It’s hard to believe, but tomorrow will be our last Classical Conversations gathering of the school year. (Also hard to believe is that my baby boy will be six tomorrow. SIX. Ack! How did this happen?) We will be having our closing program tomorrow evening, and all the kids will get to show off everything they’ve learned. I’m excited.
Yesterday, as we were reviewing our geography and history “grammar,” I grinned quietly to myself. It’s simply astounding how much they’ve learned about these subjects this year. They’ve far surpassed me! While I am loving learning everything right along with them, the fact is that I’m just not in the “grammar” stage anymore and memorization doesn’t come as easily to me. They are able to draw rivers and mountain ranges with precision across the continent of Europe (Europe was our focus this year). Pin-point European cities and locate tiny countries like Luxembourg, Cyprus and Portugal (which I seriously thought was in South America! *Hangs head in shame*) in a second.
History, though, is my favorite subject. We’ve memorized 24 history sentences this year and we had fun doing it too! Here is one of their favorite sentences…
World War II. Axis. Ally. I remember learning something about all that in high school. Probably just enough to pass a multiple choice test!
Another component to their history grammar is all about being able to grasp the scope and sequence of history, from Creation to modern times. At the beginning of the year, I, grudgingly, purchased this set of history timeline flash cards. NOT cheap! BUT…invaluable. By memorizing 10 cards a week, Elijah and Zeke know 180 events in history… in sequence. I took 30 cards out of the middle of the pack yesterday, shuffled them up and threw then on the floor. It took them a good 15 minutes…
But they were able to put them in order…
Love it! As a side note, I needed to refer to curriculum guide to check their work. Again, I’ve definitely grown out of the grammar stage! This history grammar, though, is repeated yearly. So I’m hopeful. 
Vicki
April 27, 2011 at 9:24 am
Love it! I am a little bummed that next year’s history focus is the US. At least that’s what I saw. It’s the least interesting to me. Maybe I learn something and it’ll be more interesting.
Janet
April 27, 2011 at 2:44 pm
Yeah, I have to admit, I’m not so enthused about the US history either…