Great Lessons Resources

One of the questions I had when I was first considering homeschooling was how I would know what to teach and when to teach it. I wanted something that would give me an outline of topics to cover so we that we wouldn't be stuck learning about Ancient Egypt for four years straight (which is probably what would happen if I followed my boys interests!). I wanted something that would give my children the "big picture" of all the myriad topics of study that exist. I realized that (as tempting as it sounds) I could not fill my childrens heads with the complete scope of human knowledge, instead I should aim to give them a taste of the possibilities and let them pursue their particular interests in more depth.

A solution to this dilemma that I discovered early on in my homeschooling journey is the book The Well Trained Mind. This book presents a method called classical education, and my favorite part of the whole approach is that history is used as a spine for organizing science, geography, literature, art, music and more. History is divided into four time periods (Ancients, Medieval Times, Renaissance, and Modern Times) which are studied chronologically, one time period each year for four years, after which you start again from the beginning. Literature, music, and all those other subjects are studied in their historical context. Science is also broken down into four year cycles roughly relating to the chronological development of these fields: Life Science, Earth Science, Chemistry, and Physics.

We love the chronological approach to history, and it has been working really well for us. Recently I discovered another way to present the big picture that works well in tandem with the classical ed history cycles: Montessori Great Lessons. Maria Montessori developed these five impressionistic stories to present the history of the universe to children. The First Great Lesson details the creation of the Earth, the Second Great Lesson describes the development of life, the Third Great Lesson involves the history of man, the Fourth Great Lesson describes the development of language, and the Fifth Great Lesson is the history of numbers. After each lesson is presented follow-up lessons are given on topics that spring from each Great Lesson. For example, after the First Great Lesson volcanoes, rocks, or astronomy could be studied, while the Fourth Great Lesson could lead to studies of alphabets of other cultures, grammar topics, and making books. This approach naturally emphasizes the fact that all these "subjects" that we have artificially divided in traditional schooling are really all connected and flow into each other. Montessorians call this idea "cosmic education" and it seems like a good idea to me! Lori at Montessori for Everyone has written a wonderfully complete article outlining the Five Great Lessons and the topics related to each. I will no doubt be referring to her lists often to get ideas for new directions to go in following the yearly presentations of these Great Lessons.

So with out further ado here are the resources I have gathered so far to aid in presenting these Great Lessons and their extensions to my children as well as lists of follow-up topics we might pursue:




The First Great Lesson: God Who Has No Hands
Miss Barbara's
Monteaco
Follow-up topics to possibly pursue this year: volcanoes, rocks, earthquakes, weather, plate tectonics, layers of the earth, solar system, moon, chemistry, physics, earth science, astronomy
Materials: Charts for Great Lesson 1, various supplies for demonstrations (see the Miss Barbara and Monteaco link above), volcano model

The Birth of the Earth by Jacqui Bailey

Here is a post about how this lesson went.

Mare has some great files to go with this lesson at her blog. She has Earth Science and Space 3-part cards that correlate with the follow-up ideas in Miss Barbara's albums.

The Second Great Lesson: The Timeline of Life
Miss Barbara's
Monteaco

Edited to add: I found another online version of the Second Great Lesson here at the North American Montessori Training Center aka NAMC. You have got to love NAMC's use of pictures!

Follow-up topics to possibly pursue this year: five kingdoms, animal classification, fossils, Clock of the Eras, biomes, botany, zoology.
Lesson Materials:
Prehistory Timeline (in the photo at left) and Eras of Life poster from Michael Olaf













Nomenclature cards I typed up from the info at Miss Barbara's:



PreCambrian
Cambrian
Ordovician This one doesn't download, email me at raragrayNOSPAM@charter.net, take out the NOSPAM and I'll send it.
Silurian
Devonian
Carboniferous
Permian







I matted these by kingdom, and double matted the animal kingdom by phylum, so that the children can do studies of Arthropods through time for example. I used construction paper for the mats, laminated them, and put them in envelopes for each period. I labeled them on the back to prevent mix-ups. I didn't get to the Mesozoic or Cenozoic Eras, that will be a future project.







Fossil Kit from Rainbow Resource




Fossil Coloring pages



Companion Books for the Timeline of Life from Montessori Services

Fossils Tell of Long Ago by Aliki

The Beginning by Peter Akroyd

The Dawn of Life by Jacqui Bailey
The Day of the Dinosaurs by Jacqui Bailey



The Third Great Lesson: The Coming of Man
Miss Barbara's
Monteaco
Follow-up topics: Fundamental Needs, Fundamental Needs in History, Hand Chart (I may try to make something like this), history topics, cultural geography, art, music, scientific discovery and inventions

Materials: Timeline and cards
The Stick and Stone Age by Jacqui Bailey



The Fourth Great Lesson: The History of Writing
Miss Barbara's
Monteaco
Follow-up topics: alphabets (hieroglyphics etc), book-making, grammar topics, writing, literature
Materials: History of Writing Cards from Montessori 123, The Story of Writing, Jackdaw: The Development of Writing



The Fifth Great Lesson: The History of Numbers
Miss Barbara's
Monteaco
Follow-up topics: maths, mathematicians, timelines, maps, time zones, calendars, money, geometry, measurement
Materials: The Universal History of Numbers

I am hoping to keep updating this post each year as I go through the Great Lessons and add more resources. If you have any resources to share or blog posts pertaing to the Great Lessons please email me or post in the comments, I'd love to link you!