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I was all freaked out about the Greek thing--how are we going to get it all done and so forth. I mean, don't get me wrong, we're not on a strict schedule or anything, and I have some extra padding built in to what schedule we do have, but I want to get to Rome before the Pompeii exhibit comes to town and there are just SO MANY Greeks with SO MANY achievements. Then it hit me this morning, like a stack of bricks. She's in first grade. She really doesn't have to know Empedocles from Erastothenes ('cuz you know I do, uh huh...)--she's going to be studying Greece in more depth later anyway. I mean really, she doesn't have to learn anything about Greece at all--though we're having fun doing it. DUH!! So I stopped flipping out and relaxed this morning. We're learning the Greek Myths--that's important since so much of Western Culture is built on them. We're getting an introduction to their way of life and an understanding that they more or less invented or improved on important stuff like democracy and scientific reasoning and mathematics. And we're hearing some of the great stories from the Trojan, Peloponesian, and Persian wars. And that's more than plenty.

So we had narration today on the first of Heracles' tasks--defeating the lion (from Amery's Greek Myths for Young Children) and we read about Hermes and (again) Demeter and Persephone in the D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths. I read An Octopus is Amazing by Patricia Lauber, and we read around in Technology in the Time of Ancient Greece by Judith Crosher. She did math (division!) while T watched Peep and they both watched Peep together while I made lunch. While they were eating I read the story of "Prince Hyacinth and the Dear Little Princess" from Lang's Blue Fairy Book, and then we read The Magic School Bus Lost in the Solar System by Joanna Cole. We went online and looked at National Geographic's virtual solar system, and watched an animation that demonstrates the immense distance between the planets. We made a model of the solar system on the wall in our hallway: Last night I took this coloring page, and blew up (or reduced, as necessary) the planets to be in a rough scale with one another, using this site to figure out how big each should be. Then today I made a part of a big sun with some large paper Alan brought home from work, and T and I colored the sun (it has some very unusual sunspots) while E colored the planets. She cut them out while T and I put the sun up on my bedroom door, and then we used the measurements from the "Planetary Distance Activity" in the back of The Planets in Our Solar System by Franklyn M. Branley to place the planets along the wall. So they are in rough scale with each other, and in rough scale for distance, but the distance and the size are not correspondent. I would either have to have had Mercury smaller than a pinhead (hard to color!) or a hallway bigger than a football field (I wish). Then E made labels for the planets and put them up too, using the True Books planets series from the library for spelling (she used the pictures on the covers as models for her coloring, too). Unfortunately for her, I didn't get an earth book and I refused to tell her how to spell it. Oh my, what a tantrum we had! For someone who's so bright, she certainly does have her stupid moments. Finally I had to point out to her that we had read TWO books on the solar system today, and they were at my feet, and I was sure that the word EARTH had to be in there SOMEWHERE. I wish she weren't so obsessed with spelling. I've told her again and again that I couldn't care less if she spells things right or not, as long as she writes, to no avail.

They're really pleased with the model, and E wants to add all the moons and asteroids and comets, and...oh my. Well, I told her we could add moons as we study each individual planet, but we're done with school for today so shoo! I have cleaning to do--and then some.