Jan. 16, 2008 - What a Night for a Knight
When we first started homeschooling, I did what most nervous-I'm-going-to-do-something-wrong first time homeschooling moms do . . . I followed our history curriculum to a T. We use Story of the World, which we really enjoy. My hubby and I feel strongly about teaching history beginning from the beginning and going from there. However, when I asked Big Man (now 7) after the first few weeks how he liked history (which I thought would be a major hit since we were talking about mummies and such), he said, "uh, it's okay." After some prying, he admitted he was bored. He didn't like just sitting there listening to a story, then narrating a few sentences back to me. Maybe a coloring page or map thrown in just wasn't cutting it for him. I experimented a little with lapbooking, or our small variation of it. Then I realized, hello, I'm trying to teach BOYS!! Boys need to move and explore and get dirty and build and destroy! The big hit in the first few weeks of history was our mock dinosaur bone dig in our sandbox. Dirty? Check. Movement? Check. Exploring? Check. THIS is why that dig was such a big hit! I immediately started diving into project ideas for every set of stories in our history curriculum. This takes a bit of time until you hit your groove. My husband is doing the history planning this year, at his request. He has done a marvelous job incorporating geography into the history lessons, but I am often still running to Google to find some projects to go with our lessons. Since Little Monkey (5) is usually in on history this year, I try to be extra careful to plan something in there he can get involved with, like the dino dig last year.
One big area of study this year that I knew would be a major hit if handled correctly was knights. After a whole bunch of work by mommy and daddy, our boys love knights even more than ever! We stretched the study of knights thru five weeks, and we would not have heard groans if we kept going. It was time for Christmas break, so we stopped. Since we did a full month of knights, I thought there might be someone else out there that could use some of the ideas we came up with. I always love it when a blogger outlines what they did. It tends to jump-start my brain. (and having a blonde brain, I'll take any jump-start I can get 
) Here is a list of the things we did. Considering we did five weeks of knights, this list is not huge. Keep in mind we did all of this around Thanksgiving and Christmas!
* Make your own shield & decorate with you personal coat of arms. This could be a fun family project to design an "official" coat of arms for your family. http://www.fleurdelis.com/meanings.htm has more design ideas than you could fit on any shield. It also includes the meaning behind each design. I let our boys decorate their own shield any way they wanted, using the design of the traits they liked. They especially liked that your birth order had its own design and was displayed somewhere on your shield. I used an old moving box to cut the shield shape, and we glued and taped two strips on the back as a handle (place arm thru strips so a forearm is nestled in one strip, and your hand can wrap around the other strip.)
* Make your own sword. We didn't do this since we had made battle axes when we learned about Celts.
* Make your own helmet. This can either be done with a gallon milk jug, or by wrapping a piece of poster board around their head to measure, then cutting the poster board down to size. Put a circular piece of posterboard on top, cut out eye holes, and prepare to joust!! Warning: These first three project ideas WILL provoke play fighting. Take cover to protect yourself!!
* Have a feast fit for a knight. We made our own bread and butter, pocket pies (both meat and fruit), grapes, and cheese cubes.
Butter: Put heavy cream in jar with a pinch of salt. Seal tightly. Shake, shake, shake! You can also add a couple drops of yellow food coloring for that "butter" look.
Pocket Pies: You need beef stew or pie filling -- okay I cheated, I used a can of Dinty Moore and a can of pie filling :). Place a spoonful in a small circle of pie crust (we used a large biscuit cutter for proper size, you could even use a tuna can). Put another small pie crust circle on top, seal the edges with a fork. These cook very quickly!
* On-line Jousting game: http://www.tudorbritain.org/joust/ This was Little Monkeys favorite. Once he played a few times, he found that there is a little strategy involved. Your choices affect your outcome in the joust. Win all three tournaments and you're the new champion!
* Board games: Chess. My boys love, love, love chess.
* Make a sundial. We were not able to do this fun project. We were in the middle of the longest stretch of cloudy, rainy weather in the history of the world. 
Um, except in Noahs day.
* Make a castle. We have an old Playmobil castle set, but the boys . . . and daddy. . . had fun making one out of an old cardboard box.
* Learn about castles. Why they were built the way they were, everyday life inside the castle, fun facts, etc. (My boys favorite? The bathroom of course. Going potty in a hole? Too cool.)
* Learn about the feudal system. How would your life be different if you were born in the different levels?
* Learn about some of the Code of Chivalry
* Learn about the weaponry of the time
* Learn about the various pieces of armor, and how your armor differed depending on what you were doing.
Helpful books we used: (Some of these we own, some were borrowed from the library)
Days of Knights and Damsels by Laurie Carlson. A GREAT resouce with loads of crafts/projects geared to both boys and girls.
Usborne Illustrated Stories for Boys Full of short stories geared toward boys. There were many stories in here set in the time of knights. We read most of them.
What Were Castles For? Usborne A great resource to learn all of the ins and outs of castles and castle life. Full of interesting pictures!
The Book of Dragons Full of neat pictures. Big Man liked to curl up and just look at the illustrations.
If You Lived in the Days of the Knights
The World of the Medieval Knight by Christopher Gravett
Kit: Lift the Lid on Knights. We didn't think this was worth the money I paid on ebay, but I know a lot of people really like these.
Indespensible online resource: Mr. Donn Middle Ages Europe for Kids. Always a huge help finding history projects. Mr. Donn's the man!
Comments
Jan. 23, 2008 - You Inspire Me!
Posted by MayTheyBeMightyMen
Thank you for posting all of this! I've been thinking about our history/geography long and hard. It's just not BOY enough!!!! You reminded me of the one thing that I have forgotten...they are boys! (D'uh!)
I'm not sure I can salvage what we've got going on. (Terrified I can't, actually.) But, I think it's time for a new approach to this area...big time!
Thanks for your thoughts! It sort of answers my old post about history. I just need a fresh perspective/fresh wind on this.
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