Little Women and the Civil War

From the middle of September through the end of October, Harmonia's literature, composition and social studies lessons used Louisa May Calcott's classic Little Women and it's Civil War setting as an over-arching theme. We even found a science lesson! Below are some links and activities from that unit:

* "Intro to the Civil War" Power Point -- You can find several good ones here
* Little Women Word Bank -- vocabulary words based on unfamiliar words we encountered while reading
* Death and the Civil War science lesson -- uses various historical documents to give scope and setting to the human toll during this conflict -- available here
* Civil War letters (primary documents) -- lesson available here
* The Gettysburg Address -- watched this YouTube video and this Power Point
* Battle of Corydon (As Hoosiers, taking a look at the only other Civil War battle fought on Union soil -- in Corydon, IN -- was very interesting) -- we had every intention of taking a field trip to the battle site, but the weather was uncooperative.
* Rebel Yell -- watched this video
* Letter to a character from Little Women -- give advice


Little Women journal questions:
* Which character do you think you are most like in this story? Explain.
* Write about a time when you felt awkward or uncomfortable in a social setting. Why do you think you felt this way?
* If you could change one quality about yourself, what would it be? Explain.
* Predict what you think you might be like in three year. What will you be interested in? How will you spend your time? What will you have accomplished?
* Write about a time when you felt proud of a talent or accomplishment.
* How important is money to you/your life? Explain.
* How do you handle sadness, loneliness, or disappointment? Explain.

Each picture is attached just along its top edge -- so they flip up.

Notebook Pages
(I have Harmonia keep a thematic notebook for each unit we study. I'll post about how I do that soon.)
* US Map showing Union and Confederate States
* Vivandieres -- Harmonia took notes and chose a picture from the Daughter of the Regiment website
* Zouaves 
* Morse Code and the Telegraph
* Civil War Quilts
* Civil War ships
* Women's Clothing of the 1800s -- pantalettes, chemise, corset, hoop skirt, petticoat; found information on each and printed pictures
* Food Price Comparison -- using info here and a trip to the grocery store, Harmonia made a compare/contrast chart
* Venn Diagram -- Meg at 16 v. Meg at 22
* Venn Diagram -- Laurences (Laurie and Amy) v. the Brookes (Meg and John)

Nadene at Practical Pages has some great Civil War notebooking resources here -- plus lots of good tidbits on notebooking.


Paragraph/Chunk Writing Practice
(I was trained to teach composition using the Jane Shaffer writing method. I love it, and I will write a separate entry on it in the future. For now, check out Wikipedia's entry. For chunk/paragraph practice, I provide a topic sentence and maybe a concrete detail, and Harmonia writes the rest.)
* A young person can change and mature a lot in three years.
* Talent can bring both joy and comfort
* Amy is the sister most concerned with money and social status.
* Laurie is smitten with Jo.
* Amy and Laurie fall in love in a surprising way.
* Although quiet and shy, Beth makes a big impact on her family.
* Jo was unable to love Laurie in a romantic way.

Final Projects
* Little Women commercial -- Harmonia used some simple video editing software to splice together pictures, music, and her own captions into this book trailer.
* Civil War Simulation -- Fun writing project that gets you in the middle of the action. I had Harmonia choose her person randomly. (She was Jefferson Davis!)


Just for fun, we watched Gone with the Wind.

Curriculum overview

Thought I would you an idea of what we studying, in general, right now. We don't cover all of these topics every day; rather, we have the week scheduled so that we spend a few hours on each subject at a time. Only algebra gets a slim portion of time. I mean, who can stomach two straight hours of math? Not our Harmonia!

Literature -- Romeo & Juliet
Composition -- daily journals; working on a five paragraph essay based on the Jane Shaffer method
History -- Elizabethan England -- presenting a young woman's dress at a local history fair on Feb 23
Math -- Algebra (proportions)
Art History -- Renaissance
Art -- pottery, plus Sketch Tuesdays
Science -- botany (leaf/tree identification), plus weekly nature walks
Foreign Language -- Japanese (conversational)
Music -- piano
Home Ec -- sewing
Religious Studies -- divination (beginning Tarot and palmistry); comparison of Winter holidays

We are trying out a few different local homeschool groups -- all secular. Only one is really close to us, at 20 minutes away. I just discovered it today, and I'm so excited. It meets at a nearby library twice a month.

The two others we've been attending are each about 40 minutes away. One hasn't worked out well so far as most of the kids are significantly younger than Harmonia, but the other (Free Your Mind -- FYM) has had wonderful field trips and events. We'll probably stick with the Library group and FYM.

More to come on the Civil War/Little Women unit we just finished up and the Renaissance/Romeo & Juliet unit we are beginning.

Also coming soon: The Hero's Journey/LotR  and World History/Hetalia

And then the Moms got jobs ... hmmmm

So, almost immediately after writing our first blog entry, I (Laurelei) applied for and was offered a position as a psychic reader at Inner Path in Greenwood. I work two days per week, plus the monthly psychic fairs; and I have loved it, but boy howdy! has it made life busy.  I started on October 3. Glaux started about 2-3 weeks later.

Has all of this mom-busyness put a damper on school life here at MOMrovia Middle School? Um ... yes! I thought we could easily work it out, since Grammie and Pa are so involved in educating Miss Harmonia, and Glaux works different days than me, ... but there are issues. My Harmonia girl isn't thriving, and she has to come before the other work.

So, I'm in talks with the store's owners about how best to proceed. I'd still love to teach classes here and there, and Harmonia could even help out with the dance classes. I'd even love to continue giving readings during the psychic fairs. I just can't be in the store all day twice a week.

I'll redouble my efforts with Blade & Broom Botanica -- which I can work on easily in the evenings after lessons are done. Yep, that's about it.

Chapter 1: I am born.

Welcome to the birth of our family's Pagan, Witchy, homeschooling, poly ADVENTURE BLOG!

The Black Family

 Not a one of us carries the legal name Black; however, that surname has become a collective moniker for the family. How? Well, Iron Dragon used it as part of his most prominent online pseudonym within the local Pagan community. He uses it in combination with his middle name, so the whole pseudonym sounds reasonable enough that everyone has assumed it's really his name. When I (Laurelei) entered the relationship with Glaux and Iron, I picked it up, too. I was a writer in search of a nome de plume, and here was Iron using a surname that really did belong to my family's heritage. (If Pa, my father, had been reared by his biological father, his last name and my maiden name would have been Black. Adoption, though, gave us an awesome family and a different name altogether!)

Glaux and Iron have been together since 2003. Incidentally, that was the same year "Eros" was born! I joined the relationship in August 2008, bringing my whole crazy family with me. =)

"Harmonia" was born early in 2000, making her ALMOST a teenager!

My parents ("Grammie and Pa" to my kids and readers) invited us to move in with them at the end of 2009, and we established our multi-generational, communal, artistic, Bohemian household at the very beginning of 2010.

Pa and Grammie on a family trip to St. Augustine in 2011

Laurelei & Glaux at the Ohio Ren Faire in 2011

Iron Dragon (at Brushwood) -- Firetending in 2008

Eros at the Indy Zoo in 2012

Harmonia at home in 2012

Who Am We?

Laurelei is a writer and publisher, former public school English and Theatre/Speech teacher, psychic/intuitive reader, artist, Witch shop proprietress, and life coach. Busy? Oh yes. She also homeschools Harmonia, covering literature, composition, social studies, science, and more. She coordinates Harmonia's studies with the other family members and outside teachers/activities Think of her as the Headmistress of Mom-rovia Middle School.

Glaux is an artist, web designer, librarian (by heart, if no longer by profession), psychic/intuitive reader. She teaches Harmonia Art History.

Iron Dragon is an IT consultant, former Army MP, and oft-times "Professional Scarer." (He has designed and managed several "haunts" -- houses, cornfields, woods, sanitariums.)

Grammie is also a former school-teacher (elementary), artist, and fiber artist (crochet, mainly). She teaches Harmonia Home Economics and sometimes Art. She also takes Harmonia to outside Art, Pottery, and Riding (horse) classes.

Pa worked in accounting and computer programming for the Army and the Department of Defense. He is also a musician and artist. He teaches Harmonia math (currently Algebra) and supplements her piano classes with other musical training.

Eros is the youngest member of our family, and he primarily lives with his and Harmonia's father about 90 minutes from the Black House. He attends public school, where he excels both academically and socially. He loves to play video games, soccer, basketball and baseball. We have him with us every other weekend and school holidays during the school year; and he is here every other week throughout the summer.

Harmonia primarily lives at the Black House. She spends weekends and summers on the same schedule as Eros. She loves anime/manga, making pottery, drawing, reading and costuming. She's played softball since Kindergarten and other sports intermittently.

We co-habitate with two rabbits (Fred and George) and four cats (Glaux's Hex and Jinx, Harmonia's Tux, and Grammie's Tizzy). Hex, Jinx and the rabbits live downstairs with us. Tux and Tizzy are upstairs and outside cats.


Non-Residential Family

We have a cast of characters that rotates through the house pretty regularly. Our coven -- Serpentina, the Hearth-Keeper and her daughter, and a couple of newly interested folks -- are here and heavily involved with our lives. Plenty Paws and the Bearded Goat are here almost every week.


Whatcha Gonna Do?

This blog is going to be dedicated to our homeschool activities, concepts relating to Pagan and Poly families, and communal living. We hope you enjoy peeking into our lives, and we hope that you'll have information and inspiration among the wild gypsy ramblings of the Most Ancient and Noble House of Black.