RICHARDSON ACADEMY : February 2013

SOLE: A NEW TEACHING APPROACH

SOLE: A NEW TEACHING APPROACH

STUDENT ORGANIZED LEARNING ENVIRONMENT

Today my handsome prince sent me a video link that he had watched and encouraged me to watch. I was so inspired by this that I am jumping in with a trail run tomorrow in our home school!

We have such a variety of levels and personalities in our 8 home schoolers with a wide range of ages -- 4 1/2 to 17 1/2!!

It will be interesting to see how this goes!

I had all ready planned to do an activity to go along with our brief study of Robert Fulton, so it will be fairly easy to adapt this lesson to follow the

guidelines of the SOLE approach.

Watch the video, look at the packet, and check back to see what happens tomorrow! Wish me luck!!

School in the Cloud

SOLE Tool Kit

With our variety of kiddos, some unfortunately with some baggage from their past in Russian orphanages, I think that this "group" work and the guidelines presented could be some really good learning experiences. It could also end up being chaos -- but we are going to try.

As I have summarized this in my mind: we will do a 1 - 1 1/2 hour session learning about submarines, they will gather information, create a poster and make a submarine out of supplies that I provide. I have the supplies to create pop bottle submarines but I think I will give them a little start and then NOT provide any instructions. I will see how far they can get with just an occasional question from me to encourage them.

A KEY COMPONENT in all of this approach is the "GRANDMOTHER ROLE." That is defined as having someone complimenting their efforts and telling them how clever and smart they are for figuring out what they do!!

My role tomorrow during this activity will be to present a short youtube video linked here:

US SUBMARINES

and get them excited about how cool subs are!

Then set them loose to figure out how they work, where they came from

and with the assignment to build one!

As they work and progress, I will help with behavior, be a sounding board that doesn't give answers, encourage problem solving and mostly tell them how great they are doing!!!

I am excited to see what happens!!!

I am pretty sure I will have one son who will get mad and will end up with everyone leaving his group -- there is always the option of changing groups at any time in this philosophy!!!

There will be some good social experiences and learning how to get along and to behave in a way so that people want to work with you.

It will be interesting!!!

I wonder if we will end up with 2 groups or 7 by the end of the activity!!! :)

FAYETTEVILLE, AR HISTORY -- WALKING TOUR

WALKING TOUR OF FAYETTEVILLE

We have lived in Fayetteville for about 7 years now and we finally took the time to do the historical walking tour around downtown Fayetteville, AR.

The tour starts at "The Square" and was quite a fun and educational outing!

Finishing up a scout merit badge helped us push to take this outing!

Rachel stands outside the "Old Post Office" that was built in 1909. The first government building to occupy this land was a courthouse that was built in 1837 at the cost of $49.75.

This is the Old Washington County Courthouse that was built in 1904 of native stone that was hand-cut and hauled to this site by ox wagons.

Daniel stands by a marker that marks the location of the original Butterfield State Line Depot. It ran between St. Louis and San Francisco from 1858 to 1861. The cost to ride that stage was $200 in gold.

David stands by a plaque honoring Archibald Yell, one of the best known men of this area. Yell came to Fayettevile in 1833 after being appointed a judgeship by President Andrew Jackson. He was then the first congressman from Arkansas and the 2nd governor of Arkansas.

This painting is one of Fayetteville's largest and most important and it is located in the Old Washington County Courthouse. It depicts uniformed soldiers from WWI, preceding wars and some key historical events. The mural was paid for by 10 cent contributions from school children and was sponsored by the Daughters of the American Revolution.

We had an unexpected treat as we explored. The kids found the door to the "Archives" unlocked and we went in and there were a few wonderful ladies there who were thrilled to give us a tour!!! They took us back into room after room that are sealed behind sets of double vault doors. These rooms contain wall after wall of old documents from our communities history! It is absolutely amazing! It was like something you see if a movie! It was "jaw dropping" for me as I thought of the family history extraction that could be done!!!

Bethany, Rachel, Mason, David, Chase, and Daniel

What is this???? I went through a description with

Rachel of how a typewriter works!!

This is an old "Jury Selector" box that was used to randomly select folks for jury duty. It was used up until about the mid 1900's is I remember correctly. Longer than I expected it would be used.

Benjamin really thought the huge double vault doors were impressive!

This is the oldest book of records that they county owns and it dates back to 1834. The first item logged was a passing of ownership of slaves from a father to his children.

The nice ladies in the archives room found a security guard who let us in to see the original courtroom that has fairly recently been redone. They still hold court hearings there today, though it wasn't in session on this specific day.

Mason is the judge!!!

Daniel takes a turn saying "Order in the Court!"

What a jury!!! They look tough to me!

The location of the First Christian Church was built in 1913 on the site of the original site of "Arkansas College" which was chartered in December of 1852 and awarded the first collegiate degrees in the state of Arkansas. The college was burned to the ground during the Civil War.

The intersection of College and Dickson is the site of "The Battle of Fayetteville."

The Headquarters House was a family home that was also used as the Headquarters for first the Union and then the Confederate Armies

during the Civil War.

Though it is mid-January, the bulbs think it is spring because it has been so warm.

After our walking tour, we ended up back at the square and

we had a picnic lunch!

What a treat to be able to have a picnic lunch in January!

MAPS BRING LEARNING TO LIFE

DAD'S MAPS

FEBRUARY 2, 2013

Dad has been dreaming about these big wall maps for many, many years.

He finally ordered them!! Each map is made up of 3 panels that we hung with wall paper paste. Thanks to my experience of helping my brother-in-law, Joel, hang wallpaper, I was able to help us successfully secure the maps to the wall and even line up the panels fairly well!

We did laugh a bit about the Lucy episode where she and Ethel were trying to hang wallpaper!!! We hoped we didn't recreate that hilarious episode!

We have the USA map on one wall and the World Map in our family room!

We love them!!!! It was a great investment!

We moved our big family picture to the sitting room so that it could be a focal point there and the map went in the family room.

Preparing to hang the world map! Not sure what dad is doing, but ......

FAYETTEVILLE, AR CIVIL WAR HISTORY

HEADQUARTERS HOUSE TOUR

JANUARY 28, 2013

We had a treat and were given a "personal" tour of the famous Headquarters House. We gathered several families together and met for a tour by a local woman who works to get youth involved in the history of Fayetteville and has started a "Heritage School" workshop week in the summer. One of the gals in our Young Women is a part of it so she helped out with the tour, too!!

We heard some neat stories about the Tibbetts Family and their courage to stand up for this beliefs in freedom and support of the North. Ultimately, they had to leave their home for their safety during the Civil War.