Ideas for Using Your Book of Time

Today on the Sonlight Blog I'm sharing ideas for making a timeline and using your Book of Time.

Notebooking World History

For ideas on how to make a World History notebook read my post at Ramblin' Roads.

Field Trip to Fort Walla Walla

Visit Ramblin' Roads to read about our field trip to Fort Walla Walla.

Tweaking Sonlight Core 6

Visit Ramblin' Roads to read my post about how we are using Sonlight Core 6 this year.

Lewis and Clark Adventure

Read about our trip over the Lolo Motorway...

Lewis & Clark free online resources

We are currently learning about the Corps of Discovery in our overview of American History. Here are some great printable resources I found online to use in our notebooking approach to American History:

• Worksheet - fill-in-the-blank
• Worksheet - "follow the instructions" tracing the Corps of Discovery route
  
• Puzzle sheets - maze, crossword, and word find
• Coloring pages - scenes of the expedition
• Bingo game - with full-color photos
• Paper dolls - Lewis, Clark, Sacagawea, and Pomp (can also be used as coloring sheets)
• Paper doll of Sacagawea - full color, with 3 outfits
  
• Fact card - Has a L&C graphic with "Did You Know...?" and then blank lines for writing whatever you like (half sheet size)
• Art lesson - Step-by-step instructions for drawing a portrait of Sacagawea
  
• Lesson plans and activities - middle school level (This was much more in-depth than we took time for, but each lesson has a printable student page.)

Ideas from Other Sonlighters

For years I've collected links and ideas for supplementing Sonlight. I've posted the ideas I've compiled on my website. (And, yes, it needs to be updated. I'm hoping to work on that soon! Let me know if you have links I could add to it.)

In my blog-hopping this week, I came across a couple of posts from other Sonlighters sharing how they added to their Sonlight adventures in creative ways.

• Tanya @ Everyday Adventures: Exploring Ancient Greece and Greek Mythology
• Donna @ Morningside Academy: History in Our House

I love that Sonlight has that flexibility built in, so we can add in any extras that are a good fit for our individual families.

We're having a great time with Core 3+4 this year, taking a notebooking approach and adding in lots of library books. I'll be sharing more about our experiences as we go along.


Picture from Sonlight.com.

I love libraries!

Aren't free public libraries one of the greatest ideas ever? I've alway thought so! My family didn't have a lot of money when I was growing up, but we were rich in books because my mother took us to the library just about every week!

I've often thought I could probably give my children a pretty adequate education with just a library card. I'm glad I don't have to, but I bet I could!

Yesterday my 13-year-old daughter and I made a library run. We are studying American History this year, based on Sonlight's Core 3+4. However, my daughter has learning challenges (probably ADD and auditory processing delays) so she needs to hear information over and over to be able to retain it. My approach this year is to read about the same event from a lot of different perspectives, so we are going through stacks of books!

Right now we are learning about the 13 colonies, George Washington, and the Revolutionary War. Here are the titles of the books we brought home yesterday:

• General Washington and the General's Dog
• If You Lived at the Time of the American Revolution
• Eyewitness: American Revolution
• George vs. George: The American Revolution as seen from Both Sides
• American Revolution Battles and Leaders
• Hello USA (We got several of these, as there is a separate one for each state.)
• Shh! We're Writing the Constitution
• Cartoon Nation presents The American Presidency
• George Washington's Breakfast
• Why Don't You Get a Horse, Sam Adams?
• Getting to Know the U.S. Presidents: John Adams
• In 1776
• The Revolutionary John Adams
• Midnight Riders
• Row, Row, Row the Boats
• Trouble Brewing
• Take the Lead, George Washington
• National Geographic Society: George Washington

I'm sure some of these are better than others. I haven't read them all yet. We will probably just skim some of them. But... that's the beauty of library books! You can take 'em home with you and peruse them at your leisure.

Things I Learned on Pikes Peak

Today's adventure was a drive to the summit of Pikes Peak. It was sunny at the top, above the clouds!
Did you know? "Pikes Peak" has no apostrophe in the name! (Misplaced apostrophes are one of my pet peeves. But I found it interesting that there is officially none in the name of the mountain!)
We met a yellow-bellied marmot along the road! He was kind enough to pose for a picture... but he declined rolling over to show us his yellow belly!
Did you know? The words to America the Beautiful were inspired by the view from Pikes Peak. There is a monument about it on the summit.

Bears' "Ploughed Field"

One thing I like to do on road trips is stop and read the historical markers along the way. As we traveled south through eastern Idaho today, we saw several. This was my favorite one of the day:

LONG BEFORE MINERS AND RANCHERS
SETTLED STANLEY BASIN, BEARS
DOMINATED THIS AREA
When Alexander Ross and his Hudson's Bay
Company trappers stopped here, September 20,
1824, they "observed at some distance the
appearance of a ploughed field, and riding up
towards it, found a large piece of ground more
than four acres in extent, dug up and turned
over. On getting to the spot, we observed
no less than nine black and grizzly
bears at work, rooting away," eating
camas, onions, and wild celery.

This was the first day of our 2-week road-trip. Stay tuned for more interesting things we learn along the way!