Coke-Lite: Classical Conversations: Our Experience pt 1

How did you hear about CC?

Almost two years ago I read (on Kindle) Leigh Bortins book, The Core (she is the creator of CC). I found it very helpful, but did nothing with it (the Geography section is worth the price of the book). Then a friend in-country gave me the CC Foundations book and said she would have done it if she could have figured out how to do it overseas (she was in the process of moving back to the U.S.). David grabbed the book and read through it before I did, handed it to me and said: 'this is what we should do'. He has been awesome in our homeschooling decisions, just as interested in curriculum choice, process, visioning, and of course what we desire the outcome to be. It took me a little bit to get on board too (with CC), I loved the idea of doing all of it, I just wasn't sure how it would all come together in my home, with no CC Community.

Classical Conversations website

Deciding to start.

After talking to many people in the U.S. who were doing 'CC' I kept getting comments like: 'it revolutionized our HS', 'it gave us a complete backbone', 'if we do nothing else in a day and review CC, I still know they are getting so much'. And I did not find one person who did not like CC. Not one. We ordered everything, almost (I will get to 'what to order soon'). And then we went to the States for a few months and I invited myself into two different CC communities to watch and learn. This took two mornings out of my time in two different cities that I happened to be in at the time. It was so worth it, the people were incredibly helpful, and I actually pictured how it would look at home, with me being the tutor. We do CC with our five year old and 3 year old (details on what that looks like to come). To find a community near your U.S. home go to the website linked above.

What I bought

· Foundations (book), 4th edition (there are changes from previous editions, go with the newer one), This is my go-to every week, the textbook so to speak for the tutor. Has a great Appendix and tells all you need for the extras (fine arts, science experiments), and maps, cycle subject summaries, etc.

We joined ‘CC Connected’ (explain your overseas situation and get a discount!) This is worth it to get access to things other people do each week, you can also find stuff on pinterest, but here people upload their own songs and stuff, I use this every week, and will describe how to maneuver it in that post on weekly prep.
Audio CDs for cycle 1 (if just starting) we are about to buy Cycle 2. However, if you will not start until fall and want to coincide with what most U.S. CC communities are doing you may want to start in Cycle 2 (I will discuss more about the cycles briefly next post), this would be helpful if you knew people you could talk to (though there is stuff all over the internet for help for every subject, every cycle already). OR if you may decide to ever be in the U.S. for longer and wanted to be a part of a CC community you would want to be on schedule with them. We bought:

o Cycle 1 Subject CD (use this weekly)

o Cycle 1 Timeline and More (Use this weekly, she has short ten minute talks on each level of CC, very helpful overviews)

o Cycle 1 Weekly CD (I rarely use this because it doesn't really have the songs, but still is a good resource)

o Cycle 1 Memory work Resource CD (this is mainly just pdfs/powerpoints of material) I printed out just the Geography (close up maps), and the Science and pull those out every week for just another visual aid. But this is not a must-buy.

· "Classical Acts and Facts History Cards" These are the timeline cards, buy all of them, the new ones. They are great, and are used every cycle. There has been some confusion, the actual 'History sentence' each week doesn't have their own cards per se, but really they do, because the timeline at some point covers briefly the history sentence. For example, Cycle 1 week 16 History sentence: Tell me about the civilizations of Mesoamerica: Three advanced civilizations of Mesoamerica from 1200 BC to 1500 AD were the Olmecs, Mayans, and Aztecs. In various parts in the timeline we have already mentioned all three, which means each civilization has their own timeline card filled with good info about them!

Science facts cards. We went ahead and bought all the sets for all three cycles, these are great as well. Honestly I could just sit and read these all day. These have built in extension facts for older kids or add-on stuff. We also bought the Famous Scientists cards, which are not a part of the memory work, just a supplement, which we have not used yet.

Flashcards. I haven't used these as much as I thought. But for some review games I have, I would buy them.
Trivium tables: Geography and Latin. I haven't used these either but with older kids I would. They are a four-fold 'table/map' so to speak with all the information in one spot for review.
Because we pretty much knew we were in this for the long haul and have 3 kids with one on the way, I also bought things in the States to help me organize and protect the TL cards, etc.. I bought 5 ½ x 8 ½ inch page protectors for all my cards. Yes, this was costly up- front, but will be worth it for the duration. I then got small notebooks that match the size of the cards, 9” x 7 ½ “, I bought 8 of these. I did buy one big 2 ½” binder for all the science cards, but it was flimsy so I switched it out for 4 smaller ones and broke the Science cards up per cycle, with the fourth one being the ‘Famous Scientists’ cards.

For fine arts, we ordered whatever CC said to order: Tin Whistle, Classical Music for dummies, Discovering Great Artists, and Drawing With Children (I did reference this but did not find it to be the best, yet).
Science experiments weekly: Janice Van Cleave’s 201 Awesome, Magical, Bizarre, and Incredible experiments.
There are other things you can buy to supplement any of this, especially art books, but with so much stuff on line I easily found things when needed, I am art impaired which is why I love someone telling me what to do.
They delivered this to China!!!

First time prep: before you start the entire cycle (almost all of these ideas came from what I witnessed):

Go to the appendix of Foundations and find the maps for your cycle. Get these blown up (16” x 18”) it really doesn’t matter just bigger than normal size. Laminate. The two maps used for cycle one front and back. I did two separate pages: front and back skeleton b/w, front and back color with names, then got three each (total 6 maps). At this stage I have not used the unlabeled black and white yet. I also bought a huge heavy duty plastic/vinyl type folder (bottom pic of these four) to put my big maps in for protection through the years. I bought this I think at Michael's or some other artsy type store, but office stores may have them.

I also made subject headings on little cards, laminated and stuck them on the end of Popsicle sticks. Any fun little thing that gets the kids involved is helpful. They get to close their eyes and choose which subject we do first, and thereafter on our ‘CC’ day (usually).

For review throughout the cycle (this doesn’t really have to be done up front), I photocopied all of the Cycle 1 subject summaries from the Appendix and laminated them, some needed front and back some did not. This was helpful for travel and review. Instead of even taking the flashcards with us when we travel, I grab the flat, 7 sheets of summaries. So easy.

A ‘Blob Map’. This is a thing that I love that someone at a community gave me. You can make your own and I highly recommend it. I have two laminated. For the age of my kids, which CC calls “Abecedarians”, this is great geography. You can make your own by following the instructions in the Geography section of ‘The Core’ or simply getting out an Atlas, getting proportions right for the ‘Circles’ (Arctic, Cancer, Equator, Capricorn, Antarctic, and Prime Meridan, vertical), then drawing Continent ‘Blobs’ appropriately. My girls trace this every week, and we learn the continents and where they are. As you get farther along, depending on ability you can get your child to start free drawing it (lines first), while looking at the original blob map. You can progress as needed, including progressing to non-blobs (which we have not done). This is extra and not in the ‘memory work’, we usually do not do this on our ‘CC day’, though in every community I went to, this is how they started their day.