For our Ancient Rome history presentation we welcomed extended family who had flown in from out of state to join us!
Presenting…a family from Ancient Rome. After we gave our introductions of our belief in the one true God, we enjoyed a feast the Ancient Romans would have enjoyed.
Because the Ancient Romans made oratory famous, that was the theme of the day.
We were also glad to incorporate elements of what my kids had learned from other curricula: Latin Road to English Grammar (LRTEG) and Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW).
Ending our first year with IEW, my kids wrote several cohesive persuasive essays (Unit 8) which would be perfect to use in our presentation.
Because company was staying at our house, we had less time for the usual rehearsal and preparation, so we kept things super simple. Although all the persuasive essays my kids had written were on display, they only needed to choose one to read to the audience.
We printed their essays onto parchment paper, rolled them up, and laid them with the other art projects for use during the history presentation.
Since my daughter has been studying Latin this year, she recited The Lord’s Prayer, which had been part of her LRTEG studies, then she read one of her papers.
After my son recited Paul’s famous oratory to the Athenians in Acts 17: 22-31, he read one of his papers. He also explained how his costume signified that he was a member of the Roman Senate.
Then my kids gave a tour of our museum of art projects related to Ancient Roman history.
Our focal art project was the mosaic. So quintessentially Roman, mosaics are seen everywhere today. Today these crosses are nicely displayed in my kids’ bedroom.
If we did no other art project for this era of study, our learning objectives would be covered. However my kids found time to do other crafts of their choice in their free time.
The mysterious Etruscans invented the arch along with other marvels like aqueducts that fascinated us, so my kids wrote about them for our IEW essays.
As we learned about Roman conquests, victory marches occurred under magnificent Roman arches, so the kids wanted to each construct one, which they did in different ways.
While my son was reading our history book about Archimedes, he asked if he could make a model of the Archimedes Screw for his science lesson.
Using materials around the house like a plastic storage box, rocks, a portion of hose, and water, my son not only created a model of the Archimedes Screw but he also got it to work!
Wish I had a video of it. I don’t remember exactly how we made it, but directions are easily found on the internet.
Epilogue:
Our studies of Ancient Rome was packed and greatly enjoyed because all the things we learned. We are really having ah-ha moments with this classical method of study, because it’s helping us to understand our present times so much better than our previous method of textbook studies.
We’ve seen mosaics in numerous places, including Whit’s End in Colorado and the Library of Congress in Washington DC. When my kids saw these mosaics they came to a complete stop to admire the craftsmanship. Their only words were: Wow! That took A LOT of work. We know!
We’ve seen the Archimedes’ Screw working to drain wet areas at the Witte Museum in San Antonio, and on Assateague Island near Chincoteague, Virginia.
We’ve seen arches at the Witte Museum and in real life architecture.
All the things we’re learning we see here and there and are just wowed! Things that bored us before are now full of wonder and amazement and understanding.
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