Snippets of a Week Of Ambleside Online Year 8 with a 15 Year old

*  History readings as per Ambleside Online schedule. Benj plans his own readings from the weekly list. With Churchill's books, he has always preferred to read a whole chapter per week rather than how it is scheduled (the chapters are divided as they are fairly long) so he has just finished the book this week.

*  Shakespeare's Macbeth - we've just started this play using the Arkangel BBC recording.

*  We're not doing a Plutarch Life this term as our days are full enough at present. I'm happy if we do at least two Shakespeare and two lives per year but sometimes we do more.

*  The Holy War by John Bunyan - each week Benj adds to his poetic saga narration.

*  Francis Bacon Essays - a re-writing of the essay Of Studies.
There were a few Latin phrases such as, Abeunt studia in mores and cymini sectores, which we were unsure of until we found this site which helps explain them.

*  Maths - continues with Saxon Algebra II which he's almost finished. We were talking this week about what he'd like to study at University so we can plan towards that. We've used the SAT and units from Open University as a means of providing 'formal' documentation for university entry and as he has a mathematical bent, we'll probably get him to do some subjects related to that starting either this year or the beginning of next.

He watched this video this week:




Science

Understanding Physics by Isaac Asimov - Volume 1: Motion, Sound & Heat.
Science Notebook & experiments
Apologia Exploring Creation With Biology - selected modules only

Combining two loves, mathematics & soccer:




Art & Poetry

 La Belle Dame Sans Merci by John William Waterhouse (1893)

 The painting above is based on John Keats' 1819 poem of the same name.

I really liked the sound of this book when I saw it on Janice Campbells's Excellence in Literature site and thought it would be good for me to work through myself as a devotional. So I am, but Benj is also now using it to read through the poems of George Herbert, which are unique & beautiful. Working it Out: Growing Spiritually with the Poetry of George Herbert by Joseph L. Womack.

There is a sample of the book here.
At the beginning of the book is a short section in which Janice Campbell gives suggestions on using the book in the writing process.


Linking to Weekly Wrap-up