Renaissance study

Along with the book Clown of God, we did an in-depth study of the renaissance period and specifically, Leonardo da Vinci.  We read Leonardo's Horse by Jean Fritz and the Magic Tree House Research Guide for Monday with a Mad Genius as a part of this study.  Most of the material came from homeschoolshare, but some came from a free lapbook I had downloaded to my hard drive.

We first discussed when the Renaissance period was and what it meant.  We talked about the architecture, food and clothing of that time.  Then we talked about some of the artists of that time.  This led into a detailed study of da Vinci.  As we studied him, we discovered that he was more than a great artist - he was also an architect, a scientist and an inventor.  We looked at 4 of his paintings and analyzed them.  Here are pictures of the final result:

Other Renaissance period inventions were the clock, glasses, telescope/microsope and the printing press.

The Renaissance period began in Italy.

Da Vinci was left handed and wrote backwards so that he wouldn't smear his writing in his notebooks.
Other artists of that time were Raphael, Michelangelo and Verrocchio.

The boys kept their own art gallery to go along with our study of da Vinci's works of art.  The following are the portraits they drew after studying Mona Lisa.

After looking at the Annunciation, they were to draw a picture that portrayed some kind of emotion/feeling:

After looking at the Last Supper, they were draw their own landscape or perspective picture.

We compared two painting of Virgin on the Rocks.  One version is in Paris, France and the other is in London, England.  The two paintings are similar, but there are differences.  Here are the things Alex noticed that was different between the two:

Catching up

It seems it's been so long since I've posted anything on the blog!  I will try to catch you up with what we've been doing.  We are continuing our studies in Astronomy.  We have studied Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars and the asteroid belt.  It's been an interesting study so far.  Learning the difference between an asteroid and a meteorite was very informative - mostly for me! 

For our read aloud book, we have been going through The Indian in the Cupboard series.  The boys (and I) have really enjoyed the books so far.  We are almost through book 3.  We rented the movie The Indian in the Cupboard and watched it as a family.  

We've been quite busy with co-op this past month.  We read the book Clown of God and talked some about Italy.  Today we read Papa Piccolo which also takes place in Italy.  We will be making an Italian meal later this week.  For the Clown of God, we went to Kokomo Glass factory where they make stained glass.  Here are some pictures:

We also read Katy and the Big Snow recently in co-op.  For our field trip, we visited places around town.  We started at the Marion Water plant, then went to the Marion Police Dept where we met with a K-9 unit and finished at Mayor Seybold's office.  He was in meetings and was unable to meet with us, but we had a tour of City Hall by the mayor's Chief of Staff.  (Pictures to follow - I didn't take my camera that day.)

We have also been busy with scouts.  February we had our annual Blue & Gold banquet when the boys make cakes with their father or other male adult.  Here are the boys' cakes:

Nicolas's group performed a skit.

Alex showed some of the projects he has been working on for his Craftsman activity badge - a napkin holder and leather moccasins.

And Nicolas received his Wolf badge:

Then in March, we had the Pinewood Derby race.  Here are the boys and their cars:

Now that spring is here, we are looking forward to planting in the garden and beginning work outside.  We took our spring break last week and had mostly good weather.  We were able to spend time together as a family for two of those days when dad took off work.  And in a week and a half, we head to Cincinnati for the homeschool convention.  This year, since they have a Children's program, the boys are going with us!

I'll try not to take so long to update the blog next time.