When the Greeks went to the Underworld, they had specific instructions from Circe for how to give the ghosts life and health. If they prepared this special concoction, and allowed the ghosts to drink it, the ghosts could gain human form and speech. They were to dig a trench and fill it up with the stuff ghosts just loooove to eat. So, here's the recipe:

Blood (21st century Greeks may substitute ketchup)
Honey
Milk
Wine (Again, grape juice is an acceptable substitute for Greeks under 21)
Grain (We used corn meal for allergy reasons)

The exact ratio of ingredients is unspecified in the text but we just used a lot of everything.

For this activity you will need the following:

One trench. We used a long kind of tupperware-ish thing.
The four trench ingredients
Enough little glass bottles to hold some trench mix for each kid. With CORKS!
A ladle
A turkey baster
Creepy face paint.
Index cards
Markers
Tape



Before you start, have the children use the index cards, markers and tape to create the labels for their bottles. They should use a name like "Trench Surprise!" or "Trench Soup!" or something like that. Then set the bottles aside.

Divide your class up into ghosts and Greeks. On the ghost side you will need: Tiresias, Odysseus' mother, and Achilles. Paint up your ghosts' faces with creepy paint. On the Greek side you'll need Odysseus and enough Greeks to hold all the ingredients. So, here's how it goes.

1. Establish your trench -- put the ghosts on one side of it and the Greeks on the other.





2. Odysseus orders his Greeks to put their ingredients into the trench. As they come up one by one, you sit next to the trench and mix it together. Encourage everyone to be completely grossed out by the smell, the sight, and everything. Loudly yell "EWWWW!"







3. Have the ghosts come around sniffing hungrily and drooling and begging for a drink of what's in the trench. Odysseus must refuse all but Tiresias.

4. Let Tiresias get a big "drink" of trench and then say his bit about not eating up the sun god's cows.



5. Let the other ghosts come up and have a go at the jug.





6. When it's all over, use the turkey baster to put a little bit of "trench soup" into everyone's bottle. Cork FIRMLY. Tell the children NOT to let the bottles tip over, seriously. You do not want that stuff loose in a book bag. Of course if they want to uncork it once they get home, that's the parents' problem. *cackle*

The children enjoyed this activity very very much. As with everything else that's valuable and fun, it was a pain in the bottom to set up and clean up, but it was so totally worth it.

This activity was planned and executed at our homeschool co-op, Homeschool Out of the Box, for my elementary literature class on The Odyssey. For more of my Odyssey ideas and plans, click on the Odyssey tag at the bottom of the post.

Labels: children, classical literature, homeschool, homeschool co-op, lesson plans, odysseus, odyssey

The episode in the Underworld can be a gruesome, gory read. We tried to lighten the mood by doing "Blind Tiresias" drawings. Here's what you'll need:

Blindfolds
White charcoal (available in the drawing section at a craft/art store)
Black cardstock

You could do it with white chalk but white charcoal is much nicer.

1. Show the students a picture of Tiresias and give them a little backstory on him. Tiresias is an awesome character to use when teaching how one figure can appear in multiple stories, with different purposes. Classical authors had no problem sharing characters and overlapping storylines. Why? Because these stories are based in oral traditions and myths, and characters like Tiresias the blind prophet can pop up all over the place. A good run-down on Tiresias can be found here with pictures. I love to point out places where texts can be deconstructed and the kids can kind of see beyond the page, and I find that even a six-year-old can understand this stuff, especially when you relate it to a character like "the wicked stepmother" or "the orphan who becomes a prince" etc.

2. Blindfold them. Make a big deal about checking if they can see or not, but if there are kids that get freaked out by being blindfolded, leave them a crack.

3. Pass out the materials, preferably after the kids are blindfolded, so that it will be a surprise when they see black paper and white chalk.

4. Ask them to draw Tiresias. Let hilarity ensue.







5. Some kids will cheat, and peek! That's okay! Accuse them loudly and angrily, and then move on! Bring lots of paper so that the cheaters have an opportunity to start over with virtue and a more secure blindfold

6. Some kids will not cheat, and their pictures will turn out funny:





This activity was planned and executed at our homeschool co-op, Homeschool Out of the Box, for my elementary literature class on The Odyssey. For more of my Odyssey ideas and plans, click on the Odyssey tag at the bottom of the post.

Labels: children, homeschool, homeschool co-op, lesson plans, odysseus, odyssey, tiresias

The children have memorized their Assyrian poem. Now we're on to Ozymandias. They're such good sports:

Labels: children, homeschooling, kids, language arts, memorizing, poetry, reciting

We were driving past the hospital where Benny was born. We don't normally go down that road, so I pointed it out.

Me: Look, guys -- there's the hospital where Benny was born.
Benny: WOW! If I was Jesus, we'd be in Bethlehem!
Sadie: Yeah! And if I was God, I wouldn't be afraid of the dark!

And in my neurotic homeschooling mind, my first response was that I need to teach them to correctly use subjunctive tense.

Labels: children, conversations, funny

Here's my version of "Johnny Appleseed," especially silly for telling out loud. After a few times through, your kids will be able to fill in lots of the lines. Remember to be super dramatic when you tell the story. After all, what's more dramatic than propagating apples?


An Apple Blossom

Once upon a time, before there was California, before there were movies or televisions or long distance phone calls for seven cents a minute, there was Pittsburgh. Nowadays Pittsburgh is a great big town but back then Pittsburgh was a little town and a little man lived in that town and his name was Johnny. He was a LITTLE man! He was NOT very big! But he loved to grow apple trees and pick the apples and eat them and sell them and make them into cider and spread them all around town. Did you know that apples grow on trees? Well they do!

Now the people of Pittsburgh and New York and Virginia and Boston and other places in the East end of America were itching and scritching and witching to go West. Why go west? Because they wanted to know what was there! And they wanted to live there, all out in the big open spaces, where they could plant their plants, milk their cows, and raise their children in a brand new place. Nobody knew what was out there yet, but the settlers wanted to find out. And Johnny knew that the settlers were going to need... APPLES! Where would they get those apples if they didn't have apple trees? Where would they get apple trees away way way out in the west where nobody ever heard of apples anyway!? Somebody had to get apples out west!

An Apple Tree Painting

So Johnny decided to become a pioneer. A pioneer was someone who went first, ahead of the settlers, who came later. A pioneer showed the way! A pioneer blazed the trail! A pioneer must be a big and strong and powerful man with giant muscles and huge feet! Wait a minute -- Johnny was a LITTLE man! He was NOT very big! But he loved to grow apple trees and pick the apples and eat them and sell them and spread them all around town. So he picked up a biiiiiig bag of apple seeds, and away he went out west.

Apples Ready to Pick!

Now a pioneer needs a lot of stuff. He needs a gun and a knife and a fishing pole, and a big warm coat, and he needs big tough boots, and a belt full of tools. He needs a hat and mittens and he needs pots to cook in, a sleeping bag to sleep on, and all KINDS of other things. But it's no problem for the great big pioneers, because they can carry all that stuff in their wagons! Or on their backs! Because they're soooo big and strong! But wait a minute -- Johnny was a LITTLE man! He was NOT very big! But he loved to grow apple trees and pick the apples and eat them and sell them and spread them all around town. So he chose veeeery carefully. He took a Bible and a bag of apple seeds, and that's it! He set off for the frontier with no shoes, no pot, and no sleeping bag. Just think!

Wherever he went, Johnny cut through the brush and the bracken and the bushes and planted apple trees in long straight rows. Then he built a fence around the trees and that was an apple orchard! Just about the time the sprouts were coming up from the seeds, along would come the settlers! And Johnny sold apple trees to the settlers, little tiny trees that the settlers could take to their brand new place and plant. Fruit trees make everything nice! All the settlers wanted to buy apple trees from Johnny. But being a settler is hard work, and the settlers didn't have very much money. How would they pay for the trees?

Rows of Apple Trees in an Orchard

One settler family came along and said, "Johnny Appleseed! We'd love to have some trees, but I can't pay you any money! What are we going to DO!?!" Johnny said, "Well, let me think. What DO you have?" The family had an extra cooking pot, so they gave it to Johnny, and they took their seedlings, and Johnny put it on his head. It was a hat AND a place to cook his soup! Perfect!

Another settler family came along and said, "Johnny Appleseed! We'd love to have some trees, but I can't pay you any money! What are we going to DO!?!" Johnny said, "Well, let me think. What DO you have?" The family had an extra pair of shoes, so they gave the shoes to Johnny, and they took their seedlings, and Johnny put the shoes on his feet. Now he could walk through the woods without getting cut by thorns! Perfect!

Another settler family came along and said, "Johnny Appleseed! We'd love to have some trees, but I can't pay you any money! What are we going to DO!?!" Johnny said, "Well, let me think. What DO you have?" The family was just about to build their house, and they said that Johnny could come and stay for a while. So they built their house right next to one of Johnny's orchards, and in return Johnny could stay with their family whenever he was close by.

Johnny Appleseed pioneered his way through the brand new territory with a pot on his head, shoes on his feet, and a bag of seeds at his side, planting trees, making friends, and bringing beautiful apple blossoms to the frontier. There are lots of stories about Johnny Appleseed -- why don't you make up one yourself?

Words to Learn: apple, sprout, seedling, seed, bloom, blossom, tree, frontier, pioneer, orchard, settlers.

Labels: apples, children, johnny appleseed, stories, unit study

Last week at Phi Bensa Zoe Academy, our homeschool mini-co-op, the junior class did a math/art/nature project that resulted in a picture frame decorated in painted shells. Of course, with preschoolers, it's all about the process.

Step 1: Wash the shells.

I had a big bucket of shells that were pretty much straight from the beach. Sand in them, bits of seaweed, random ocean gunk, etc. I put the bucket in the sink and turned on the water. Sadie and Phillip washed the shells and each chose a bowl full to use in their projects.

This was definitely the kids' favorite part of the whole thing. They liked clinking their hands around in the bucket of shells and water, they liked picking out different variations of color and shape, and we talked about the creatures that had inhabited the shells, why they were shaped how they were shaped, why they were sandy, why some had ridges and some didn't, etc. The nature lesson was good, but I think the tactile sensation was better.

Step 2: Paint the shells.

When they had their shells picked out, I laid paper towels on the table and set their bowls next to their workspace. They each chose ten shells, which we laid out in a row and numbered, then ten more, another row, then ten more. We counted to thirty, we counted by ten to thirty, we talked about three groups of ten making thirty, and we exploited the math moment in other ways. Then we painted.

Painting shells is complicated because of the ridges. We tried, with varying degrees of success, to paint with the ridges rather than across them, to make an even, smooth layer of paint. We also tried to cover the whole shell.

We used pearl white and metallic gold paint, and then came behind with silver and gold glitter paint. I like glitter paint 50 times better than shaking loose glitter onto glue. It's so much easier to control, so much less messy, and so much less likely to get into your eye and drive you crazy for the rest of the day.

Step 3. Arrange the Shells on the Frame.

After the kids chose their favorites and organized them on the frame, I came behind with a glue gun and attached the shells. We used an unfinished wooden frame, which we later varnished with spray varnish, because the glue and the shells will stick better to an unpainted wood surface than to paint or shellac.

Another example of the quiet, private nature of homeschool learning. Looking at the finished frame, some silvery shells stuck onto a wooden rectangle, you don't see the math, the marine biology, the joy in the tactile sensation. While school teachers have to focus on deliverables, proofs, and evidence, the homeschool teacher has her own experience, her own memory, her own relationship with the project and the moment, and there's no one to prove it to, no need to quantify it.

Of course the homeschool teacher also has her homeschool blog where she occasionally does record it, quantify it, and provide all the evidence she likes.

Labels: children, counting, crafts, kids, painting, phi bensa zoe, preschool, projects, shells