As part of our Homeschool Series, this particular post is a photo record of the fun we had doing our favorite Konos unit for the year (2003-2004) when the kids were 4 and 6. You can see that we had a blast doing this unit. We did this unit for much longer than the prescribed four weeks, and drug it into a nearly three month journey through the Medieval Times! This was one of our favorite all-time units (of course, every year we find another all-time favorite unit).
We finished off our Kings and Queens study with a fabulous Medieval Feast where we ate “authentic” medieval cuisine and dressed up like lords and ladies at court. We turned our garage into a “great hall” and invited our family and friends to share in the festivities. The feast was our last “school day” of the year, and we used it as a ceremony for graduating the “Queen Morgan” and “Knight Kaden” into the next grade level… while presenting them with awards and honors. They were thence dubbed Second and First graders! Even the non-homeschooling crowd had fun. My husband got a kick out of calling me “wench” and making me fetch his ale (cider). We all took turns making home made butter in a glass jar with a marble (however incorrect for the “period” that method might be – it worked for us!). My children remember this unit (especially the feast) fondly and hope to do it again in older years. Maybe I can learn to sew by then and actually provide them with REAL costumes. We still make a few of the dishes we ate at our feast. The menu is at my Gathering Manna Recipe Blog (along with a cute photo of Morgan with our home-made butter loaf)!
Making Chain Maille out of Pop Tabs and Beading Wire
The Finished Coat of Maille – This took 3 Hours!
Coronation Orb Craft
Experiments with Coffee Paper for our Invitations to the Feast
Marble Paper and our Feast Invitation Wording
Wax Grape Seals with Red Melted Crayon
Lady Nana at the Feast Table in the “Great Hall”
The Graduation Cake (Minus Cinderella)!
“Salat” with Edible Flowers
“Queen Morgan” and “Knight Kaden” at the Seat of Honor
Our Tapestry (throw blanket) and Photo Display Banners
The Royal Bow after being dubbed First and Second Graders
Update 2008:
Here’s a fun link to build your own castle. A friend of mine has left a link with her Medieval Unit Study ideas recently and I wanted to link them here for you as well. Hope you have a fun trip back into the days of the Kings and Queens with your little ones, too!
Technorati Tags: Homeschooling, Graduation, Medieval, Fun, KONOS, Curriculum, Homeschool, History, Home School, Unit Studies, Teaching, Learning, Feast, Children, Parenting, Photos
Dandelion Seeds says
These pictures are just too great! Thanks for sharing them!
Sprittibee says
Thanks Amy. 🙂 I know I should start the CHCHC… maybe I will. I have soooooo many projects on the burner right now that I’m not sure which to do first! Keep me in your prayers. Thanks for the comment.
Anonymous says
Thanks so very much Heather. We just finished our Medieval co-op on Monday and I wish I had seen this earlier! Since I was the teacher, I would have had us do some of the things you did. Instead we just had the feast and talked about what we learned. We only had 45 minutes for our class so we had to cut it short anyway. I am going to redo this unit with my son next year when he is in 3rd grade (he was in the co-op this year) but we will go into much more detail as you did. Thanks for all your inspiration! I appreciate it that you share so much with us. sue in FL
Sprittibee says
Thanks Sue. I am not sure if I posted this to the Konos loop or not…? Glad you enjoyed it. Have fun when you go through it again. 🙂
Dawn says
Okay, you’ve set the bar kind of high here – I’ve got to do this with 50+ kids in my co-op class! 🙂 Maybe our family will do some other stuff at home, too.
Anonymous says
Yes, I completely agree! These are great pictures… we just started our Kings & Queens study this week and my girls are already loving it! Thanks for letting us see your feast, we were wondering how we were going to pull that off.
Great ideas…you are so creative. Your kids are truly blessed to have you as their teacher. 🙂
Raquel Gonzalez
(from your KONOS loop)