Thursday, September 8, 2011

3D Drawing Class...Online!


Jojo and I recently signed up for this very cool website where Mark Kistler teaches 3D Drawing through online videos. It is really, really fun! Here are some of my pictures. A shark (above) and Fat Cat below:


Two simple houses:


A crazy house:

A sphere (with planets and rockets behind):

Space Hamsters:


Crunchinators:



Homeschool History Studies Part 2 - Ancient Rome


When Jojo, Baba, and I got back from our trip to Spain, England, and Greece in June (where we saw a lot of things we learned about in our homeschool history studies - part one), we moved on to studying the history, culture, and philosophies of the Hellenistic era and Ancient Rome.

We still use Gloria Fiero's Humanistic Tradition to start us off, but then we read and watch lots of other cool stuff.

Books:

Epictetus Art of Living: The Classical Manual on Virtue, Happiness, and Effectiveness
Seneca Letters from a Stoic
Alain de Boton's The Consolations of Philsophy (chapters on Epicurus and Seneca)
Marcus Aurelius Meditations
Shakespeare, Julius Caesar
Shakespeare, Anthony and Cleopatra

Films, TV, and Documentaries:

Julius Caesar (the 1953 movie with Marlon Brando as Mark Antony)
Anthony and Cleopatra (the 1980s BBC production)
I, Claudius (the 12 part TV series - we watched it all, and I loved it!!)
Alain de Boton's Philosophy: A Guide to Happiness - Seneca on Anger (30 min TV show on Seneca - available online)
Alain de Boton's Philosophy: A Guide to Happiness - Epicurus on Happiness (30 min TV show on Epicurus - available online)
PBS series (four episodes) The Roman Empire in the First Century

We're now studying the fall of the Roman Empire and the birth of Christianity and Buddhism...