Planning Year 8 (Form III)

It's that time of year where the planning is in earnest! How am I typing Year 8?! I really am amazed that we have made it this far... when we very first started homeschooling, my thought was to take it a year at a time and don't commit for the rest of our lives but now I don't see any other way for our family. It really is a blessing despite the challenge of five children and all the work it takes to make it happen smoothly.

So, here are our Year 8 plans (these are mostly the same as AO with a few changes here and there to make it specific for Kailyn).

Bible:

We plan to read together OT & NT throughout the week, with narrations. On Fridays, we will continue Big Truths for Young Hearts by Bruce Ware. We will also continue our Bible memory review and learn 3 new passages over the year (TBD).

Devotional Reading: 

The Case for Christ by Lee Strobel
Mere Christianity by CS Lewis
The Small Woman by Gladys Aylward (I subbed the missionary bio because I feel sometimes a story is more necessary than theology books. We will save AO's recommendation of Desiring God till high school.)

I might also add in some reading from The Savior of the World by Charlotte Mason... we'll see.

History:

The New World by Winston Churchill

Various historical speeches: Martin Luther's Defense before the Diet of Worms, Queen Elizabeth's speech to the Spanish Armada, and John Donne's Devotions upon Emergent Occasions.

Kailyn will also continue to add to her Book of Centuries and we will start a new History Notebook for 8th grade (which will contain written narrations, timelines, drawings, etc from the year).

History Biographies: 

A Man for All Seasons by Robert Bolt (we will actually watch the play instead of reading)
The Life of Sir Francis Bacon by William Rawley
The Voyage of the Armada by David Howarth
A History of Plymouth Plantation by William Bradford (various chapters per AO)
The Life of Dr. John Donne by Izaak Walton
A Coffin for King Charles by C. Wedgwood

Geography: 
Christopher Colombus by Samuel Morison
Kon Tiki by Thor Heyerdahl
The Discovery of Guiana by Sir Walter Raleigh

We will also add in some geography drills of the Caribbean and South/Central America.

Government & Economics:

Whatever Happened to Justice by Richard Maybury

Citizenship:

Ourselves by Charlotte Mason (selections)
Plutarch - we will read the lives of Demetrius and Alexander.
Utopia by Sir Thomas More
Selected essays by Francis Bacon

Current Events:

Kailyn will continue to listen to Breakpoint Commentary, read a news story from World Teen and Student News Daily (one of these each day) and then write a brief weekly summary.

Literature:

We will read/listen through Shakespeare's Coriolanus, Macbeth and Henry VIII.

History of English Literature by H.E. Marshall (various chapters)
Everyman, A Morality Play
Westward Ho by Charles Kingsley
The Betrothed by Alessandro Manzoni
The Holy War by John Bunyan
The Diary of Samuel Pepys (excerpts)

Poetry:

Fierce Wars and Faithful Loves by Edmund Spencer
Shakespeare's Sonnets (selected)
John Donne poems
George Herbert poems (we're going to read these ones together w/Louisa at Circle Time)
John Milton poems (including Paradise Lost book 1 )
The Roar on the Other Side by Suzanne Clark

Grammar:

Winston Grammar

Math:

Teaching Textbooks Algebra 1

Science:

Autumn in America by Edwin Teale
A Naturalist Buys an Old Farm by Edwin Teale
First Studies of Plant Life by George Atkinson
Great Astronomers by RS Ball (3 chapters)
The Chemical History of a Candle by Michael Faraday
Johannes Kepler by John Tiner
Phineas Gage: Gruesome but True Story About Brain Science by John Fleischman
A Briefer History of Time by Stephen Hawking
The Microbe Hunters by Paul DeKruif (only one chapter-- this was super interesting)
William Harvey and the Discover of the Circulation of Blood by Thomas Huxley
Signs and Seasons: Classical Astonomy by Jay Ryan (selections)
Filippo's Dome by Anne Rockwell (these are not rec by AO but I am subbing the architecture books for the microscope book since we did that last year.)
Architecture by Gladys Wynne (I am using this instead of Napoleon's Buttons that AO recommends because Kailyn is interested in Architecture and this qualifies as a science.)

Charlotte Mason had her students study ALL the streams of science at the same time, making for an integrated science approach. This list can look overwhelming but in reality, these are for the entire year spread out over three terms. She basically will be reading from one of the books each day of the week, and then doing either a drawn/written entry in her science notebook or oral narration to me.

Logic:

How to Read a Book by Mortimer Adler (three chapters read over the year)

Art:

The Story of Painting by Janson (selections)

We will be studying Michelangelo, Pieter Bruegel the Elder and John William Waterhouse as our artists for the year.

We will also continue working through Drawing Textbook by Bruce McIntyre.

Music:

We will be studying Rachmaninoff, Franz Haydn and Robert Schumann for the year.

We will be learning and singing through one hymn for each month of the year and working through our American folk songs book.

We also need to add in some Spanish songs to compliment our Spanish language study.

Kailyn will also continue learning piano.

Foreign Languages:

Greek- Kailyn will continue studying Koine Greek twice a week- we are using some books from Trivium Pursuit Ministries (Harry Bluedorn).

Latin - Kailyn will continue with Visual Latin II through Compass Classroom (Dwane Thomas is the online teacher). This is working very well for us and she is learning how to read and write ecclesiastical Latin pretty fluently. She works on Latin 3 days a week.

Spanish- we plan to finish out La Clase Divertida II and then probably continue with Level III mid-year. We study Spanish three times a week.

Handicrafts:

We plan to meet up once a month with our friends for a new project each term. My current ideas are embroidery, paper cutting and photography but I still have to finalize it.

Phew- I think that's about it! Thankfully, Ambleside Online does SO much of the work, and I am just adapting it to our family's needs. I am so, so thankful for their dedication to giving a free curriculum to any who desire.

If you want to see AO's complete Year 8 - this is the link.