This year in our homeschooling, we began our history and geography with the discovery of America, since that is where we live. We began with an entry from the Greenlander Sagas, all about Lief Erickson's discovery of the North American Continent, and the Native Americans who lived there.
We read the entire entry and talked all about how interesting it must have been for the Greenlanders to come to America and meet people here and how different the climates were, more so than they are today. We discussed the similarities and differences in cultures, and how they must have been highly suspect of each other, especially the Native Americans towards the Greenlanders, since it was so very unlikely that they had met people like them before.
Then, my son asked me a loaded question: What were the vikings when they weren't "viking"?? This, of course, led to almost of an hour of questions and answers about Nordic Cultures, and once my personal wealth of knowledge was tapped out, we turned towards the internet, and there found a vast array of information to flood our minds.
So, what originally began as an American History lesson, has now evolved into an all-consuming obsession with Viking Era Scandinavian culture and life. My second grader has decided to learn Swedish, to study the lifestyle, laws, religion and diet of the Viking Era Nordic People.
The good thing about homeschooling is that you can change curriculum in an instant. Actually, it's the best thing about homeschooling. We will continue to study American History, but now, we have a new subject: Historical Cultural Life Study. We have also adjusted our entire curriculum to reflect and incorporate aspects of Viking life and diet into our everyday lives.
(A LIST OF RESOURCES IS AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST)
Here's what Hemundervisning (Homeschooling) will now consist of for my children: (ages 11,7, 4 and 15 months)
History: Viking Era Europe 800-1200AD: How Nordic Culture influenced other cultures, and how other cultures influence Nordic Life
Math: Singapore Math U.S. Edition in their respective levels (can't find Viking Era math books! :p )
Arts and Science: Scandinavian Science Studies:
Nautical Navigation, Agriculture, Boat Building, Turf Building, Compass Making, Ale Brewing, Food Preservation, Woodworking, Carving and Engraving, Metallurgy, and anything else we come across/ have time for! One subject is studied each month or until completion of task. As you can see, the various aspects of science involved in Nordic life cover everything from Chemistry to Earth Science, Engineering to Physical Science.
Domestic Engineering: Food Preparation, Nutritional Understanding of Nordic Diet, Aspects of cloth making, clothing construction, Viking Camp life (one week as a full-on Viking Camp, after the turf building/tent has been constructed, food preserved and clothing made...should be interesting!)
Introduction to Svenska: Basic Swedish Vocabulary (We selected Swedish because it is understood perfectly in Norway, Sweden and much of Finland...) We create copy work worksheet pdf's with basic Swedish words and their English translation for the children to trace over, which helps them to learn not only Swedish, but also proper letter formation and spelling and builds vocabulary, all in one sheet of paper!
Writing: "My Saga" - After reading passages of Sagas, each child will compose a short Saga of their favorite memory, their favorite trip with the family, Their favorite part of Viking culture, or a make_believe Saga. These sagas will be typed up and printed out as copy work pdf and collected for the Viking studies portfolio.
Multimedia Study Aides: Either documentaries, videos or computer pages and games that assist in the retention of information 30 minute maximum per day
Here's My Resource List for where I get my Various Information, things I use to teach and just plain fun, educational stuff for the kids to do:
Visit The Viking Answer Lady for all of those very in-depth questions about things like what the heck did vikings eat, how did they take baths, and where did they relieve themselves?
Hurstwic Society, probably the most comprehensive site on Viking life. You can find everything from the laws regarding vengeance, to the proper way to wear your breeches and kirtll. ( good for avoiding those embarrassing and potentially deadly fashion fax-pas of the Viking Era!)
BBC Primary History-The Vikings for the kids. games and stories and plenty of information with visuals to keep the kids interested, plus a very fun game where they are the archeologist discovering Nordic items and guessing what they are used for.
Then there are some very nice Horrible Histories videos about Vikings..fun for grown-ups and kids! (LITERALLY!)
We make our Swedish worksheets by using Google translate English to Swedish and copying and pasting basic words and sentences into this Copywork Worksheet Generator.
and as always, PBS can be counted on to teach your children how to write "POO" in Runic with their write your name in runes page.
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