Homechool unit studies have been a fun way for us to engage as a family and study together.  I don’t always use them, but when I do, the kids are thrilled, and so is my budget. 

Unit studies can be a very low-cost homeschool curriculum option, especially if you use free unit studies or create your own.  All you need is a plan, some great books, and a little bit of time.

While I do put together my own studies, if I can’t find one I need online and I’m short on time or motivation, I ask my friend, Tina Franks, to put one together for me.  Tina is awesome at unit studies – especially ones around literature or when you want lapbooking pages too.

When she offers a lapbooking or unit study class at her home, I send my kids – cuz they *love* Ms. Tina and her three kids, so much so they love to volunteer to go “help out” Ms. Tina.

In fact, here’s a picture of Tina and Kate  taken here in March 2011 when K was helping Tina out  for a few hours.

So when I got this idea to do this homeschool unit study series, that we are about to embark on, I asked Tina to help me out with it.

So, on Mondays for the next 7 weeks, Tina will be guest blogging here, with a primer on how to write your own homeschool unit studies from scratch.  Starting with:

What are Unit Studies?

by Tina Franks

Before we can talk about writing our own unit studies, we should make sure we all know what they are.  So what is a unit study, anyway? 

Simply put, a unit study is the cross-curricular study of a specific theme or topic.  A topic, such as snow, is thoroughly explored and expanded upon from all angles, incorporating many subject areas (art, music, applied math, language arts, literature, science, social studies, character, writing, etc.).

Unit studies can be adapted for any age range or combination of age ranges.  They can be short-lived or lengthy.  They can be highly structured or left up to the student to expand upon. 

There is a great deal of freedom in learning through unit studies.  Let’s start at the beginning…

Shannon’s Note: One of my favorite things about homeschool unit studies is that there is flexibility, flexibility to educate across multiple ages, like we are doing with our geology unit study, and the flexibility to delve as deep or as shallow as you need or want, or have time for. The kids will often dive much deeper on their own time and accord if something catches their interest.

Up Next: Homeschool Unit Studies: Choosing a Topic & Expanding On It

**UPDATE**
Tina is about to start a new, huge monster of a unit study, and she volunteered to let you and I follow along as she creates it. This is the perfect opportunity to learn exactly how she goes about putting together a study.

Interested? Just enter your email address below and we’ll send you Tina’s updates whenever they are ready!

Okay, this is a little silly, but for whatever reason the fact that there is a special Robinson Crusoe Day makes me smile.

February 1st is Robinson Crusoe Day, to commemorate the actual rescue of Alexander Selkirk, the Scottish sailor who is said to have inspired Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe story.

Originally published in 1719, the story of a castway sailor deserted on an faraway island has long captured the imaginations of boys and girls (and men and women).

And as I really want the kids to listen to this book for literature, I think we are going to take the day off  our scheduled schoolwork and celebrate Robinson Crusoe Day too.

What can be more fun than tossing aside conventional schoolwork for a day of adventure and imagination on  a deserted island?

If you’d like to join us, here’s some free resources for you:

Robinson Crusoe Audio Books

Robinson Crusoe audio book (from Libriovx)

For younger children, here’s two more free audio book versions from Librivox that might be easier for them to understand:

Robinson Crusoe Written Anew for Children by James Baldwin

Robinson Crusoe in words of one syllable by Mary Godolphin

Robinson Crusoe E-Books

If you prefer to snuggle up and read alound for the day and don’t already have a copy of this adventure story, here’s some free ebook versions of Robinson Crusoe for you:

The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808 version) – Kindle Version (free from Amazon.com)

 Robinson Crusoe: Edited from Original Writings (1866 version)  – Downloadable scanned book from Google Books

Robinson Crusoe Written Anew for Children by James Baldwin – Downloadable scanned original book with wonderful little pictures and easy to read typsetting (via Google Books)

You can also pick up text, epub, and possibly kindle versions for each of these at ProjectGutenberg, just search on the title keywords “Robinson Crusoe” and you’ll find all the versions they have available, including the ones for children.

Robinson Crusoe Activities

If you’d like to turn this into a larger unit study, or give the kids something to do while they are listening, here’s a few more resources to check out:

Geography/Maps

Interactive Map of Robinson Crusoe Island (the island Alexander Selkirk was deserted on) Zoom out to see it’s proximity to Chile and South America. Then have your student find it on a blank world map.

Interactive Satellite Map of Tobago – the island the bookRobinson Crusoe is said to have been actually based on. Zoom out to the 4th position from the bottom to see a nice view of where it’s positioned between North and South America.  Then have your student find it and mark it on the blank world map (above).

Art/Coloring Pages

Palm Trees amd then your student can press their thumb on a stamp pad or in a little bit of paint and put “coconuts” in on the palm trees  

Learn to draw:

A Row Boat

A Tropical Beach

 

Other Fun Activities to Try

- Get a coconut from the grocery story and make it an adventure to figure out how to open it. We did this one day and had a grand time with it.  Then we tasted the coconut milk inside and sampled the coconut meat. Very memorable and fun adventure. Also a good discussion point of how you’d open coconuts if you didn’t have any tools.

- Create your own 3-D island and Palm Trees, using a cake mix or dirt. Or use these instructions from Crayola to do it with construction paper and toilet paper tubes.

 - Ask your student(s) what they would do and need to find if they were deserted on a island. Brainstorm some ideas, or if you have a group of students, try this Island Survival challenge activity.

This is also a great opportunity for all ages to reinforce what is needed to survive (food, water, shelter, how to get it when there’s no grocery stores or hardware stores or internet in sight, and what skills would be helpful to know in survival situations, and of course God’s amazing provision.

Lesson Plan for Robinson Crusoe

If you like more formal teacher lesson plans, here’s a free one from the Colorado Unit Writing Project called Robsinson Crusoe: The Original Survivor. It includes 8 lessons, vocabulary words, activities, and writing assignments. It’s geared for 4th grade, but could easily be adapted for multiple ages or up or down based on your students.

Enjoy!
…Shannon