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Archives for January 2018

“The stellar gauge of earthly show”

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Early tomorrow morning there will be a lunar eclipse, visible in its totality in far western North America, the Pacific, and East Asia, but only in partiality in the contiguous United States.

Everything you need to know — from timing, to geographical coverage, to animations of the phases of the eclipse — is available on the wonderful timeanddate.com website:

If the weather is cloudy or you’re out of range, you can even watch a live broadcast of the eclipse at the link above.

[Lunar eclipse]
Lunar eclipse of 7 August 2017 as seen from Helsinki, Finland. (Image: Wikimedia Commons.)

And while you’re making your homeschool astronomical for a little while, why not also make it poetical and introduce your students to this little sonnet-masterpiece by the great English poet Thomas Hardy (1840–1928):

At a Lunar Eclipse

Thomas Hardy

Thy shadow, Earth, from Pole to Central Sea,
Now steals along upon the Moon’s meek shine
In even monochrome and curving line
Of imperturbable serenity.

How shall I link such sun-cast symmetry
With the torn troubled form I know as thine,
That profile, placid as a brow divine,
With continents of moil and misery?

And can immense Mortality but throw
So small a shade, and Heaven’s high human scheme
Be hemmed within the coasts yon arc implies?

Is such the stellar gauge of earthly show,
Nation at war with nation, brains that teem,
Heroes, and women fairer than the skies?

❡ Count and map: When you introduce your students to a new poem, especially one in a traditional form, the first thing to have them do is count the syllables and map the rhyme scheme. How many syllables in each line in this poem? Ten throughout. (And that gives you a clue about how certain words should be pronounced: Heaven’s is one long syllable, not two.) The ten syllables in each line follow a generally iambic pattern, with the accent on the second syllable of each pair. That makes this poem iambic pentameter. What about the rhyme scheme? The first two stanzas are sea–shine–line–serenity and symmetry–thine–divine–misery. That looks like ABBA ABBA. The next six lines follow a different pattern: CDE CDE. Uncovering these details of structure teaches your students that a poem of this kind is not the result of some sort of spontaneous imaginative outburst on the part of the poet; it is instead an intricately crafted piece of work that required a great deal of labor.

Library Tuesday: The Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library

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It’s Tuesday Tea at the Library! On FDR’s birthday, take a few homeschool minutes to visit the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library in Hyde Park, New York — and share this post with your friends!

Tuesday is Books & Libraries Day at the River Houses. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd President of the United States, was born on this day (30 January) in 1882, so why not pay a visit today to the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library in Hyde Park, New York. Here’s the library’s own website, with historical documents, photos, and much more:

“The Library’s mission is to foster research and education on the life and times of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, and their continuing impact on contemporary life.”

[FDR Library]
The Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library, Hyde Park, New York. (Image: Wikimedia Commons.)

The library’s website also has a special page of educational resources that will come in handy for homeschool students and teachers:

What have you discovered at your library lately? 😊

❡ Little lessons: You can find a little summary of Franklin Roosevelt’s life and presidency on pages 494–495 in your River Houses almanac (riverhouses.org/books) — just right for an educational read-aloud minute.

❡ Books in the running brooks: The sidebar on the River Houses website (riverhouses.org) has links to several important online library collections that we like to explore. The WorldCat Library Finder will help you find all the libraries in your local area, and WorldCat itself (worldcat.org) will help you locate the nearest copy of any book you please.

Monday Museum: Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark

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Every Monday we pay a virtual visit to a notable museum or historical monument in the United States, all in keeping with our comfortable philosophy of “teaching with-out the curriculum.” Spend a few minutes exploring the place online with your students, look up its location your atlas (riverhouses.org/books), learn a new name or a new date, and your little lesson is done. Over the course of the year, almost without realizing it, your students will absorb a wealth of new cultural, historical, and geographical information — and so will you!

This week’s state-of-the-week is Alabama, so we’re going to pay a virtual visit to the Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark in Birmingham, Alabama. Here’s the national landmark’s own website, with photos, historical background, and more:

The Sloss Furnaces are one of the few industrially oriented National Historic Landmarks in the country.

[Sloss Furnaces National Landmark]
Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark, Birmingham, Alabama. (Image: Wikimedia Commons.)

Their website explains the importance of the landmark to the history of Birmingham and the nation:

“A lot more than iron flowed from those furnaces. Our whole culture did. Our whole way of life.”

Sloss Furnaces was once the largest manufacturer of pig iron in the world. It stands today just as it did in the late 19th century — a monument to the Industrial Revolution. With its web of pipes and towering stoves, this unique National Historic Landmark provides visitors a glimpse into Birmingham’s rich industrial heritage. It stands with pride and is a symbol of where the “Magic” began for Birmingham.

Sloss Furnaces operated from 1882–1970 making it the longest continually running blast furnace in Birmingham’s history. We invite you to come visit and learn about the materials, the process, the products, and the people who ran the furnaces and built this city.

If you have a “maker” student, what better place to explore online than this grand old center of industrial manufacturing.

What museum or monument have you visited in your homeschool lately? 😊

❡ Your River Houses almanac (riverhouses.org/books) has a list of U.S. national parks and monuments on pages 425–432 and a list of notable U.S. museums on pages 247–248. The sidebar on the River Houses website (riverhouses.org) has links to the comprehensive America’s Parks website (americasparks.com), which includes national and state parks, historic sites, wildlife refuges, and more.

Sunday States: Alabama, Jordan, Kiribati, and More

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Tour the United States and travel the countries of the world each week with the River Houses. Our Sunday States & Countries posts will point the way.

Many homeschoolers review the U.S. states and the nations of the world each year, and your recommended River Houses reference library (riverhouses.org/books) includes a current world almanac, a world atlas, and a history encyclopedia that make these reviews fun and easy. We go through the states in the traditional order of admission to the Union (almanac page 422), so this week’s state, with a link to its official website, is:

  • [Seal of Alabama]
    Seal of Alabama
    ALABAMA (the 22nd state, 14 December 1819) — The Camellia State. Capital: Montgomery. Alabama appears on page 564 in your almanac, and on plates 42 and 142 in your atlas. Name origin: “Choctaw word for a Chickasaw tribe. First noted in accounts of Hernando de Soto expedition” (almanac page 423). Website: alabama.gov.

❡ Little lessons: You can teach a hundred little lessons with the state-of-the-week, using your reference library (riverhouses.org/books) as a starting point. Find the state bird with your almanac and look it up in your bird guide. Trace the state’s outline with your atlas. Read the almanac’s one-paragraph history aloud each week. Using each state’s official website (above), find and copy the preamble to that state’s constitution into a commonplace book over the course of the year. Practice math skills by graphing each state’s population and area. Look up the famous state residents listed in your almanac either online or at the library. The possibilities are endless, they can be as simple or as complex as you wish, and they can be easily adjusted according to each student’s age and interests. Pick a simple pattern to follow each week, and by the end of the year, without even realizing it, your students will have absorbed a world of new geographical information.

This week’s countries, with their official websites, are:

  • JORDAN 🇯🇴 in the Middle East. Population: 10,248,069. Capital: Amman. Website (in Arabic and English): jordan.gov.jo.
  • KAZAKHSTAN 🇰🇿 in Central Asia. Population: 18,556,698. Capital: Astana. Website (in Kazahk, Russian, and English): government.kz.
  • KENYA 🇰🇪 in East Africa. Population: 47,615,739. Capital: Nairobi. Website (in English): www.president.go.ke.
  • KIRIBATI 🇰🇮 in the Pacific Ocean. Population: 108,145. Capital: Tarawa. Website (in English): www.president.gov.ki.

These all appear in your current almanac, atlas, and history encyclopedia as well. For example, you’ll find the main entries for the Middle Eastern country of Jordan on almanac pages 792–793, atlas plates 79 and 134, and history encyclopedia pages 572–573, with illustrations, flags, and other mentions available through the indexes in each volume.

❡ Read and think critically: The country links above go to official websites, which are not always in English and which may well be propagandistic in one form or another, thus offering older students a good opportunity to practice their critical reading and thinking skills.

What geographical discoveries have you made in your homeschool lately? 😊

Quick Freshes for Homeschool Families – Week of 28 January 2018

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Quick Freshes are our Sunday notes on the homeschool week ahead. Pick out one or two items below and incorporate them into your regular homeschooling schedule!

Our state-of-the-week is Alabama, and our countries are Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, and Kiribati. (Our separate Sunday States & Countries post will be up shortly.)

❡ Little lessons: “Did you know that the tiny Pacific Ocean nation of Kiribati, then known as the Gilbert Islands, was the scene of fierce fighting in World War II?” Your River Houses history encyclopedia will give you an overview of WWII’s Pacific Theater on pages 402–403 (riverhouses.org/books).

The Moon at the beginning of this week is waxing gibbous — a good time for moonwatching (but less so for stargazing). Track the moon’s phases at timeanddate.com/moon/phases, and note that on Wednesday (31 January) there will be a lunar eclipse!

Monday (29 January) — On our weekly Museums & Monuments Day, take a few minutes to explore a new place and broaden your homeschool horizons. Since Alabama is our state-of-the-week, we’re going to pay a virtual visit to Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark in Birmingham — come along with us!

Tuesday (30 January) — Join us for Tuesday Tea at the Library, with notes on books, libraries, and literature. ⬩ Franklin D. Roosevelt, the 32nd President of the United States, was born on this day in 1882. You can find an outline of his life and presidency on pages 494–495 in your River Houses almanac (riverhouses.org/books).

Wednesday (31 January) — A lunar eclipse! More notes to follow.

Friday (2 February) — On this Groundhog Day, we’ll take some Friday Field & Nature Notes.

Saturday (3 February) — One of our countries-of-the-week is Jordan, so our Saturday Sounds, Songs, and Music will feature “Jordan’s Stream.”

Our weekly toast: “To evening hours: may their quiet induce reflection, and reflection improve our hearts.”

❡ Toasts are a fun tradition for your family table. We offer one each week — you can take it up, or make up one of your own (“To North American dinosaurs!”), or invite a different person to come up with one for each meal (“To variety in toasting!”). Our current examples are adapted from two old collections: Marchant’s “Toasts and sentiments” (1888) and the anonymous Social and Convivial Toast-Master (1841). What will you toast this week?

Everything flows: Jordan is one of our countries-of-the-week, so our Weekly World River is the Jordan River. You can chart its course in your River Houses atlas (riverhouses.org/books), and you can read much more about its storied history in the comprehensive Jordan River entry in Wikipedia.

[Jordan River valley]
The Jordan River Valley, scene of so much history, both ancient and modern. (Image: Wikimedia Commons.)

What do you have planned for the homeschool week ahead?

Poet-of-the-Week: Robert Burns (1759–1796)

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Take a few homeschool minutes to remember (and listen to) the great Scottish poet Robert Burns, born on this day in 1759.

Robert Burns (1759–1796) is the much-loved national poet of Scotland, and his poems and songs have been read and sung around the world for more than 200 years. What better day to introduce him to your homeschool students than January 25th, the day of his birth in 1759.

Many of Burns’ poems are written in the Scottish dialect of English — sometimes a bit difficult for beginners — but with a little practice and thought (and with occasional help from a good dictionary) their structure and imagery are easily understood. His famous poem of the departing lover who promises to return, “A Red, Red Rose,” is a fine place for any young poetry student to begin.

A Red, Red Rose

Robert Burns

O my Luve is like a red, red rose
That’s newly sprung in June;
O my Luve is like the melody
That’s sweetly played in tune.

So fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a’ the seas gang dry.

Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi’ the sun;
I will love thee still, my dear,
While the sands o’ life shall run.

And fare thee weel, my only luve!
And fare thee weel awhile!
And I will come again, my luve,
Though it were ten thousand mile.

But “A Red, Red Rose” isn’t just a poem, it’s a song, and this fine version by the Scottish-Canadian singer John McDermott may help your students understand and appreciate it even better:

[Robert Burns stamp]
One of a series of 1996 British postage stamps commemorating the poetry of Robert Burns.

Happy birthday, Robbie — may your songs be remembered till all the seas gang dry!

Tuesday Tea at the Library: The Challenger Deep

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Tuesday is Books & Libraries Day at the River Houses. This week, take a few minutes from your homeschool schedule and explore the deepest depths of the ocean (by way of the Library of Congress).

All libraries, even the smallest, have a section devoted to maps and atlases. In a little town library it may only be a few shelves or a separate case set aside to hold large folio-sized books; that’s where you’ll usually find the library’s copy of the National Geographic atlas that we recommend to all homeschooling families (riverhouses.org/books). In a large city or university library the map and atlas section may be a separate room, and in the largest libraries whole departments are devoted to the collection and study of geographical reference materials.

The Library of Congress — our national library in the United States — has one of the largest map and atlas collections in the world, and the Map Division’s blog, “Worlds Revealed,” has just posted a beautiful account of the charting of the lowest point on earth:

It wasn’t until the 1870s that oceanographers began to develop a generally accurate sense of the true depth of the ocean in different parts of the world, and it was the expedition of the British research ship Challenger that discovered the area now called the Challenger Deep in the southwest Pacific near the island of Guam.

[Challenger Deep]
“Detail of Challenger Deep from Tiefenkarte des Grossen Ozeans by August Petermann, 1877.” (Image: Library of Congress.)

Spend a few minutes with your homeschool students this week exploring the beautiful map images that the Library of Congress has gathered of this lowest point on earth. And get out your recommended River Houses atlas for comparison: plate 115 illustrates the whole of the Pacific ocean floor, and right there, a little southwest of Guam, you’ll find the Challenger Deep named, at a depth (according to modern instruments) of 35,827 feet — almost 6.8 miles below the surface.

What geographical discoveries have you made in your library lately? 😊

❡ Learning the library: Teaching your students how to use the library makes them independent learners. In today’s example, you’ll find the Challenger Deep in section K6 of plate 115 in the tenth edition of the comprehensive National Geographic Atlas of the World, the edition we recommend for homeschoolers (riverhouses.org/books). Do your students know how to locate a specific reference like that: “section K6 of plate 115”? Spend a few minutes teaching them (with any atlas) that the full-page map spreads are typically called plates and they are numbered in sequence (and the plate numbers don’t necessarily correspond to page numbers). The individual plates are labeled along the top and bottom edges with numbers and along the left and right edges with letters, so to find section K6 just locate the K row along the left side, and see where it crosses column 6. That will take you right to your target. This mode of reference is common in many atlases, and knowing how to use it is a valuable skill for your young library students to learn. 👍

Monday Museum: The Field Museum of Natural History

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Every Monday we visit a notable museum or monument in the United States, all in keeping with our comfortable philosophy of “teaching with-out the curriculum.” Spend a few minutes exploring the place online with your students, find its location your atlas (riverhouses.org/books), learn a new name or a new date, and your little lesson is done. Over the course of the year, almost without realizing it, your students will absorb a wealth of new cultural, historical, and geographical information — and so will you!

This week’s state-of-the-week is Illinois, so we’re going to pay a virtual visit to the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, Illinois. Here’s the museum’s own website, with photos, exhibits, maps, and much more:

The Field Museum is one of the world’s great natural history museums, and if you ever travel to Chicago you should be sure to pay it a visit in person. Established in the 1890s and named for its first great benefactor, the department store magnate Marshall Field, the Field Museum is a major scientific research center and hosts up to two million visitors each year in its public exhibit halls.

[Field Museum]
The Field Museum in Chicago, Illinois. (Image: Wikimedia Commons.)

If you don’t have the opportunity to make a personal visit, today you can explore many parts of the museum online, including “Inside Ancient Egypt,” the spectacular Grainger Hall of Gems, and perhaps the most famous exhibit in the museum, the giant Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton nicknamed “Sue.” The museum also has a special site for educators (fieldmuseum.org/educators) that will be of interest to all homeschool science teachers.

What museum or historical monument have you visited in your homeschool lately? 😊

❡ Your River Houses almanac (riverhouses.org/books) has a list of U.S. national parks and monuments on pages 425–432 and a list of notable U.S. museums on pages 247–248. The sidebar on the River Houses website (riverhouses.org) has links to the comprehensive America’s Parks website, which includes national and state parks, historic sites, wildlife refuges, and more.

Sunday States: Illinois, Israel, Japan, and More

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Tour the United States and travel the countries of the world each week with the River Houses. Our Sunday States & Countries posts will point the way.

Many homeschoolers review the U.S. states and the nations of the world each year, and your recommended River Houses reference library (riverhouses.org/books) includes a current world almanac, a world atlas, and a history encyclopedia that make these reviews fun and easy. We go through the states in the traditional order of admission to the Union (almanac page 422), so this week’s state, with a link to its official website, is:

  • [Seal of Illinois]
    Seal of Illinois
    ILLINOIS (the 21st state, 3 December 1818) — The Prairie State. Capital: Springfield. Illinois appears on pages 570–571 in your almanac, and on plates 41 and 142 in your atlas. Name origin: “French for Illini or ‘land of Illini,’ Algonquin word meaning ‘men’ or ‘warriors’ (almanac page 423). Website: www2.illinois.gov.

❡ Little lessons: You can teach a hundred little lessons with the state of the week, using your reference library (riverhouses.org/books) as a starting point. Find the state bird with your almanac and look it up in your bird guide. Trace the state’s outline with your atlas. Read the almanac’s one-paragraph history aloud each week. Using each state’s official website (above), find and copy the preamble to that state’s constitution into a commonplace book over the course of the year. Practice math skills by graphing each state’s population and area. Look up the famous state residents listed in your almanac either online or at the library. The possibilities are endless, they can be as simple or as complex as you wish, and they can easily be adjusted according to each student’s age and interests. Pick a simple pattern to follow each week, and by the end of the year, without even realizing it, your students will have absorbed a world of new geographical information.

This week’s countries, with their official websites, are:

  • ISRAEL 🇮🇱 in the Middle East. Capital: Jerusalem. Website (in Hebrew and English): www.gov.il.
  • ITALY 🇮🇹 in southern Europe. Capital: Rome. Website (in Italian): www.governo.it.
  • JAMAICA 🇯🇲 in the West Indies. Capital: Kingston. Website (in English): jis.gov.jm.
  • JAPAN 🇯🇵 in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Asia. Capital: Tokyo. Website (in Japanese, Chinese, and English): kantei.go.jp.

These all appear in your current almanac, atlas, and history encyclopedia as well. For example, you’ll find the main entries for the island nation of Japan on almanac page 792, atlas plates 91 and 134 (where you can practice reading insets on a map), and history encyclopedia pages 590–591, with illustrations, flags, and other mentions available through the indexes in each volume.

❡ Read and think critically: The country links above go to official websites, which are not always in English and which may well be propagandistic in one form or another, thus offering older students a good opportunity to practice their critical reading and thinking skills.

What geographical discoveries have you made lately?

Quick Freshes for Homeschool Families – Week of 21 January 2018

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Quick Freshes are our Sunday notes on the homeschool week ahead.

Our state-of-the-week is Illinois, and our countries are Israel, Italy, Jamaica, and Japan. (Our separate Sunday States & Countries post will appear shortly.)

❡ Little lessons: “Did you know that many of the artistic and cultural styles we think of as characteristically Japanese originated during the ‘Edo Period’ from the 1600s to the early 1800s, when Japan cut itself off from trade with the rest of the world?” Your River Houses history encyclopedia will tell you more on pages 242–243 (riverhouses.org/books).

Monday (January 22nd) is our weekly Museums & Monuments Day — take a few minutes to explore a new place and broaden your homeschooling horizons. Since Illinois is our state-of-the-week, we’re going to pay a virtual visit to the Field Museum in Chicago, one of the world’s great natural history museums.

On Tuesday (January 23rd) we’ll sit down for our regular Tuesday Tea at the Library, with notes on books, libraries, and literature.

On Friday (January 26th) we’ll take some Friday Field & Nature Notes.

Our weekly toast: “A fair welcome at the end of a long journey.”

❡ Toasts are a fun tradition for your family table. We offer one each week — you can take it up, or make up one of your own (“To North American dinosaurs!”), or invite a different person to come up with one for each meal (“To variety in toasting!”). Our current examples are adapted from two old collections: Marchant’s “Toasts and sentiments” (1888) and the anonymous Social and Convivial Toast-Master (1841). What will you toast this week?

Everything flows: Our Weekly World River is the Ara or Arakawa River of Japan, the principal river of the city of Tokyo. You can find it on plate 91 in your River Houses atlas (riverhouses.org/books), but just barely. Because Japan is a mountainous island nation, it doesn’t have large river basins as continental landmasses do. You can learn more about the current state of the Arakawa in this fine article from the Japan Times newspaper.

[Arakawa River, Japan]
Aerial view of the Arakawa River in Tokyo, Japan. (Image: Planet.com.)

❡ Little lessons: Most of the major cities of the world have grown up beside rivers because rivers are highways of commerce. New York is by the Hudson, London is by the Thames, and Tokyo is by the Arakawa. How many cities (and even small towns) near you owe their placement to a nearby river?