Children's Homer Report and "The Little Engine That Could"

Week of February 3 thru 9, 2013:


The Children's Homer

Jaden and I finished reading The Children's Homer together, and Jaden subsequently wrote a book report on it.  It was his first book report, so I decided not to give him a really hard time about the briefness of it and lack of detail.  It was around this time (perhaps shortly afterward) that he suddenly changed his stance of hating writing to liking it, so I'm happy about that, and I'm happy that he at least did what he did on it without complaint.  He was awarded afterward with something of his choice, which ended up being a boxed macaroni (something I rarely buy otherwise), namely Annie's Homegrown shells and cheese. 

Jaden William's first book report WRITTEN by him (as opposed to "wrote")

William's report cracked me up, as I'm sure it will you.  He didn't like the first section (which would have been based on The Illiad).  I like the part that is based on The Odyssey much better myself, but there were some good learning lessons in both parts.

There was much to learn about: humility/humbleness, wisdom (probably this above all), loyalty, faithfulness and hope, kindness, respect, prayer, love, endurance, obedience, and more.

Odysseus greatly valued wisdom and was greatly known for being wise.  He also showed great humbleness, faith, respect, and love.  He received good instruction.  He was loyal to his wife back home in Ithaca, even when he found himself trapped for many years on the island of the nymph Calypso who promised him immortality and forever youthfulness if he agreed to marry her, refusing because of his great love for his wife and son.  Odysseus endured through many great trials for twenty long years total, even after he came within sight of his own land and yet blew far away again for several years.  He was kind to his men and to those who were hosts to him, showing respect and honor due people.  He prayed to Zeus (the greatest of the Greek gods) and to Athene (goddess of wisdom). 

The prayers to the various gods opened up a good opportunity to explain to Jaden about how pagan cultures prayed to various gods and goddesses based on what was important to them and how gods of agriculture and war have been especially important to men and goddesses of fertility and love have been important to women.  I also explained how the Great Whore (Catholic Church), in spiritually fornicating with paganism, teaches prayers to various "saints" in belief that they receive eternal and immortal life upon death and reside in Heaven.  Just as the pagans believed in praying to various gods based on circumstances, devoted Catholics pray to various saints of this and that with "the Virgin Mary" as the highest.  We also reviewed how there are indeed many gods, as "angels" and whatever immortal creatures the Creator placed into existence and mankind are called gods in the holy scriptures and that "god" or "God" simply means a great, powerful, intelligent being.  That is why the bible specifies that the Holy Father in Heaven is the "Most High God." The Son who is the Christ/Messiah is also a God being, and all those in the human family who end up being rewarded eternal life will be reborn as God beings, all being sons of the Most High and brethren to the Firstborn the Lord.

Odysseus' son Telemachus also endured trials and kept hopeful that his father would return home. He obeyed the goddess Athene when she agreed to help him.  Penelope, Odysseus's wife also was faithful, loyal, and enduring.  She loved Odysseus and refused to marry any of the suitors who went to her house each day to order their servants around and eat Odysseus' substance up.  She and Telemachus also demonstrated a certain amount of wisdom.

There was a good lesson in loyal servitude in the story.  Odysseus, upon his return, was disguised as an old beggar by Athena.  Besides other reasons, this happened to be useful in determining which of his servants remained loyal and which ones were disloyal.  Just a few of his slaves were righteous and missed Odysseus who had been so good to them, hating to serve the suitors.  Several others were evil servants who hated Odysseus and sided with the suitors, not caring that they were wasting Odysseus' substance.  I don't think the evil servants were spared...

So it will be in God's Kingdom as well.  As for I, I'm more than willing to promise complete servitude to my Lord throughout eternity.  I think I will end up getting a pretty good deal, way more than I deserve.  I'm very happy to serve my lord husband during this temporary journey here in a body of flesh, and he's not perfect.  How much better of a deal to serve my Lord now and all through eternity.  He's already treated me well and fully expect it to be so forever afterward.

" Book of the Week"

I started a "book of the week."  This is mainly for Trusten and Liv, but Jaden still likes to listen to me read stories sometimes, and he participates in the Sabbath scriptures.  Now back when Jaden was Trusten's and Liv's ages and even before, I read a LOT of books to him each and every day.  We'd read the same books over and over and over again, and then he'd finally want some different book or books, and we'd read it/them over and over and over.  He sat with me before he was even a year old and listened to me read and looked at pictures.  He also learned a lot of the ASL signs I taught him this way (he signed over 200 ASL signs on a regular basis before the age of two). He loved books from the beginning.

The same hasn't been true of Trust and Liv.  They are a different variety.  Trusten finally started liking books enough to sit and listen to a portion of them maybe a couple years ago, but it's only been more recently that he has enjoyed sitting through a whole story book (he's also learning how to read).  Liv is the same way.  At nearly 3.5 she is still hopping down and running away sometimes before the entire book is read.  And as for the scripture reading...well, I know she's getting some of it, but I don't expect her to sit with us during all of that.  She has been good to sit through the whole storybooks more lately, though.  

I do a lot teaching through analogies and parables, as by nature I'm a very analytical person and like to draw examples and parallels from nature and the scriptures.  I've already done a lot of this throughout everyday discussions and while reading books.  It sometimes takes a long time to read through certain things, because I'll stop at certain points and elaborate, especially when I think it requires it for their understanding. 

Then my friend Chel told me she really thought I'd like the program "Five in a Row" by Fiar.  I'm familiar with it, because she has used it for years.  Yes, I like that type of learning, and I have already done similar things to an extent in that I'll sometimes use things from here and there to theme things together and do fun things on the side to go with it. But I don't have any interest in getting that curriculum.  But I did come up with a new idea.

Of course I'm a free person, so I may or may not choose to stick with this.  But I started "Book of the Week."  I don't have to read the book five days in a row, but I do at least read it two or three times in a week, perhaps watch fun videos to go along with it, eat fun snacks, or do related projects, BUT the main partner to this is the Sabbath scripture study.  It really doesn't matter to me WHAT the book is, because I enjoy the challenge of teaching biblical lessons from ANYTHING.  I seriously can draw from just about everything that comes along in daily life, all through the day, and books are no exception.  I do hide God's Word in my heart, so I can quote scripture on the spot, and I usually do a good job of immediately turning to where something is in the bible.  So this is a FUN thing for me, too.

So the first book is...

The Little Engine That Could

Trusten with The Little Engine That Could by Watty Piper

 
Many know the story of the engine carrying the dolls and toys and all the good food to eat for the good little boys and girls on the other side of the mountain.  The train breaks down, and the engine and all the dolls and toys were sad.  The positive-minded clown kept everyone's spirits up with his faith, and he asked for help from approaching engines.  The luxurious and shiny passenger engine was too proud to pull kiddie stuff over the mountain, as was the big freight engine who boasted about carrying printed things for adults to read.  The dingy old engine who was greeted as "kind" by the clown exhibited a negative attitude, expressing that he was just too weary and "could not, could not, could not" help.  Then along comes the little blue engine who was only used to switch around trains.  The aspect of towing the broken down engine over the mountain seemed insurmountable, but the little blue engine was full of faith and confidence, as well as kindness.  She hitched the broken down engine carrying all the yummy apples, oranges, bottles of milk, lollipops, spinach, and peppermints and various dolls and toys to hers and over the mountain she went with a "I think I can, I think I can" attitude, and though it wasn't easy, she was successful and was able to go down the other side with a joyful "I thought I could, I thought I could."

I chose scriptures dealing with various bad pride, then weariness in doing good and lack of faith, concluded by a positive lesson on kindness, faith, etc.

And the kids happily sat down to a large snack of fruit, milk, and lollipops.

Until next time...

Icicles, Art, Robots and Homer

Week of January 13 thru 19:


The usual math, language lessons, spelling, etc., as well as reading lots of things with God's Instruction Book I as the top priority.  We also read about "India and Hinduism" in Mystery of History after Jaden did a quiz and pretest, the January edition of Ranger Rick where we read about the crabs on Christmas Island and some other things, the Learn-to-Read Bible with Trusten; and Jaden and I started reading The Children's Homer.

The Children's Homer

At the beginning of The Children's Homer, the king of Ithaka Odysseus was told by a messenger that he was being called to war with the other kings against Troy to rescue King Menelaus' (of Sparta) wife Helen whom was stolen by Paris, a prince of Troy.  Odysseus was a man of wisdom, among other things, and he feigned being mad in order to avoid leaving his wife and newborn son for war.  So what did he do to make it look as if he was crazy?  He started plowing a field with a donkey and ox yoked together!  I stopped at this point and talked to Jaden about the statute in the law of Moses that commanded not to yoke a donkey and ox together.  It's apparent that those of Greece didn't think this was a good thing, either.  The messenger tested him, though, by placing his firstborn infant son in the way of the plow, and when Odysseus got to the child, he stopped, so it was seen that he was sane and so went to war with some of his men.  Odysseus, if he was a real king, wasn't the only king recorded in history to feign madness.  King David of Israel pretended to be insane so that people would not know who he was, actually before he became king, but Achish, king of Gath, thought it was David the king, and so David was afraid, because he had fled from Saul who was still king and was envious of how the people treated David over him.

Robots

In one issue of Weekly Reader/Scholastic News we read about robots, especially humanoid robots and how they're being used more and more.  That led to some very interesting discussion about where our future is heading and the pros and cons of such a thing. 

Some Art

We started reading in the booklet that came with the Origami set that was a gift from my sister.  There are a couple other things we need to start doing origami. 

Here are some of the recent drawings and colorings of Trusten (who went quickly from practically no drawing and coloring experience to doing it and enjoying it), as well as an addition done by William to my turtle family set that I keep on my dresser.  My sister gave me the turtle family as a gift she got from Cozumel a year or two ago.  It was perfect, as it had a daddy turtle on bottom, a momma turtle, two boy turtles, and a girl turtle.  But now we have Elizabeth, so Jade decided to take a couple of my shells and make a new turtle (without legs, because I do not have shells small enough).  He got eyes and a puffball from his art stuff to add the finishing touches.

L: A pink person, a blue rabbit, and a yellow flower for Momma, from Trusten; An "Elizabeth" turtle (notice he used blue eyes) added to top of pile-up by Jaden William

  
Icicles

Jaden got his beloved wish to play with icicles from the bluffs.  It truly made his day that day:

A lovely sight for us to drive by whenever we go out

He doesn't like what he calls "the toddler picture." ;-)  He was appalled by his facial expression when I snapped the picture.  He was talking.

Ice treasures!!!  And yes, those are his good shoes!  We had gone to town that day.

  

Sabbath Day

Ahhhh....just gorgeous scenery and such a lovely day to relax and praise God on His holy day:

See the moon in the top picture?

 

Until next time...

Homer, Geodes, and Other Fun Things

For the week of Dec. 30, 2012 to Jan. 5, 2013:

Chef Jaden

Jaden William fixed breakfast for us every day this week, because he wanted to do so, except for the sixth day when we ate a quick fruit breakfast and got to work, and except for the Sabbath on which we always eat an easy breakfast.  The first day he made pancakes, and I made muffins (I didn't want pancakes), and the other four days he made muffins.  He decided one of the days to make peach muffins.  Now I haven't made peach muffins in nearly seven years.  I made them one time, and I'd used a different recipe than the base recipe I use now for all my various muffins.  We had not liked them, and though I've thought a few times about trying peaches with my beloved muffin recipe, I've just never done it.

Jade came up with the idea totally on his own, though, and wow, did they turn out delicious (I did take out the cinnamon and told him we should include it just like in our apple cinnamon muffins).  The very next day we all wanted peach muffins again, but the electricity was off, hence my grain mill would not function.  However I have a manual mill, so William took out that grinder and went to work.  I was working with Trusten on a workbook, and so when Jaden William the flour was coming out too coarse I didn't pay too close attention.  From where I was sitting it looked ok, and so I told him to carry on.  Well he got everything mixed together (and right afterward the electricity came back on), and I then saw what he meant.  The mill can be adjusted, just as the electric one can be, and the thing had been set on a setting that basically just chopped the grain.  There was no turning back, though.  We ended up eating the muffins that way.  It was a good lesson in how the flour normally soaks up the liquids in the correct way.  Sorry.  I took no pictures of any of this.

Jaden and Trusten did workbook math, nothing fun about math this week.  I worked with Liv in the Southwestern book I have on Numbers.

Eye Collages

Trust and Liv used the window crayons I bought.  Trusten designed one of the boys' bedroom windows, and Liv decorated the second.  I mentioned this in  my last post, but this particular activity took place during this week.

We all participated in a fun eye collage (my idea).  I couldn't possibly get Elizabeth still enough for her picture to turn out well. I did finally get one with which I was satisfied, but I had to take it while nursing her, and so hers is more diagonal.  Liv's, Jade's, and Nathan's turned out the best.  In the second collage I used different pictures of Jade and myself where the colors of our eyes look quite different.  This was fun, and I have the top collage set as my newest desktop background.

Top, from l to r: Liv, Trust, Na; Bottom: Jade, Liz, Tara

Bottom left is alternate Jade, bottom right is alternate Tara

A Lovely Sight in the Sky

One beautiful morning we headed to the post office to pick up a package.  The skies were gorgeous, but we saw nothing out of the ordinary.  Late that afternoon we started off to NWA (Northwest Arkansas) to get groceries.  I was amazed to see a strange sight in the sky.  We had recently read in one of Jaden's weekly readers about solar storms and how the solar flares could cause the aurora borealis to be seen as far south as Arkansas, so Jaden said that he thought it might be that.  It didn't look like an aurora, though.  It partially looked like a second sun shining, and then there was a red bow.  The bow had a longer reach than you can really tell in my pictures, but the most visible part was with the bright circle of light, and you can see that in the pictures.  You can see clearly where the sun (a few minutes shy of an hour before sunset) is, and there are only light cirrus-like clouds in the sky, not cumulus clouds covering that whole area with just a break for the sun to shine through.  It literally looks like there is an entire different light-source (though it must surely not be).  Does anyone know the correct explanation for this phenomenon?  I do remember that the waves that show red show through better in the evenings, so this seems to me to be related to solar particles and waves, but I'm not sure whether it can be referred to as aurora, when I've never seen any aurora picture like this.

 Anyway, it was neat. I had to stop and take pictures.

Homer

We read in Mystery of History about "Elisha," "Joel and Obadiah," and "Homer."  I decided to read The Children's Homer with Jaden, which is a shortened version of the two classics The Odyssey and The Illiad.  I loved the movies.  Odysseus underwent many trials but never gave up in trying to get home to his wife and son.  And his wife was noble and faithful for two decades, refusing to believe he'd died and not wishing to marry another.  I'm also hoping to open Jaden's eyes wide to the biggest difference between the One True God and the many pagan gods, which is the fact that it's not that God the Father is a single god, but rather one, and that "one" means unity and union with harmony.  God can reproduce and beget sons just as any man or animal or plant, but they are one with him (like is fully explained in Christ's prayer in John 17).

There are other gods.  The scriptures call both angels and men gods.  Satan is called the god of this world.  And indeed there is a lot of truth seen in the pagan religions.  The problem is that people have worshiped all the various gods, and they WAR against each other.  There is NO unity/oneness.  The gods warred with each other, took revenge upon each other, etc.  One person may have prayed to one god or goddess for one thing, and delighting to answer that person's prayer, something horrible may have happened to that person when another god did something to him or her to get back at the other god or to answer one of his loyal follower's prayers.

I'm hoping for some good discussion and important lessons. 

The World of Randolph the Grasshopper

Speaking of important lessons, I'll share one of the latest Randolph stories.  For those who don't recall, as I've not shared many Randolph stories on the blog, Randolph is the main character in the most regular bedtime stories I've told the children.  I've been telling Randolph stories for five years or so now.  They are fun but almost always have a moral lesson, too.  This story was about two more of Randolph's sons named Shiloh and Abaddon.  Randolph taught both those sons how to make fire.  The two sons took the knowledge of making fire and went on two separate paths.  Shiloh used his knowledge of making fire to light lamps for others so that they could see their way in the dark and to build fires for warmth.  Abaddon was full of hate and so used his knowledge of making fire to deliberately burn down a nearby forest.  (Not sure whether I shared it a while back, but there was another son of Randolph's--Pyro--who also caused destruction with burning, and he perished in a field fire of his own making.)  Shiloh was loved and praised by those around him, whereas it was discovered what Abaddon did, and he was executed for his deed, and there was much mourning for the innocent that was lost, as well as mourning on Randolph's part that his son chose the wrong way.

This story was to further the understanding of the knowledge of good and evil and that knowledge itself is not evil but what is done with it can be.  Jaden and I have returned to this topic a lot over the past few weeks.  Two people can obtain the same basic knowledge, and one can use that knowledge to do evil, and another can use that same knowledge to do good.  A person can make a knife to cut food or leather, etc. or can make a knife to kill in battle.  A person can read a story to meditate upon its concepts and learn from the characters' successes and failures to become a better person, or a person can read the same story and decide to engage in wrongful activities learned in the story.  A person can learn uterine surgery to undertake a life-saving cesarean section operation or to remove the baby to kill it.

I had already conceived the story right before the children went to bed, but when I went into the boys' bedroom Trusten was beating on the big stuffed horse in the middle of the room, kicking and punching it.  I said, "I believe the story I'm about to tell will be just perfect, because Trusten is not doing the right thing toward the horse."  Immediately he started dancing with the horse,  holding onto its front feet.  So after I told the story I revisited the incident with Trusten and the horse.  Trusten had the knowledge to move his arms/hands and legs/feet, but he showed how that could be used for both good and evil toward the horse.

Geodes

We opened geodes this week, and of the six geodes, only one of them was not much to look at inside.  I've  now got them all adorning a shelf on one of our bookcases.  We also read about geodes:  what the word means (earth-like,  shaped like the earth), how they form, what kinds of minerals can be found inside, where they're located, etc.  The first five Jaden chiseled around them and then hammered.  The last one we left for Nathan, and he cut it open neatly.  Some of my pictures got deleted, and I'm disappointed in how some of these look, as they look so much more gorgeous than you can see, but the one Nathan is holding looks nice.  The one busted open shown on the floor with just a tiny cap off the top is a very gorgeous one, too.  You just can't tell it. 

Icicles and Chickens

Jaden loves all the ice in the winter, as most of you reading well know.  Here he is by the bluffs with an icicle.

 
 And everyone who knows Jaden William also knows he dearly loves chickens.  He has wanted some silkies again ever since his beloved black silkie Rudi died years ago.  He went with his daddy to get some white and gray ones.  The one pictured below became injured (leg was hurt by an attacking chicken), and Jaden cared for it all day.

Well, that covers the high points of our week.

Until  next time...