How lovely it is to get back to blogging after so long away! Our home leave in England finally came to an end and we've been back in Russia for a week now. The entire contents of our house (minus the larger items of furniture) were in storage, so it's been a huge job getting everything unpacked and back into place, but I finally got to a stage this evening where I could say 'I'm done'! I'm sure I'll write a post sometime on the trials of packing and making multiple moves overseas :-)
In the meantime, I wanted to write this post on Living History ever since I came across this road name in the town in which we were living:
"Look, look!" I shouted at Sophie (aged 7) as we were driving past, "Hengist Road!" She looked at me a little blankly. "You know, we've been reading all about him and the Saxons in our school book". (We've been reading 'Our Island Story' by H.E.Marshall as part of the Ambleside Online Curriculum for Year 1). Fortunately she seemed to remember who Hengist was. "Hmmm," I continued, "I wonder if.......?" And sure enough we came across:
I was one very excited homeschooling mummy! Ok, ok, yes I need to get out more, but after that we started noticing names such as 'Saxon Hotel' and the 'Aethelstan Pub'. Suddenly the history we'd been reading about was coming alive.
We were also reading about King Alfred for school. One of the books mentioned he'd been crowned in Winchester, a town very close to where my sister-in-law lives. With a bit of persuading, Hubbie let us have an hour wandering around Winchester town centre, where we came across this statue of Alfred. Unfortunately my camera battery had died (note to self: homeschooling mothers on a mission must always check batteries are fully charged on all electronic equipment), but I found this small photo on the web.
This is Corfe Castle, which dates back to the 11th century and was built by William the Conqueror. The kids had great fun filling in a treasure hunt quiz, where they learnt lots of interesting things about who had been imprisoned in the castle and so on, and they even won little medals at the end.
The highlight was getting to dress up as knights and ladies and stage mock sword fights in the grounds of the castle!
I'm so glad I was able to supplement our history studies in this way. The children genuinely enjoyed going around the museums we went to, and were super-excited when I told them they probably had some Viking blood in them from their Great Grandmother's side.
I think I'm going to start making a list of all the places I want to visit in England on our next home leave. In the meantime, we'll be checking out the local museum here in our town in Russia to learn a little of the history of the people from this region.
Qu: What opportunities have you had to involve your child(ren) in Living History?
Qu: What tips do you have to keep history trips interesting and fun?
As always I love reading your comments!
Abide in Him!
How fun!!! Isn't living with history amazing? You'll get much more of that in Russia and Europe than I will here in central USA. :)
ReplyDeleteFound you via the blog thread in the AO forum...
ReplyDeleteThat is SO neat! We also wrapped up Year 1 last year (it took longer than a year. heh) for one of mine. We've just started Year 2 for her and there's a LOT we're learning about William the Conqueror! How amazing to see and set foot on so much you've learned about.
Once again, you make me a little jealous. We had an adventure like this when we were doing Year 1 and discovered that our Russian history was very local. You can find what I wrote about it, if you search our blog for "Svyatoslav." Oh, and when we visited Krakow while reading The Trumpeter of Krakow! Visiting Kiev is a little like that for us now, too. I really hope that someday we can go back to Moscow, and maybe we'll make it to England someday. :-)
ReplyDeleteHi everyone, thanks for visiting and leaving a comment. Perhaps if we actually lived in England we wouldn't make such an effort to visit places :-) Oh, and we're still wrapping up Year 1 too and will be for at least another 2 weeks (sigh). Hopefully we'll be caught up by Christmas.
ReplyDeleteI think you could use Charlotte's words here when she said, "We've had a splendid bag!" What a wonderful time of making connections and living out the history you've been reading. And I am more than a wee bit jealous of the opportunities your current locale provides. What a blessing this is to you AND your children.
ReplyDeleteFrom joy to joy,
Nancy
Lovely post. I really like the Erma Bombeck quote on your sidebar!
ReplyDeleteThanks Nancy and Carol. Yes, that quote always brings a smile to my face when I read it!
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