Wonderwood Academy 2004-5

Jelly – 2nd grade Doodle – Kindergarten

Still ecclectic with a Charlotte Mason twist:
Singapore Math
Hooked on Phonics
Dolch Sight Words & Spelling
All About Me – Notebooking
Holiday Studies
Hogwarts Correspondence School Yr. 1
Gingerbread Unit Study
Horseback Riding
Swimming (incl. lessons)
Nature Studies at the Beach
Vacation Bible School
LOTS of library books on LOTS of topics, just because!

Our main course of study:
American Girl books

We learned about the following 6 girls, having previously studied Kirsten - 1854. The stories are not great literature, but they are good stories, and serve well as “tags” to associate with real history. Each book has a fantastic feature in the back called “A Peek into the Past.” We took off on a lot of rabbit trails after reading those features.
(Descriptions from the American Girl website) --
Kaya - 1764
Meet Kaya, Kaya’s Escape!, Kaya’s Hero, Kaya and Lone Dog, Kaya Shows the Way, and Changes for Kaya. These are stories of an adventurous girl. Author: Janet Shaw.
Felicity - 1774 Williamsburg
Meet Felicity; Felicity Learns a Lesson; Felicity’s Surprise; Happy Birthday, Felicity!; Felicity Saves the Day; and Changes for Felicity. These are stories of an independent, spirited girl. Author: Valerie Tripp.
Josefina - 1824
Meet Josefina; Josefina Learns a Lesson; Josefina’s Surprise; Happy Birthday, Josefina!; Josefina Saves the Day; and Changes for Josefina. These are stories of a caring, faithful girl. Author: Valerie Tripp.
Samantha - 1904
Meet Samantha; Samantha Learns a Lesson; Samantha’s Surprise; Happy Birthday, Samantha!; Samantha Saves the Day; and Changes for Samantha. These are stories of a compassionate, generous girl that offer lessons about choices and friendship that still touch girls today. Author: Susan S. Adler, Maxine Rose Schur, and Valerie Tripp.
Kit - 1934 Cincinnati
Meet Kit; Kit Learns a Lesson; Kit’s Surprise; Happy Birthday, Kit!; Kit Saves the Day; and Changes for Kit. These are stories of a resourceful, inquisitive girl. Author: Valerie Tripp.
Molly - World War Two
Meet Molly; Molly Learns a Lesson; Molly’s Surprise; Happy Birthday, Molly!; Molly Saves the Day; and Changes for Molly. These are stories of a lovable, patriotic girl. Author: Valerie Tripp.

Resources we used included:
Teacher Guides, Craft Books, and Paper Dolls published by Pleasant Company. You can still get the paper dolls on the American Girl website, but the Teacher Guides and Craft Books are not currently available. We found some of them at our library, and you can find some of them used through Amazon or Ebay, but they’re usually pretty expensive. We let the girls choose their favorite American Girl, and got them each a set of paperdolls. Otherwise we used only the books we could find from the library, and had more than enough to work with.

As we learned about each time period, we played games, did crafts (sewing puppets (Samantha); weaving placemats (Kaya)), made paper dolls, cooked and ate food from (patriotic cookies and candy flags (Molly)), wrote newspaper articles (Kit), and even listened to music appropriate to the time. Our Homeschool support group has a Great Brain Day each year where students share what they have become experts at during the year.

Great Brain Day - A presentation on Kaya and the Nez Perce

When I was searching for links to help you out, I found this:
It is a listmania list on Amazon.com. Here is the description:
David F. Pocai says: "This list contains resources for teaching history with the American Girl books. This list is geared toward homeschoolers, but can be used for larger groups.

We also had a TON of magical fun doing some Hogwarts correspondence classes. (You have to be a member of the appropriate Yahoo groups to access these files.) They served mostly as our science curriculum. Our regular classes were Potions and Care of Muggle and Magical Creatures, but the girls had a few extra lessons occasionally just to keep things interesting - Honeydukes Home Ec., History of Muggles and Magic, and Herbology, for example.

Bertie Botts Beans – Graphing/Math

Potions – Keeping a lab book, including test results (Daddy=guinea pig!); in the Kids’ Corner at the Visitors’ Center (Sequoia Nat’l Park); coloring eggs with potions
Herbology – Fall Leaves; Field trip to the Bolsa Chica Wetlands (herbology AND magical creatures!)
History of Muggles and Magic – Field trip to the Autry Western Heritage Museum and the Holyland Exhibition, both in Los Angeles; Field trip to Rancho Los Cerritos in Long Beach (Josefina); Field trip to the Lady Washington, a tall ship at the Newport Harbor Nautical Museum (Also for Magical Creatures) - Check this site to see if the Lady will be in your area any time soon.
Care of Muggle and Magical Creatures - Field trip to the Santa Ana Zoo

Gingerbread Unit Study

We focused on all things gingerbread during the month of December. We made paperdolls and then dressed them everyday appropriately for the weather. We read every gingerbread story we could get our hands on. We used Jan Brett’s Gingerbread Baby online activities. We made cinnamon and applesause “gingerbread” ornaments. The girls did an Advent Lego Calendar, and made gingerbread men for one of the days. We made Old Fashioned Gingersnaps and gingerbread cookies. As a culminating activity, we went to Grandma/Mawgs’ house for a gingerbread and graham cracker house-making celebration with some cousins. School made our house smell yummy all month long!

Family Vacations (Extended Field Trips) – In no particular order: Three Rivers, Sequoia Nat’l Park, California Pioneer Life – Mt. Shasta area/Whiskeytown Nat’l Rec. Area , a trip on the Coast Starlight Train, river trip on a sternwheeler down the Columbia River, OMSI in Portland, OR, and a grist mill near Vancouver, WA.

We lived, laughed, loved, and learned a lot!