Review of The Action Bible Anytime Devotions

 We just finished The Action Bible Anytime Devotions.  Here's the link through Rainbow Resource.

In the description, it says this devotional is for grades 4-8.  I would say it's great for about ages 8-13.  Each devotional is two pages and touches on a certain topic.  These topics include things like kindness, courage, trust, hope, love, bullying, sharing the Gospel, loneliness, serving others, anger, compassion and faith.  Each devotional begins with a fictional story, followed by an explanation from a Biblical standpoint, a prayer and an exercise for further understanding.  The book includes 90 individual devotions.  We spend maybe ten minutes a day on the devotional.

This book was excellent.  We're also reading through The Action Bible and the two books definitely complement each other.  I think this has been one of our favorite books this year.

Review of My First Hymnal by Concordia Publishing House

https://www.cph.org/my-first-hymnal?srsltid=AfmBOor44fxfZkJqerfT4bX0oEB4Wx4jZexgaiJCz6_zoNqgeoTWsiyx

It looks like it's $21.99 from CPH's website.  It's also $21.99 on Amazon (at the time of this post).

This book was amazing.  I think this is one of our favorite books ever.  It took about ten months for us to go through all of the hymns in the book.  I was worried that it would be babyish for a 10-11 year-old, but it absolutely was not.  He loved this hymnal.

The hymnal is very colorful with large print (a big thanks from the dyslexics in this house).  It has sections that cover the church calendar, different morning and evening prayers, confession and absolution, The Apostle's Creed, the Lord's Prayer and obviously a big collection of hymns.  The hymns are arranged around the church calendar.  When we began the hymnal, we started in the middle of the hymnal based on what time of year it was when we started.  I think we started at the beginning of Pentecost.  

There is a also a YouTube page with all of the hymns either sung by a choir or played acoustically without a choir.  We always listened to the hymns on YouTube as we went through them.

We loved this hymnal so much that even though we finished the entire thing, I don't want to put it back in the bookcase.  I would like to keep it out in the school room.

Concordia sells another kid's hymnal, so I may take a look at buying that hymnal also.

Links to Lutheran Homeschool Resources

 I happened to be looking around online and found several links to Lutheran homeschool articles and websites that seem useful.

From Concordia Publishing House: https://blog.cph.org/teach/christas-homeschool-religion-curriculum-favorites-elementary-years  I think I need to buy My First Hymnal, described about halfway down the page.

Three Books Every Lutheran Homeschool Should Have: https://thefaithfulhomeschool.com/2023/01/08/three-books-every-lutheran-homeschool-should-have/

https://www.lutheranhomeschool.com/

The Consortium for Classical Lutheran Education: https://www.ccle.org/classical-lutheran-education/

A compilation of writings from Martin Luther on the importance of education and how children should be educated: https://www.ccle.org/luther-on-education/

Lutheran Homeschool Marketplace and Press

https://www.lutheranhomeschool.com

I haven't posted about this website in about a year, but I'm looking through it today to get some ideas for Bible this summer.  Most of the curriculum on the site are free, but you have to "buy" it in the shop to have access to it.  We did the Angels & Demons study about a year ago and it was excellent (and written by a Lutheran pastor).

Our Bible study was on life-support all spring and I really wanted to add more to it over the summer.  I wanted to go back to doing a Saint study and a Hymn study once a week - in addition to our daily Bible readings.

Solus Christus: A New Lutheran Bible Curriculum

https://thefaithfulhomeschool.com/product/lcmsbiblecurriculum/

A fellow LCMS homeschooler has created a multi-age Bible curriculum for Lutheran homeschoolers.  You can see samples on her blog, as well as a list of subject areas covered in the curriculum.  This program covers topics like church history, catechism, hymns, and memory work.

Lutheran-specific resources for homeschoolers are so limited.  I am so excited that someone has written a Bible curriculum for Lutheran homeschoolers.  Hopefully, this is just the beginning, as far as more curriculum and resources being created by Lutherans - especially with the big surge in homeschooling now.

She has some free printables, also: https://thefaithfulhomeschool.com

Saint & Hymn Study 4/2

We had great discussions today!  Here's what we did:

Lutheran Hymn

I Know That My Redeemer Lives,  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkLuZxqPPzE

Saint Study

St. Drogo, https://inkyn.wordpress.com/2018/01/14/st-drogo-patron-of-the-unattractive/

Process the Catholic Church Uses to Become a Saint

https://people.howstuffworks.com/question619.htm

(And the Lutheran church teaches that all believers who die are saints)

How the Roman Catholic Church chooses a Pope

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUtj8nd_pl4

Future Plans

I want to put together a weekly study on what the different denominations believe and how that compares to the Lutheran church.  Just studying some of the Roman Catholic beliefs has been fascinating and great platform for discussion.

Homeschool Days 3/30 & 3/31

 Kindergartener

• Lots of reading - probably 4-5 picture books a day
• Playing at the park 
• P.E. today - we played baseball for PE.  We worked on catching, throwing and batting skills
• He went to an Easter egg hunt at church and his Wednesday night class at church

13 Year-old

• Gospel of John
• Algebra
• Language Lessons for the Secondary Child
• Free reading
• To Kill a Mockingbird and Mrs. Frisby
• Apologia Anatomy - reading from the text
• History 
• video: "Brutal Execution of the Romanovs"
• video: "The Revolution that Shaped Russia"
• movie depicting life around WWI: Legends of the Fall (we fast forwarded the Brad Pitt love scenes 😬)
• Group discussions during the two days we watched the videos and movie
• trench warfare
• mustard gas
• the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
• Austria-Hungary and its alliance with Germany
• Prohibition
• the draft 
• the murder of the Romanov's - also specifically talked about the daughters
• Ballet 
• Confirmation class at church
• P.E. - baseball
• EasterNow app - following Jesus' activities during Holy Week in real time

History was very productive this week for both teens.

16 Year-old

• 2 Samuel
• Algebra 2
• Language Lessons for the High School Student - I'm, once again, getting pushback from this kid, because the program is too easy.  This time, she wrote an essay on how to write a really bad essay - it was an instruction guide.  She's asking to do more creative writing, so after we finish this batch of stuff, it's time for more creative writing, I guess.
• Apologia Biology - reading all week about spiders and other arachnids
• German together
• History 
• video: "Brutal Execution of the Romanovs"
• video: "The Revolution that Shaped Russia"
• movie depicting life around WWI: Legends of the Fall (fast forwarded the Brad Pitt love scenes)
• Group discussions during the two days we watched the videos and movie
• trench warfare
• mustard gas
• the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
• Austria-Hungary and its alliance with Germany
• Prohibition
• the draft
• the murder of the Romanov's - also specifically talked about the daughters
• Communism
• Scarlet Letter Unit Study
• Read Scarlet Letter
• Whatever Happened to Justice
• The Fallacy Detective
• Viewed The Mayflower Collection from the Pilgrim Hall Museum
• "The Mayflower on Her Arrival in Plymouth Harbor"
• "The First Thanksgiving at Plymouth"
• Ballet
• Youth Group at Church
• P.E. - baseball
• EasterNow app - following Jesus' activities during Holy Week in real time

Here is the EasterNow app:  https://easternow.com

Saint & Hymn Study 3/19

This week, we read a biography of St. Patrick and listened to the hymn Be Thou My Vision.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihJAJA4ibEs

We also went through the Stations of the Cross.  The Kindergartener watched the Lego Stations of the Cross:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bs5Z8TAVoGg

The teens watched the Stations of the Cross using the Passion of the Christ movie:  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CLBy2r72Cg&list=PLm16ih_BT9xjWau5ETineOJYx2ZAVSCqR

This led to a long discussion and some online research of Veronica's Veil, the Vatican and the Shroud of Turin and whether or not these are authentic artifacts and why the Catholic Church has an interest in these (and also, why the Lutheran church does not have an interest in religious artifacts like the Catholic Church does).

Saint and Hymn Study 3/12

 Saint and Hymn

We watched a video about Saint Christina the Astonishing: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmn69EDWN6I  

We also read the background information and listened to the famous Lutheran hymn A Mighty Fortress is Our God.  (This actually led to a discussion on the German princes at the diet that created the Augsburg Confession)

Because of the video on Saint Christina the Astonishing, we ended up having a great discussion on the Catholic belief in Purgatory, why Lutherans do not believe in Purgatory, the Augsburg Confession....we talked about at the apocryphal texts, Sola Scriptura....why there are more books in the Catholic Bibles than the Protestant ones...I mean, it was a GREAT discussion.

Always have a laptop handy when you do Bible study with teens.  They ask some deep questions that I don't know the answers to.

Saint/Hymn Study 3/5

 Kindergartener

• Teach Your Monster to Read
• Dragonbox's Numbers App
• Hymn/Saint Study

13 Year-Old

• Gospel of John
• Dragonbox Algebra
• Visual Thesaurus Spelling Bee
• Hymn/Saint Study

16 Year-Old

• 1 Samuel
• Visual Thesaurus Spelling Bee
• Mapping the World with Art: Australia
• Hymn/Saint Study

Hymn and Saint Study

• We listened to "Lift High the Cross" - a popular Lutheran hymn - A Capella version 
• Saint: St. Christopher - https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=36
• We looked at an old painting of St. Christopher and talked about the halos in the painting.  We're now wondering about the origin of halos in religious paintings.  I'm going to do some research into this for next week
• Both older kids remembered the Lutheran Common Table Prayer.  5 year-old couldn't remember it, so I guess we'll practice more.  We listened to the prayer in German.

Saint and Hymn Study - 2/19

 Saint, Hymn and Bible Study

• St. Augustine of Hippo - https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=418

• "Jesus Loves Me" (Hymn) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULNcM5BiqHM

• We also memorized the Lutheran Common Table Prayer - https://witness.lcms.org/2011/come-lord-jesus-6-2011/

• 15 Year-old read from 1 Samuel

Supplemental Apps, etc

5 Year-old

• Dragonbox's Numbers app
• Teach Your Monster to Read

13 Year-old

• Dragonbox Algebra
• Visual Thesaurus Spelling Bee

15 Year-old

• History of Medicine
• ACE's Health

Homeschool Day 2/17: Ash Wednesday

 It's Ash Wednesday, but we are not able to go to church, because of the snow.  Church is closed.  😔  We're planning to watch the Ash Wednesday Chapel Service through LCMS.org

The service is on Facebook on The Lutheran Church Missouri Synod page.  I can't find a link through their website.

Kindergartener

• Beginner's Bible - read about 4 Bible stories today - he did not want to stop reading
• Addition game with farm animals for math
• Reading - he used Montessori reading blocks
• Explode the Code

Five in a Row - The Giraffe Who Walked to Paris

We did more talking about Egypt, the seasons, etc.

13 Year-Old

• Ended up having a huge playdate with another homeschooling family, so she didn't get much schoolwork done
• Read Gospel of John
• Visual Thesaurus Spelling Bee
• Free reading from her book crate
• Atlas Anatomy App
• US States Puzzle

15 Year-Old

• Also went nutso all day with her best bud, but she managed to finish school
• 1 Samuel
• Algebra 2 - that last lesson on algebraic equations
• Language Lessons for the High School Student
• Visual Thesaurus Spelling Bee
• Huckleberry Finn
• US States Puzzle
• Biology reading
• Reading for American Government - about impeaching the President (ironically)

Saint & Hymn Study 1/22

 Instead of doing a saint and hymn study this week, we've been watching The Chosen series.  The entire first season is on Youtube, along with commentary.  We're on episode 6 and I like the series, but the teens were surprised at how much liberty the show takes to build characters and a storyline (and that's actually one of the big criticisms of the series).  I do think it's worth watching and I've enjoyed watching it with the kids this week.

Bible Readings

13 Year-old is reading from John.

15 Year-old is still in 1 Samuel.

I'm reading Mark.  

15 Year-old still needs to work on Health, read a chapter in The History of Medicine and go to her theater class.

Lutheran Homeschool Marketplace & Press

A great website that is currently being built...  

I spoke with the lady who's trying to put this all together and she is putting a ton of effort into this site.  You could get lost on her site for hours.  

https://www.lutheranhomeschool.com