Any teachers out there?

There’s this great program that they do in Rachel’s school called “Art Through The Ages.” It’s completely run and taught by the PTA and the idea behind the program is to teach kids both history, and art history, while also giving them an art class. The time period is discussed along with what things were happening in the world and a particular region at that time, art during that time frame is shown and discussed, and then the kids get a chance to try their hands at creating similar art using similar methods from the time. Rachel loves the program. She comes home and tells me all about what she learned, and what she made.

This year I offered to help. Honestly, I really didn’t think they’d need me or that they’d pick me to lead the lesson. I thought maybe there were better trained people and I would just be helping them. I chose the Renaissance time period. Yesterday we had the training, and I found out that, in fact, *I* will be leading the lesson. (There was someone listed as being available to help me – but I haven’t heard from them).

So the history portion (as far as I understand it! Someone PLEASE correct me if I’m wrong!) talks about the shift from God-centered thinking and artwork, to human-centered. People sent less money to Rome to the Church. Because of the bubonic plague, there were just less people around in general, which meant less famine, less (business) competition and a “middle class” rose into being that had more expendable money. Some of this money was spent on the arts; Music, plays, artwork. Artists could make a living on their craft – and this gave rise to an explosion in creativity.

This is the point that we’re supposed to do an activity with the kids to get them to “feel like they’re in this time” – and unfortunately the activity just made no sense to me. The activity they had revolved around having a few kids pick a “job” (for example: corn farmer) and having them set a price for their product – and would the rest of the class pay that much, (if there’s just one corn farmer – do you have much choice) – and then if there are more corn farmers – how does their competition and price change.

I just don’t get the connection between that activity and the Renaissance. There’s got to be another activity (non-art-related – that comes later) that can give them a better understanding of the time period. Unfortunately, I’m on my own if I want to try something different (which we’ve been given the freedom to do) but aside from the fact that I 1) suck at public speaking even in front of kids! and 2) suck at teaching in general – WHAT?! What do I do??

The ART portion of the lesson I think I can do (or at least do better than what is planned for the HISTORY portion) – I’ll be covering the new concepts that came about during the Renaissance such as “vanishing points”, “foreshortening”  – I can show paintings during the Medieval time and compare that with paintings during the Renaissance. I can show how vanishing points work – etc. Then the kids are to try their hands at creating a “fresco” (which actually isn’t really a fresco – from what I understand – fresco means painting on WET plaster – secco is painting on dry plaster. Most FRESCO’s were a combination of fresco and secco because while the fresco had more permanence, the colors couldn’t be as vibrant – so most artists went back over their fresco and added details with the more vibrant colors – secco) The kids will be painting on DRY plaster. (Do I bother to explain the difference between fresco and secco? They didn’t even mention it in the training and just said the kids will be doing a fresco – which is wrong!)

But what about the HISTORY portion? Any ideas? Any resources? (I could use more painting samples too – any websites out there that have a lot of examples I can show the kids?) (I should probably add that this is for a 4th grade class)

Man, I am NEVER doing this again!!! There’s a VERY GOOD reason I don’t homeschool – I absolutely SUCK at this!

Want a FREE night at the movies?

U

General Mills is doing a promotion right now when you buy two boxes of specially marked boxes of cereal, you can print up a free movie ticket. (up to $12 value) Here’s how it works: Look for either Honey Nut Cheerios, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, Lucky Charms, Trix or Reese’s Puffs cereal. Inside, you’ll find a code. When you have two codes – go here to enter them in and get your free movie ticket! (Click to find a list of participating theaters or for more details.) You should be able to find these boxes in stores starting the beginning of this month (November)!

To help spread the word about this promotion, General Mills, through MyBlogSpark, sent me coupons for us to head to the theater ourselves as well as a coupon for a free box of General Mills cereal. Personally, the only somewhat kid friendly movie out right now is Where the Wild Things Are, and I think it’s not something my kids would enjoy. I know for a fact that there’s a few more kid movies coming out soon. In fact the new Disney movie is due out in the middle of December: The Princess and The Frog – so I’ll be holding out a bit before we head to the theaters.

BUT! I didn’t want to wait to tell you about the promotion because I have a packet of 4 free movie tickets and a coupon for 1 free box of cereal for a GIVEAWAY! (The tickets are good until September 2010, so if you’re like me and wanting to hold out for a particular movie to be released – you’ll still be able to do that)

HOW TO ENTER “MOVIE MOMENT” CONTEST:
I’m going to keep this really simple. Each item below only counts once and is worth 1 entry into the contest. You can do just the first one – or all three – up to you.

1) (Mandatory Entry – you must at least do this one) Leave a comment on this post.
Make sure you put in a real email address (that you check often!) as this is the method I will use to contact you if you win. In your comment, I’d love to know what movie you’d want to see (or if you’re going to hold out for awhile for a particular movie to come out). Or tell me what your favorite movie is. 🙂

2) Tweet about this post. If you’re feeling uninspired, you can use this text exactly:

Go to the movies FOR FREE! Details and MOVIE TICKETS GIVEAWAY here: http://bit.ly/3vJGvJ Pls RT

Then come back and leave a comment telling me you did (and tell me your Twitter ID so I can see your tweet) 😀

3) If you have a blog – mention and link to this post.

Contest ends November 12th at 10pm MST. There is no purchase necessary to enter the contest. I will be using random.org to choose the winner. I’ll contact the winner via email, and he/she will have 48 hours to respond. After 48 hours, if I don’t receive a response, another winner will be chosen.

Word Cub – Educational iPhone Game for Kids

WLearning Cubed, LLC.

Zach loved playing this game. He has a pretty good grasp on his letters already, but this was a great way to reinforce what he already knows and push him along to getting ready to read. The game is fantastic and if you have a child that is just starting to learn letters or is a pre-reader, I highly recommend getting it! It’s really well done!

Word Cub: $1.99 (at time of this writing)

Halloween Leftovers

Halloween is done. Our routine is to usually let the kids stay up late, gorge themselves on their candy and then try to get rid of it the next day. I think one year we did a “Halloween Fairy” that exchanged a toy for the leftover Halloween candy. Surprisingly, Rachel totally forgot about it this year (so did I). I’m thinking since she figured out the tooth fairy didn’t exist, trying to pass a “Halloween Fairy” over her this year probably isn’t a good idea. I’m sure Santa’s clock is ticking in her mind as well… (But I’ll put money on her deciding not to ask about it until AFTER she gets her Hanukkah/Christmas presents… Yes, we do both in this house. Our kids are spoiled.) 😛

The Halloween Fairy would probably work for Zach, but I’m trying to go for a simpler approach and convince him the candy goes bad very quickly and has to be thrown out. I’ll give them one more day of too much sugar – and then it goes OUT! We had very few trick-or-treaters and have lots of leftovers. (I bought little single-serving bags of pretzels. And NO that’s NOT why we didn’t see many people. LOL! We had the same thing happen last year and I had 4 different brands of chocolate bars to hand out!) I think the pretzels will be perfect for after-school snacks so I’m not upset about the leftovers. 🙂 (And despite their original protests, I think neither are the kids!)

Zach dressed up as Spiderman this year, and Rachel was originally going to be a butterfly, but after checking the weather, she decided to opt for a warmer, kind of ambigous “baby” costume. (The neighbors were confused. LOL! Almost everyone had to ask her what she was. Well, sorry, they just don’t make costumes keeping in mind the fact that it is the END OF OCTOBER and usually FREEZING.)

(Here is what her costume was SUPPOSED to be)

Very cute – but not so comfortable in 40 degree weather. (And with a coat over it – it would have been just as ambiguous as the baby costume!) 😉

Little Cook – iPhone Game For Kids

MAqility.com or see a video of the game.

Both Zach (4 yrs) and Rachel (9 yrs) enjoyed playing this game. Zach, in his ever so naughty ways, loved making a fish and sprinkles topped sundae and making the tester try it again and again. Rachel liked trying to find combinations of foods that the taster would appreciate. I’m sure this is going to continue to be a favorite of theirs.

Little Cook: $0.99 (At the time of this writing)