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Oct. 30, 2008
Uncle Remus
Today is going to be a laid back kind of day. We are going to be reading from Joel Chandler Harris's Uncle Remus. My husband and the girls watched Disney's Song of the South last night while I was at a meeting, and it sparked an interest in several different areas. I had to study Harris's work in college, and still have the book and all of my notes, so I decided to use that as part of our extended study. The younger girls just love the Brer Rabbit and Brer Bear stories. Lindsay seems to be interested in the historical background for the setting of the story (the part about Uncle Remus, not Brer Rabbit). I don't know why I didn't think of pulling this stuff out before. Leave it to Shan to have a great idea that sparks lots of interest for the girls! Who knows where this will eventually lead, but I'm going to "strike while that iron is hot"!
I know this particular choice for literature has been somewhat controversial in recent years. I have never been one to believe that we should shove a part of our history or literature into the closet to be hidden. I think it is relevant to who we have become as individuals as well as who we have become as a country. I remember when we were required to study this particular work in college that we were told we would probably not be allowed to teach it, but that it was still important to study it. So, here I am about to teach it!
I guess the truly amazing thing about this new vane of study is that it was my hubby's idea. He tends to lean more toward the "school at home" arena of homeschooling while I have always wanted to be more delight driven. I want the girls to have a good foundation in math and language arts (grammar, spelling, writing, reading), but I want to be more laid back with history and science and even with our choices for literature. I want the girls to have a good knowledge base in each of those subjects, but I just feel like they will only be kids once and I would rather them be educated than "schooled". I'm sure that makes sense to the people here at Homeschoolblogger, but making some of the people in our lives understand it is another matter to be tackled another day. |
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Oct. 30, 2008 - Untitled Comment
My kids both loved the Uncle Remus stories and Song of the South. We learned a lot from studying different aspects of this--the historical periods, the literature, etc.
This has been controversial, but if we don't talk about this to our kids, who will?
You are most welcome to steal the shirt idea. lol
I finally got a good picture made and posted tonight for Friday show and tell if you'd like to see what it should look like.
Pam