Saturday, June 27, 2009

Engineering for High School Students

Here is a great resource for engineering topics for different grades -- and some great ideas for middle/highschool. It would be very cool to do a coop of kids to explore these topics.

http://www.engineeringk12.org

Of course, lots of their resources are expensive and only work in a public school but the idea would be great -- explore different aspects of engineering over an 8 month period.

Friday, June 26, 2009

Personality Enneagram

A good resource for Enneagrams -- worth looking at more. Even has info on how 2 different types relate to each other.

http://www.enneagraminstitute.com/

Language Arts Resource

Here's a great NING for language arts -- full of teachers talking about lots of different English/LA topics. Look more at the teaching texts groups -- some good thoughts for this fall.

http://englishcompanion.ning.com

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Highschool and Middleschool resources

I really need to get Barbara Shelton's Form-U-La book for designing high school classes.
http://www.homeschooloasis.com/
It's time to start collecting the right info so it's on hand for a highschool transcript.

Finding Dulcinea: LOTS of resources by theme for highschool and middleschool
http://www.findingdulcinea.com/guides.topic__ss_categories_ss_education.html

Preschool Themes

Soon, soon, I'm going to start thinking about Middleschool and Highschool again but for now, I'll continue to dabble in the Preschool mode...

Here's a great resource for planning themes -- each theme (including each alphabet letter) has songs, book recs, activities, science, songs, art, games on that theme or letter. We could do the typical one letter a week for the year and do all sorts of different activites.

Everything Preschool

Another cool resource is "Finding Dulcinea" -- here's the list of resources for Preschool:
http://www.findingdulcinea.com/guides/Education/Early-Childhood-Education.pg_04.html#04
But there are also lots of themes like highschool history (I'll post that separate so I can find it again!)

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

More Preschool Curriculum Ideas

Though I think that preschoolers really don't need an elaborate curriculum, some seasons in life require more pre-thought than others. This time around, I'm interested in doing a more directed or purposeful time with Jm each day. Not only will pre-planning help on the days when I can't think of anything fun to do with him and we're in a rut, but it also may give a bit more space that I can spend with Bj on his schoolwork.

Plan for creating preschool curriculum:
http://www.nncc.org/Curriculum/planguide.html

Very, very cool pop-up ABC folders!!!! Not sure it's worth the time and effort but might be interesting to try one or two.
http://cp.c-ij.com/en/contents/2023/pop-abc/index.html

Monday, June 1, 2009

8th Grade Literature

8th Grade Literature... it continues to be a challenge!!!!

Here's a booklist from the people who wrote Teaching the Classics:
http://www.centerforlit.com/booklists/booklist7th.htm

Other options:
K12 8th Grade Literary Analysis and Composition

Institute for Excellence in Writing: Windows to the World

Hewitt's Lightning Literature


Janice Campbell's Introduction to Literature

AND a list of the top classics for highschool and middleschool students to read:
1. The Three Musketeers (1844) Alexandre Dumas
10. Robinson Crusoe (1719) Daniel Defoe
100. Mutiny on the Bounty (1932) Charles Nordhoff & James Hall
101. William Tell (1804) Frederick Schiller
102. The White Company (1891) Arthur Conan Doyle
103. Men Against the Sea (1933) Charles Nordhoff & James Hall
104. Bring 'em Back Alive (1930) Frank Buck & Edward Anthony
105. From the Earth to the Moon (1870) Jules Verne
106. Buffalo Bill (1920) William F. Cody
107. King of the Khyber Rifles (1916) Talbot Mundy
108. Knights of the Round Table (1903) Howard Pyle
109. Pitcairn's Island (1939) Charles Nordhoff & James Hall
11. Don Quixote (1605) Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
110. The Speckled Band (1892) Arthur Conan Doyle
111. The Talisman (1825) Sir Walter Scott
112. Kit Carson (1873) John S.C. Abbott
113. The Forty-Five Guardsmen (1848) Alexandre Dumas
114. The Red Rover (1827) James Fenimore Cooper
115. How I Found Livingstone (1872) Henry M. Stanley
116. Robert Louis Stevenson: The Bottle Imp (1891), The Beach at Falesa (1892)
117. Captains Courageous (1897) Rudyard Kipling
118. Rob Roy (1818) Sir Walter Scott
119. Soldiers of Fortune (1897) Richard Harding Davis
12. Washington Irving: Rip Van Winkle (1819), The Headless Horseman (1819)
120. The Hurricane (1936) Charles Nordhoff & James Hall
121. Wild Bill Hickok (no author listed)
122. The Mutineers (1920) Charles Boardman Hawes
123. Fang and Claw (1935) Frank Buck
124. War of the Worlds (1898) H.G. Wells
125. The Oxbow Incident (1940) Walter Van Tilburg Clark
126. The Downfall (1892) Emile Zola
127. The King of the Mountains (1857) Edmond About
128. Macbeth (1606) William Shakespeare
129. Davy Crockett (no author listed)
13. Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (1883) Robert Louis Stevenson
130. Caesar's Conquests (51 B.C.) Julius Caesar
131. The Covered Wagon (1922) Emerson Hough
132. The Dark Frigate (1923) Charles Boardman Hawes
133. The Time Machine (1895) H.G. Wells
134. Romeo and Juliet (1597) William Shakespeare
135. Waterloo (1868) Emile Erckmann & Alexandre Chatrian
136. Lord Jim (1900) Joseph Conrad (Korzeniowski)
137. The Little Savage (1848) Captain Frederick Marryat
138. A Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864) Jules Verne
139. In the Reign of Terror (1890) G.A. Henty
14. Westward Ho! (1855) Charles Kingsley
140. On Jungle Trails (1936) Frank Bucks
141. Castle Dangerous (1831) Sir Walter Scott
142. Abraham Lincoln (1952) Benjamin Thomas
143. Kim (1901) Rudyard Kipling
144. The First Men in the Moon (1901) H.G. Wells
145. The Crisis (1901) Winston Churchill
146. With Fire and Sword (1890) Henry Sienkiewicz
147. Ben Hur (1880) Lew Wallace
148. Lafitte the Pirate (1930) Lyle Saxon
149. Off on a Comet (1878) Jules Verne
15. Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852) Harriet Beecher Stowe
150. The Virginian (1902) Owen Wister
151. Won by the Sword (1899) G.A. Henty
152. Wild Animals I Have Known (1898) Ernest Thompson Seton
153. The Invisible Man (1897) H.G. Wells
154. The Conspiracy of the Pontiac (1851) Francis Parkman
155. The Lion of the North (1890) G.A. Henty
156. Conquest of Mexico (1632) Bernal Diez Del Castillo
157. Lives of the Hunted (1902) Ernest Thompson Seton
158. The Conspirators (1843) Alexandre Dumas
159. The Octopus (1901) Frank Norris
16. Gulliver's Travels (1726) Jonathan Swift
160. The Food of the Gods (1904) H.G. Wells
161. Cleopatra (1889) H. Rider Haggard
162. Robur the Conqueror (1886) Jules Verne
163. Master of the World (1904) Jules Verne
164. The Cossack Chief (1839) Nikotai Gogol
165. The Queen's Necklace (1849) Alexandre Dumas
166. Tigers and Traitors (1880) Jules Verne
167. Faust (1808/1832) Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
17. The Deerslayer (1841) James Fenimore Cooper
18. The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831) Victor Hugo
19. Huckleberry Finn (1884) Mark Twain
2. Ivanhoe (1820) Sir Walter Scott
20. The Corsican Brothers (1845) Alexandre Dumas
21. 3 Famous Mysteries: The Sign of the Four (1890) Arthur Conan Doyle, The Flayed Hand (1880) Guy de Maupassant, Murders in the Rue Morgue (1841) Edgar Allen Poe
22. The Pathfinder (1840) James Fenimore Cooper
23. Oliver Twist (1838) Charles Dickens
24. A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1889) Mark Twain
25. Two Years Before the Mast (1840) Richard Henry Dana Jr.
26. Frankenstein (1818) Mary Shelley
27. Marco Polo (1921) Donn Byrne
28. Michael Strogoff (1876) Jules Verne
29. The Prince and the Pauper (1882) Mark Twain
3. The Count of Monte Cristo (1844) Alexandre Dumas
30. The Moonstone (1868) William Wilkie Collins
31. The Black Arrow (1888) Robert Louis Stevenson
32. Lorna Doone (1869) Richard Doddridge Blackmore
33. Sherlock Holmes Stories: A Study in Scarlet (1887) Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902) Arthur Conan Doyle
34. Mysterious Island (1874) Jules Verne
35. Last Days of Pompeii (1834) Edward Bulwer-Lytton
36. Typee (1846) Herman Melville
37. The Pioneers (1822) James Fenimore Cooper
38. The Adventures of Cellini (1562) Benvenuto Cellini
39. Jane Eyre (1847) Charlotte Bronte
4. Last of the Mohicans (1826) James Fenimore Cooper
40. Edgar Allen Poe Mysteries: Pit and the Pendulum (1845), Adventures of Hans Pfall (1845), The Fall of the House of Usher (1838)
41. Twenty Years After (1845) Alexandre Dumas
42. Swiss Family Robinson (1813) Johann Wyss
43. Great Expectations (1861) Charles Dickens
44. Mysteries of Paris (1842) Eugene Sue
45. Tom Brown's School Days (1856) Thomas Hughes
46. Kidnapped (1886) Robert Louis Stevenson
47. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1870) Jules Verne
48. David Copperfield (1850) Charles Dickens
49. Alice in Wonderland (1865) Lewis Carroll (C.L. Dodgson)
5. Moby Dick (1851) Herman Melville
50. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) Mark Twain
51. The Spy (1821) James Fenimore Cooper
52. The House of the Seven Gables (1851) Nathaniel Hawthorne
53. A Christmas Carol (1843) Charles Dickens
54. The Man in the Iron Mask (1850) Alexandre Dumas
55. Silas Marner (1861) George Eliot (Marian Evans)
56. Toilers of the Sea (1866) Victor Hugo
57. The Song of Hiawatha (1855) Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
58. The Prairie (1827) James Fenimore Cooper
59. Wuthering Heights (1847) Emily Bronte
6. A Tale of Two Cities (1859) Charles Dickens
60. Black Beauty (1860) Anna Sewell
61. The Woman in White (1860) William Wilkie Collins
62. Western Stories: The Luck of Roaring Camp (1870) Bret Harte, The Outcasts of Poker Flats (1870) Bret Harte
63. Man Without a Country (1863) Edward Everett Hale
64. Treasure Island (1883) Robert Louis Stevenson
65. Benjamin Franklin (1817) Benjamin Franklin
66. The Cloister and the Hearth (1861) Charles Reade
67. The Scottish Chiefs (1809) Jane Porter
68. Julius Caesar (1607) William Shakespeare
69. Around the World in Eighty Days (1873) Jules Verne
7. Robin Hood (1883) Howard Pyle
70. The Pilot (1823) James Fenimore Cooper
71. The Man Who Laughs (1869) Victor Hugo
72. The Oregon Trail (1849) Francis Parkman
73. The Black Tulip (1850) Alexandre Dumas
74. Mr. Midshipman Easy (1836) Captain Frederick Marryat
75. The Lady of the Lake (1810) Sir Walter Scott
76. The Prisoner of Zenda (1894) Anthony Hope (Hawkins)
77. The Iliad (962 B.C.) Homer
78. Joan of Arc (1801) Frederick Schiller
79. Cyrano de Bergerac (1897) Edmond Rostand
8. Arabian Nights (1704) Antony Galland
80. White Fang (1906) Jack London
81. The Odyssey (927 B.C.) Homer
82. The Master of Ballantrae (1889) Robert Louis Stevenson
83. The Jungle Book (1894) Rudyard Kipling
84. Edgar Allen Poe: The Gold Bug (1843), The Tell-Tale Heart (1845), A Cask of Amontillado (1845)
85. The Sea Wolf (1904) Jack London
86. Under Two Flags (1868) Ouida (Louisa de la Rame)
87. A Midsummer Night's Dream (185%) William Shakespeare
88. Men of Iron (1891) Howard Pyle
89. Crime and Punishment (1866) Feodor Dostoevsky
9. Les Miserables (1862) Victor Hugo
90. Green Mansions (1904) William Henry Hudson
91. The Call of the Wild (1903) Jack London
92. Henry W. Longfellow: Courtship of Miles Standish (1858), Evangeline (1847)
93. Pudd'nhead Wilson (1894) Mark Twain
94. David Balfour (1893) Robert Louis Stevenson
95. All Quiet on the Western Front (1928) Erich Maria Remarque
96. Daniel Boone (1939) John Bakeless
97. King Solomon's Mines (1885) H. Rider Heggard
98. The Red Badge of Courage (1895) Stephen Crane
99. Hamlet (1603) William Shakespeare