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Anya
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| Posted: Sept 21 2006 at 3:22am | IP Logged
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I've just been reading the CHC Tour the Continents threads and like this idea for geography. It will work nicely with our short unit studies from FIAR and Ami's.
I was just wondering how many days each week do you spending touring each continent? And how many topics do you cover on each day? I decided not to buy the plans, as the only part I would use is the Tour the Continents. However, I do plan to buy their speller and grammar LOG book and some others.
The threads on this topic have been very helpful and I can wait to get started soon. We have gotten off to a bit of a slow start this school year, but are beginning to get into a rythme. 
Anya
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Dawnie
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| Posted: Sept 21 2006 at 4:33pm | IP Logged
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Anya,
The lesson plans suggest spending one day a week on the project, but we have been spending more than one day on most weeks, mostly b/c I added a lot of read-alouds to the project. If you only did what was in the lesson plans, you probably could spend just one day a week.
The lesson plans suggest spending about 5 weeks on each continent, doing a continent outline the first week, studying a few native animals the second week, one or two landmarks the third week, native saints the fourth week, and wrap-up activities the fifth week.
For the North America section, I added a lot of read-alouds so that we were reading something related to North America almost every day. There were so many good books available for me to choose from that I ended up planning a little too much.  We read 2 folk tales each week, a chapter book about St. Elizabeth Ann Seton (one chapter/day), Paddle-to-the-Sea (one chapter/day), The Courage of Sarah Noble (one chapter/day once we finished Paddle-to-the-Sea), and my dd read picture books set in North America for Independent Reading once a week. At the same time, we were also reading These Happy Golden Years by Laura Ingalls Wilder for our bedtime read-aloud, which is also set in North America. I also checked out some books on famous North American landmarks (the Grand Canyon and Niagara Falls were the two that I chose) and a few books about the tundra, since one of the picture books my dd read was set on the tundra. We spent 7 weeks on North America instead of 5 weeks. I posted my lesson plans here if you'd like to see how I planned everything out. We aren't done w/ the hands-on projects yet--we'll probably finish those up as we start the South America unit. We'll also probably wait on going to the zoo. I think we will have our pioneer dinner this week, though.
Anyway, my point is, as I plan the rest of the units, I'm going to cut back. All the reading aloud was fun, but I think it would be better for us to focus in on fewer books in the future and study them a little more deeply. I think that what I planned would have worked a lot better if it had been the ONLY thing we were doing for school. It was a little much to do in addition to the other subjects.
I'll be posting my South America plans soon...we'll be starting South America next week, so I'll probably post them this weekend. I wasn't able to find nearly as many resources for South America, so it won't be hard to cut back for that unit!
HTH
Dawn
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Cheryl
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| Posted: Sept 21 2006 at 5:47pm | IP Logged
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So far, we are doing the Tour of the Continents as the lesson plans suggest. We spend about a half hour or less on Mondays. Week 1: the boys colored maps of North America and I talked about the oceans, mountains,etc. Week 2: they cut out pictures of North American animals and glued them to construction paper or cardstock. Week 3: they drew a picture of the landmark of their choice. I showed them pictures of the golden gate bridge, niagra falls, the statue of liberty, empire state building....but they both chose the CN Tower because my ds 7 and I went up in it last year. I was only thinking about US landmarks. For the last two weeks of North America we'll read about saints, then wrap up somehow.
We also read some Tall tales for the past two weeks, and listened to some American folk songs. Our booklist is on my blog. Thanks to Dawnie's ideas, we have been reading Paddle to the Sea, which ds 7 and I love. He's been drawing Paddle's trip on a map. I think I may draw with him some of the trips we've taken and where my dh and I honeymooned. It would be interesting to see how many states we've been to. I also think we'll have time to read the Courage of Sarah Noble (a book we own and Dawnie's idea) in the next two weeks.
For the other six continents I will continue to follow the simple plans on Mondays, but I'll add a chapter book and some picture books (such as FIAR) to go along with the continents for maybe one or two weeks each. The continents won't be the focus of our entire year, (just on Mondays for that half hour)as we don't do long unit studies. A week or two is enough for us.
We too are still trying to get into a rhythm. I will probably add more read-alouds when we are no longer going outside at night. Does anyone have suggestions for read-alouds for South America?
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Cheryl
Wife to Bob ('97)
Mom to Matthew 13, Joseph 11, Sarah 10, Rachel 6, Hannah almost 4 and Mary 1
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Anya
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| Posted: Sept 21 2006 at 9:29pm | IP Logged
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Thank you - Dawnie and Cheryl for your detailed postings. This will help alot. After our first week, I will post about it as we join you on the tour.
Anya
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4Real Forums : Across Time and Place
Topic: CHC Tour the Continents
