Knitting - Interested Based Education

We constantly shift our daily routines between various degrees of interest based education and loosely structured basic requirements. During our last adventure moving toward interest based education I constantly worked to ensure my children were growing in their knowledge of their areas of interest.

A few years ago my youngest learned to knit around the age of five years old with a peg loom. She went on to both crochet and knit herself hats. After she made a second knit hat identical to her first I was hoping she would be interested in another knitting project which was slightly more difficult.

I was in luck. All I had to do was suggest she search the internet for fancy hats. She giggled as she looked, but then chose a very appropriate hat to increase her knowledge and continue her knitting.

After finding the hat she wanted to make she chose her yarn.

While she was selecting yarn, I worked to write down a pattern for her to follow. We talked about the Fibonacci numbers as they are useful in designing stripes. In addition, we counted the number of rows in her hat and how many rows of each color were to be knitted, which involved lots of addition and subtraction.

This project was perfect because she worked on it several days in a row while sick with a fever, was able to read the directions on her own, and able to see how math is involved in pattern creation. It is always interesting to see where kids go when they are given the freedom to explore.

For more great educational activities check out these blog hops.

Native American Unit Study - Lesson 3: Blackfeet Clothing

needs more photos

Lesson 3: My daughter created a Native American woman's dress in the style of the Blackfeet Indians for her doll.

The Blackfeet were a plains Indian tribe which lived in the North. Ranging from Colorado to Canada, they were dependent on buffalo. They ate buffalo, made their houses and clothing from buffalo hides and used the bones as tools and decoration.

My daughters love sewing and crafting. Therefore, the book Indian Costumes, written in chapter format and describing traditional clothing of several different Native American tribes was very interesting to them. While focusing on the clothing, the book describes materials used in the clothing as well as the clothing's purpose. Since Native American clothing was typically made from animal skins and decorated with natural objects, they learned a little about different animals surrounding the various tribes. In addition, they learned about the climate as people from the north wore heavier clothing while southern tribes dressed lighter.

After reading about the clothing of the Blackfeet, my seven year old began work on a dress for her doll. She used fleece since it is very easy to work with and it was available in the house, but she chose red fleece which confused me, so I asked her about it.

Native American clothing was typically made from leather so was colored in shades of white, yellow, to tan and brown. After reading the book, she looked up Blackfeet clothing on the internet to see better pictures. She liked one which was a bright red dress. It turned out that it was constructed from cloth in the late 1800s. Once cloth became available via trade, the styles stayed the same, but the construction materials changed. 

Please return to Highhill Education next week as we continue our Native American unit study.

Native American Unit Study - Lesson 2: Beadwork

done

Lesson 2: My daughter made a beaded bracelet.

This lesson was actually completed months before our Native American unit study, but fit right in.

Joel E. Hendricks has had a life-long interest in Native American costume and design. He is featured in this PBS video, Illinois Stories: Native American Clothes and Beads. His interest began at the age of 9 years old with reading lots of books on the topic. Today, he not only creates Native American clothing, but attends Pow-Wows, judges dancing and works to preserve Native American culture.

Illinois Stories: Native American Clothes and Beads

My girls love crafting of all sorts, so to inspire them to learn more about Native American history I turned on the video above. Well it didn't take long for the girls to sit beside me. They were very interested.

The video did an excellent job of displaying examples of Native American bead work. After watching, we were craving tutorials.

The video above is one that left an impression on my seven year old. After watching, she got out our beads and tried out some of the techniques.

Materials
Felt
Needle
Thread
Plastic Beads

Typically very small, size 13, seed beads and nylon monofilament thread are used for Native American beading. Since my daughter is only seven, the big plastic beads, and ordinary needle and thread worked great. If her interest continues to grow, I will look into purchasing more authentic materials. 

This was another successful interest based educational activity. My daughter did all the work on her own.

Van Gogh Self-Portrait - Art Project

My daughter recreated Van Gogh's self portrait using chalk pastels.

After visiting the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam, he became the favorite artist of my 7 year old. We have visited tons of museums, and she never really liked any of them. I think she liked the Van Gogh museum because it was filled with color. Upon leaving, she requested a book from the gift shop. Since she has never done this before and seemed genuinely interested in Van Gogh, we purchased a book.

All that's required for this project is a sheet of paper, chalk pastels and a picture of Van Gogh's self portrait. My daughter began with the face and continued to layer color down toward the beard and up toward the hair. She was careful not to mix the color, but to layer it.

This was a completely self-directed project and an example of a successful interest based education philosophy activity.

Switch to Interest Based Education - Update 3

As much as I admire the unschooling approach to education, I have found I'm incapable of leading a family of unschoolers. The intrinsic based motivation of interested based education has many benefits. Kids absorb so much information when they are engaged, and the philosophy of interest based education keeps kids completely engaged.

Unfortunately, I just can't get over the way the lack of desire to explore a subject can leave it completely neglected. My 13 year old daughter has little interest in science, so when left to her own, she never studies science. My 8 year old daughter doesn't like to read, and consequently never reads when left alone.

The experts in the interest based education philosophy say that kids will learn skills as they are required. Therefore, my 8 year old daughter will likely learn to read when the skill becomes necessary to her curiosity, but I doubt my 13 year old girl with ever explore science. For me this is an issue because I want my children to be capable of achieving any future goals they develop. While I believe that they will still be capable of achievement, not having exposure to certain subjects could handicap them significantly.

For example, learning a second language is a difficult skill of which most people are capable. However, experts in many fields state that kids have significant advantages when learning second languages due to the way their young brains work. I believe that kids have similar advantages when learning all kinds of other subjects as well. Therefore, by not exposing them to topics when young, they will be at a disadvantage should they decide they want to explore them as adults.

Now I know exposing children to all topics and subjects is next to impossible, but by ensuring their young education includes a wide variety of topics, I believe they will have an advantage as adults.

Therefore, I now know that I am not an unschooling parent, nor will I ever be. I am a relaxed homeschool mom incorporating principles of many different education philosophies. Last year in June I wrote about the Highhill Educational Philosophy. This post does a good job of explaining how we approach education. Although we go through phases of more and less detailed requirements, the basics still reign supreme. We typically spend between 2-3 hours per day studying reading, writing and math. The rest of the day has more variation. Sometimes we experience phases where the kids spend all their remaining time exploring their interests, other times they select things to do from a list of activities as described in the Highhill Educational Philosophy post, and other times I lead an art, science or craft project. We take clues from each other and alter our school day to create new balance whenever necessary. (usually 3 times per year).

Regardless of our weekly homeschooling detailed or undetailed schedule, whenever the kids have free time to explore their interests, they engage in quality activities. Here are a few of their recent explorations.

My son wanted to improve his drawing techniques, so he followed several tutorials in a learn to draw book.

My 8 year old wanted to try another knitting project, so together we found an appropriate project in a knitting book. She made two small coin purses. One she kept and the other she gave to her aunt for her birthday.

My 13 year old daughter worked with a local seamstress to sew dance costumes for her group. She learned proper techniques, practiced her German and was able to help complete several costumes.

She worked to master the techniques she learned from the expert retired tailor by sewing an identical costume for her stuffed bear. This bear's priceless costume took over two months to complete.

To read more about how we began exploring the unschooling approach to education and then returned to our roots, please click the links below.

Switch to Interest Based Education - Update 1
Switch to Interest Based Education - Update 2



Check out these great blogs full of educational activity ideas.

Egyptian Middle and New Kingdom - Sculpture Activity

Ancient Egypt Unit Study

Lesson 4: My daughter created an Ancient Egyptian sculpture.

During the Middle and New Kingdom periods of Ancient Egyptian history, temple building and sculpture flourished. Pharaohs such as Thutmose III conquered foreign lands including Nubia, Palestine and Persia. Demanding annual tribute from those conquered raised the standard of living for Egyptians. As a result, there was a seemingly unending supply of wealth and resources available for the pharaohs. Much of the resources were used to construct temples full of art and sculpture. 

Like Ancient Egyptian art, Ancient Egyptian sculpture was created according to a strict set of rules.

• People were depicted as youthful.
• Men stood with their left foot forward and their arms by their sides.
• People were seated on thrones with their hands on their knees.

We continued reading the simple book Ancient Egyptian Art (Art In History) to create an Egyptian sculpture as it covers many basic ideas displayed in Egyptian art.

Crayola Model Magic was used to create the sculpture. It's a soft, modeling material, that is light, air drys, brightly colored, and feels a lot like foam.

This seated pharaoh has dark hair because the Egyptian people wore wigs to protect their heads from the sun, red skin because men were typically depicted with reddish skin, a bright necklace typical of those worn by pharaohs, and a skirt because Egyptians typically work light-weight white linen skirts. Finally, he is seated on the throne with his hands on knees because that is one of the basic accepted poses for Ancient Egyptian sculpture.

Please visit Highhill Education again next week for more on our Ancient Egypt Unit Study. For past posts, please visit our history page.

Check out these great blogs full of educational activity ideas.

Old Kingdom of Ancient Egypt Study and Activities

Ancient Egypt Unit Study

Lesson 3: Canopic Jars - My daughter made a paper mache canopic jar and my son built a pyramid building tool.

Mummies were made throughout the entire history of Egypt, but pyramids were only built during the Old Kingdom and Middle Kingdoms. Pyramids were built to house the mummy of the pharaoh as well as the items he would need during the afterlife. Before pharaohs began building pyramids, they were buried in mastaba tombs which were much smaller versions of pyramids. Unfortunately, pyramids were magnets for robbers seeking the wealth of objects the pharaoh was planning to use in his afterlife. Therefore, in later times pyramid building went out of style and pharaohs were buried in secret tombs.

Like the pharaohs, royal and common Egyptians believed they would need their bodies in the afterlife. During the Old Kingdom period, very few people could afford the expense of mummification. However, as Egypt prospered into the Middle Kingdom period, the wealthy became able to afford mummification. During the New Kingdom period of Egyptian history, even the poor could afford some level of mummification.

In addition to people, Egyptians mummified animals. For example, the crocodile was a symbol of the Nile river. People whose life depended upon the river may have chosen to worship the crocodile god which mummified crocodiles for religious ceremony. Throughout the course of Egyptian history animal mummification became so popular that it was big business. Since it was big business, there were incidences of corruption. I was surprised to learn about ibis birds and sticks being mummified to look like hawks in the video Egypt - Deities and Demons.

Pyramid Videos

Engineering an Empire - is a video series which details great engineering accomplishments of several different historical empires. The Egypt episode describes how pyramids, obelisks and temples were constructed.

Engineering an Empire - Egypt

Hidden Secrets of the Great Pyramid - Revealed - In the video a new revolutionary theory for the construction technique of the Great Pyramid at Giza is described in detail.

 Secrets of the Great Pyramid - Revealed

Gravity Lifting System

The main theory for building the Great Pyramid at Giza in the video Secrets of the Great Pyramid Revealed, suggests a pulley gravity based system was likely installed in the interior of the pyramid. Large stone blocks could have been lifted by attaching a counterweight. The counterweight may have been a container which workers could have filled with stones of lesser weight until the weight was sufficient to lift the pyramid block.

The counterweight system inside the pyramid likely ran on a track, where as ours was a hanging system. Nonetheless, the concept is the same.

Two objects are attached with a string or rope around a pulley or transition point at the top with little friction. When one object outweighs the other object, the heavier object will travel down and the lighter object will be lifted.

Canopic Jars

Canopic Jars were used to store organs during the mummification process in Ancient Egypt. The tops of the jars changed throughout time, but in later years they often contained an animal head. The book Ancient Egyptian Art (Art In History) briefly explained canopic jars. After reading a portion of the art book, my crafty seven year old began flipping through Crafts From The Past: The Egyptians and decided to make a paper mache canopic jar.

She began with a stout cardboard tube and stuffed a newspaper ball into the top. Next she taped the newspaper in place and added cardboard ears.

Well, she lost interest in this project and never finished...... but that's alright with me. She has done plenty of paper mache in the past, and now she knows about canopic jars.



Check out these great blogs full of educational activity ideas.

Ancient Egyptian Art

Egypt Unit Study

Lesson 1: My daughter created Ancient Egyptian Art.

The other day during lunch my seven year old daughter announced she wanted to study Egypt. I couldn't have been more excited by her statement. For several months we have been working towards a less structured, more interest based education routine. We literally dove right in.

Planning for the 2013/14 school year I prepared a unit study on Egypt. Well we ended up studying the Middle Ages and the Renaissance instead. Therefore, when my daughter showed her interest in Egypt, I knew just where to begin. She loves art, design and fashion, and has seen pictures of elaborate Egyptian necklaces.

Ancient Egyptian Art (Art In History) was the perfect book for her introduction to Egypt. It is short, contains lots of pictures, and explains some of the techniques used by the Egyptians. We read about half of the book when she wanted to stop to try a few of the techniques for herself.

People in Egyptian art were drawn according to a very strict set of rules:
The heads always faced the side.
The eye was drawn from the front.
The chest was drawn from the front.
The arms and legs were drawn from the side.
Women were colored with lighter shades of paint than men. Usually women were yellowish and men had reddish skin.

She began by making a few sketches of people.

Next she gathered her paints. Although she didn't try grinding them from rocks, she was careful to select colors used in Egyptian paintings.

Please visit Highhill Education again next week to see more of our Ancient Egypt study.




Check out these great blogs full of educational activity ideas.

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Using a Typewriter to Inspire Kids to Write

My daughter decided to type and illustrate a story.

To me, the most important part of writing education is to develop a love or at least a desire to write. Changing the medium from a pencil, to a pen, to crayons, markers, or paint, from lined paper, to blank paper, to colored paper, to the computer word processing program, to the drawing program on the computer, to a postcard.......... can help to keep writing motivation strong. So when my daughter wanted to drag out the typewriter my son purchased a few years ago at a flea market and type her story, my husband helped her right away.

She had fun pushing the keys, but in the process wrote three different stories.

This was completely my seven year old's idea and a perfect example of a successful unschooling activity.

Unschooling Arts and Crafts

In the summer of 2014 we decided to explore an interest based approach to education. While we haven't been pure unschoolers, the kids have had a lot of free time to explore their interests. Each child is unique. My oldest spends hours per day reading, while my son experiments. My little one likes me to read to her, but they all three have put hours into arts and crafts projects. Here are a few.

My seven year old has been experimenting with perspective drawing. A while back we watched a video on drawing people in perspective. Now she finally has more time to explore.



While on vacation in the Netherlands, we visited the Van Gogh museum. My seven year old, who doesn't care for any museums, loved it. At the end, she insisted we buy a book from the gift shop. When we returned home, she tried recreating a few Van Goghs.

My oldest can't get enough photo editing. She loves to dance and is very creative, but could use a little practice working with computers. So I introduced her to gIMP, a photo editing program and showed her how to find a few tutorials on the internet.

She took it from there, creating almost 30 edited photos. Next, I'm planning to introduce her to a scrapbooking program so she can put her pictures into a book.

My seven year old completed a latch hook rug she received for Christmas.

My son watched a video on how to change a quarter into a ring. We still need to get the proper tools to finish the job, but he took it as far as possible.

My son also remembered our perspective drawing tutorials and looked up another on drawing a house. Maybe we will move to one like this? I think it's pretty nice.

She decided she wanted a dress, and got busy sewing.

After reading about Chinese New Year, my daughter went crazy making Chinese lanterns.

Bottle cap collecting became a hobby of my son's over the summer. He has hundreds now, so I bought him an unfinished wooden box and he's been hot gluing the bottle caps into a decorative design.

My son decided to make himself a musical instrument with cardboard and rubber bands.

My 13 year old crafter, crocheted a hedgehog from a pattern she found on the internet.

We seem to start and end everything around here with dance. Lots of detail and time went into this needle felted dancer created by my 13 year old daughter.

I'm finding that by giving my kids lots of free time they use it doing high quality activities. Centered around crafts, they are learning computer skills, reading, a little math; mostly pattern, and learning a bit about history. I've been supplementing their activities with some math and writing on a daily basis. In addition, I spend one-on-one time reading books and doing music activities with each child based on their interests. My son has several science kits that he likes to explore, and once or twice a week I ask if they would like to watch a science based movie and they are usually up for it. This relaxed approach has taken so much stress out of our school days and really seems to be working!