Saturday, June 27, 2020

Planning 9th Grade with Ambleside Online


We are officially entering the high school years at our house with K! We will be using Year 9 in Ambleside Online, adjusted to meet her needs. It's no joke that there is quite a bit of extra planning needed in preparation for these upper years! I found myself quite overwhelmed at times and am hoping I haven't overdone it with the book load, but we can always cut back and move things around if she finds it too much work. This daughter is a high achiever and loves to learn about such a variety of things that I think she will really enjoy the books and still continue to read in her spare time :). 



The hardest decisions for me were in the science area, since AO doesn't have their science selections nailed down. After much internal debate, I'm happy to say that I am pleased with what I have chosen and am thrilled to post it here for anyone who might need ideas (like I desperately did). I really wanted her science books to be living and interesting and not boring with textbooks, and I think I have met that goal. 

I have tried to do as much pre-reading as I possibly could and I did get a good chunk done! But I have fallen woefully behind in the main history texts. Anyways, without further rambling, here is what I have picked from the many available options on AO.



Bible - We will continue reading the Bible together at our afternoon Circle Time (reading OT & NT).
Living By the Book by Howard Hendricks (once/weekly)

DevotionalPracticing the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence
The God Who is There by Schaeffer 

History - Age of Revolution by Churchill
The Oxford Book of American History by S. Morison

History speeches/docs - so many listed on AO! I have chosen about 1 per week.

History biographies - The Indispensable Man by James Flexner
Napoleon and the Napoleonic Wars by Albert Marrin 
John Adams by David McCullough 
The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson by Robert Southey

Geography - The Royal Road to Romance by Halliburton 
Longitude by Dava Sobel
also 10 min weekly map drills on Seterra Geography

Gov't/Econ - Are you Liberal, Conservative or Confused by Maybury
The English Constitution
Essays by Jane Marcet
Common Sense and The Rights of Man by Thomas Paine
Selections from The Federalist Papers

Citizenship - Life of Alexander, finish Pt. 1 and complete Pt. 2 (Plutarch)
Ourselves by Charlotte Mason
An Essay on Man by Alexander Pope
The Four Loves by CS Lewis

Current Events - will be done together with Louisa at our afternoon Circle Time

Worldview -The Problem of Pain by CS Lewis
The Christian Mind by Harry Blamires

Literature - Shakespeare's The Tempest and  Coriolanus (?)
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
continuing with History of English Literature by H.E. Marshall
She Stoops to Conquer by Oliver Goldsmith
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
Faust, book 1 by Goethe

Poetry - she asked to study more poetry, so we are adding in The Art of Poetry by Classical Academia Press. We will do this slowly over two years or four years. Also she will be reading William Cowper, Phillis Wheatley and from The Oxford Book of English Verse

Grammar - continuing with Our Mother Tongue

Math - (a.k.a. the-perpetual-thorn-in-my-flesh) I think we will be ditching Teaching Textbooks... it seems like she has gotten to a point where it is hard to understand the reasoning and whys behind the way to work the problem. I think we will be looking at Jacob's Algebra and Geometry for High school. Still to be finalized.

Science -  we are taking the approach of studying multiple streams at once and taking them slowly through the year. These are all living books and I am adding in the accompanying study guides from Sabbath Mood Homeschool.

Signs and Seasons (finishing this up)
Look at the Sky and Tell the Weather by Eric Sloane
For the Love of Physics by Walter Lewin
Microbe Hunters by Paul de Kruif
Men, Microscopes and Living Things by Katherine Shippen
Wonder of Chemistry by Frederick Collins 

The weather book, biology, physics and chemistry books will have the study guides and experiments to go along with. Signs and Seasons will continue to have field work throughout the year. 

Nature Lore - Land of Little Rain by Mary Austin
Fascinating Insect World by Fabre 
Also will require a bird sighting list, flower sighting list or tree list to be entered into her nature journal. Weekly nature journal entries will still continue.

Logic - How to Read a Book by Adler (continuing this year)
Love is a Fallacy by Max Schulman

Art - The Story of Painting by Janson (continuing this year) and looking at the art of Titian, Vermeer and J.S.Copley

Music - Piano lessons, hymn singing, folk singing, and listening to the music of Beethoven, Haydn and Dvorak

Recitation - 2 poems/term from the poets read, Ephesians 6, Matthew 6:1-24, Psalms 46, 121, 127, one monologue from each Shakespeare play

Foreign Language - continuing Homeschool Greek Level 1, Visual Latin II and Spanish

Health - Folks, This Ain't Normal by Joel Salatin

Life Skills - I'd like her to start making dinner twice a month and take a CPR class sometime over the year. 

Free Reads - 
Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Letters of W.A. Mozart
The Bride of Lammermoor by Sir Walter Scott
The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy
The Man Who Was Thursday by Chesterton
Manalive by Chesterton
Horatio Hornblower series by C.S. Forester
A Tale of Two Cities by Dickens
Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Two Years Before The Mast by Richard Dana

and if she reads all of these, I have a few more :)



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