia Coolidge. I had a hard time choosing between this book and my ultimate choice. This is a very clearly written version of the Trojan War. I just wish she had a full version of the Odyssey to go with it. The adventures of Odysseus are only briefly described or summarized in The Trojan War, and that was the sticking point for me on using this one in our formal studies. I'd want continuity of authorship in going into the Odyssey and it is not to be had. However, if you are not hung up on that point like I am, this is a fantastic choice, recommended by many on The Well Trained Mind boards and with great reviews on Amazon. Black and white illustrations. Probably best for 4th or 5th grade to 8th.


The Tale of Troy-Roger Lancelyn Green. We usually like Green around here, but for whatever reason his retelling of the Trojan war didn't speak to me. Chalk it up to having previewed too many others already? Maybe. Again, it is mostly a retelling of the Iliad, with brief descriptions of the Odyssey. This one is used in Sonlight's Core 6 program.


Tales from the Odyssey-Mary Pope Osborne. From the author of the Magic Treehouse books. These 6 short volumes telling of Odysseus' return home from the Trojan War are definitely not written in the same simplistic style as her other series! Probably best for ages 7-9, they are well-written and contain enough adventure and gore to satisfy the boys! I've heard that the audio books are very engaging as well. I'm tempted to try them for Charlie in a couple years. As far as introducing the Trojan War, the first book (The One-Eyed Giant) tells the story of how Odysseus is called to fight, and of the Trojan Horse. Plenty for the targeted age.

The Adventures of Odysseus-Hugh Lupton. This offering is from Barefoot Books and has the lovely artwork that is standard fare for their books. This would be a great choice for the younger, or more sensitive set as far as illustrations go, although Polyphemus still "crammed the corpse into his mouth" and brains do "splatter against the walls and the floor". YMMV. We're not using this one, either. Even though the illustrations are quite lush, they seem to not quite match the feel of the tale.


Black Ships Before Troy, The Wanderings of Odysseus-both by Rosemary Sutcliff. Well this is it. The moment you've all been waiting for! These are the books we will be using this coming fall. BSBT tells the tale of the Trojan War, while The Wanderings of Odysseus covers, well, the wanderings of Odysseus! How did I choose? Two complete books by the same author, well-written, with the hands-down best illustrations of anything I've looked at. Beautiful hardcover editions to add to a permanent library. I think we will do these as read-alouds and discuss together. Charlie (who will be 6 in the fall) is always hanging out with us and usually listening in, so if the gore becomes too much for him, my plan B is to have Ben read these independently and give Will the Mary Pope Osborne books to read. He can always catch up with a more sophisticated version later.

In addition to the Sutcliff choices, I will have Ben read Penelope Lively's In Search of a Homeland which is a retelling of Virgil's Aeneid. Put out by the same publisher as the Sutcliff books, I believe this is meant to complete the trifecta of ancient epics for children.