Homeschool Den

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Category: History and World Cultures Units

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History: Africa Unit / History: Geography Activities

Learning About West Africa – Children’s Games and more

It has been quite a while since I talked about our African Unit. I think the last time I wrote, I shared the history pages I made about the Ghana and Mali Empires. We had also learned about some famous Africans such as Sundiata and Mansa Musa. The past couple of weeks, we’ve been learning more about contemporary Africa.  We’ve been doing a lot of reading from Journey into Africa:...

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Freebies / History: Africa Unit / Must Read

West African History – Free Notebook Pages, Africa Picture Books

We have spent two weeks learning about the history of West Africa.  The kids did a lot of different West African art projects and while they worked on those, I would read aloud to them. After the camel was introduced in the 7th century or so, West Africa began trading more and more with North Africa. West African gold, salt and slaves moved north, while goods, ideas and Islam came down...

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History: Africa Unit / History: Geography Activities / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Geography of Africa–The Countries and Physical Features

Once again, we brought out our pin maps as we learned about the countries of West Africa. We used the flags of Africa from Montessori Materials  to create country pins for our pin map (African Flags-page 1;  African Flags-page 2). You can download and print out the map from the African Learning Pack I made back in September. I used a plain cork board underneath the map. As we were talking about the trade between...

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Arts and Crafts / History: Africa Unit / Must Read

African Art Projects – Moroccan Tiles, African Masks, African Music

This year we have been studying world cultures focusing primarily on Africa.  We started out with some basic facts about Africa and then moving on to Egypt including a study of Ancient Egypt.  From there we studied the Islam and its history.  We learned about the spread of Islam and moved on to a study the countries of northern Africa.  We looked at some of the beautiful examples of Moroccan...

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Freebies / History: World Religions / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Learning about the New Catholic Pope

I felt it was important to talk to the kids a bit about the newly elected pope, Pope Francis. We’ve been listening to the news and talking about it a bit, but I wanted to go into a little more detail tomorrow morning and made some pages for them to add to their history notebook. We are not Catholic, but Grandma is. My Mom died a couple of years before LD...

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History: Africa Unit / Recipes

Cooking with Kids: A Taste of Africa and the Middle East

As you probably know, the kids are studying world cultures this semester and the focus has been on Africa. Last week, the kids and I made several African and Middle Eastern dishes for dinner. We used the Kids Multicultural Cookbook and Cooking up World History for ideas. We made korma chicken (we added broccoli) with rice: The next night we made almond soup and Moroccan couscous. The almond soup was very, very...

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History: Africa Unit / History: World Religions / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Our Visit to the Local Mosque

As I mentioned yesterday, we have been studying Islam. We spent about a week and a half learning about how Islam was founded and some of their basic beliefs. Over the course of the week, the kids had tons of great questions… Things I just couldn’t answer. I decided to contact a nearby mosque to see if they did any community outreach. I make that sound easy, but it was actually...

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Freebies / History: Africa Unit / History: World Religions / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Learning About Islam – Free Worksheets and Resources for Kids

This year we are studying World Cultures and our focus has been on Africa.  Before we delve further into the culture and history of northern Africa, I wanted to help the kids understand a bit about Islam. Here is a set of worksheets I made for the kids as we learned a bit about Islam. This might also be helpful if you are doing an introduction to world religions.  You...

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History: Africa Unit / History: Ancient Egypt / Homeschool Den / Homeschool: Our Homeschool (what our day is like, curriculum choices, etc.) / Must Read

The Day in the Life of a Homeschooler

Every now and then I like to write up these posts. The first one I did was when the kids were 3 and 1 (and ED wasn’t born yet!)…I’ve done them periodically since then. This is a glimpse of what goes on when we’re actually home all day. It’s not a “typical” day because as homeschoolers each day is different than the day before–at least in our family. That’s what...

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History: Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt – Hieroglyphic Generator

If you are studying Ancient Egypt, the kids might like this hieroglyphic generator from Discovery Kids.  They can type in their name and see what it would look like in hieroglyphics: Update: Their website has moved no longer works! It now looks like this. You can find it here: Hieroglyphics Typewriter Here are some of our posts from when we studied Ancient Egypt – our projects and activities. I recently...

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History: Africa Unit / History: Ancient Egypt / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Could the Pyramids and Sphinx be Destroyed?

Since we are studying Ancient Egypt, this story is especially timely. The kids and I had some really deep discussions about this and the actual destruction of the Buddha of Bamiyan back in 2001. Some radical Islamists view the pyramids as symbols of paganism that should be destroyed. In fact, a couple of weeks ago (Nov. 10, 2012), Murgan Salem al-Gohary, the leader of Egypt’s ultra-conservative Salafist party called for the “destruction...

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Arts and Crafts / History: Africa Unit / History: Ancient Egypt / History: World Religions / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Ancient Egypt Death Mask Craft

I hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday. Ours was truly wonderful. I love Thanksgiving because its a time to focus on family and the best part is the dinnertime conversation about what we are thankful for. The kids have such precious things on their minds! Anyway, we’re back to school now—and we’re finishing up some pretty fun projects. We had stepped away from our Ancient Egypt unit for several...

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Freebies / History: Africa Unit / History: Ancient Egypt / History: World Religions / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Ancient Egypt: Gods, Goddesses and Myths (Free Worksheet Set)

We have been learning a lot about the myths of Ancient Egypt. While I read to the kids, they often work on their own art. I came across a wonderful drawing book Ralph Masiello’s Ancient Egypt Drawing Book  (affiliate link) that the kids have been using to create their own Ancient Egyptian-themed drawings. Below they are drawing the Ancient Egyptian god, Osiris:  Another day the kids drew Ra as they...

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History: Africa Unit / History: Ancient Egypt / History: Geography Activities / Homeschool Den / Must Read

Ancient Egypt Unit: Creating the Nile River Valley

We started our unit on Ancient Egypt with a geography project. This is one we did about four years ago as well, but it was well worth repeating! We placed sand in an old plastic container. Then using toilet paper and paper towel rolls, we created the base for the winding Nile River. We covered that with aluminum foil. In upper Egypt we created the ‘mountains.’ We sprinkled potting soil...