Copied from one of my posts at the Sonlight forums:
So, how VP works. That is a rather difficult question, and one that is going to take a bit to explain, and hopefully try not to violate any copyright laws at the same time. So, I will do my best to describe a few random cards that we have done so far to sort of give you a feel for the program.
Ok, there are 3 main components to the program. History and Bible work the same, and some of the cards are exactly the same. The cards are slightly smaller than half a sheet of paper, and on the front have a large picture of what the topic is, and a title, and perhaps a Biblical reference, or date. There are 32 in each Bible program and each history program. The cards are numbered and color coded (but all the Bible cards are purple, but the history ones are all different colors) to the topic. They are numbered 3 different ways. First, each card is numbered according to where it is in the set to which it belongs. I'll explain a bit more in detail below. I think they are SUPPOSED to be done at the rate of 1 per week, with 4 extra weeks for review.
The workbook has questions, occasional crafts and extra readings, and the like.
The CD has one or two songs on it, very long songs. They cover the titles of every single one of the cards, in historical order (as a sort of verbal timeline) and Biblical references for the Bible songs and so forth. There are some extras to them which are nice, for example, the creation part goes into what happens on each day of creation, and another song lists all the 12 tribes of Israel. Each time we cover a new card, we sing the song UP TO where we have learned, and then stop, because it makes it so much easier to learn a 10 minute song if you do it in parts. And it is always fun to see how many times you have to play it before you can say "the unification of upper and lower Egypt by Pharaoh Menes" without tripping over your tongue on the fast part.
Now, really, out of these three things, the only thing you really NEED is the history cards.
OK, the first card I am going to describe is Solomon's Reign.
Front of the card says
Solomon's Reign
I Kings 1-11
II Chronicles 1-9
Back of the card repeats this information, and then gives the dates:
c. 971-931 B. C.
Then, there is a section on the back of the card with 4 paragraphs summarizing Solomon's rule, from how he became so wise to building of the temple, to the Queen of Sheba, to his death.
Now, if you wanted to stop there, you certainly could.
As far as numbers go, Solomon is a history card, AND a Bible card. In the Bible program, it is card #56. Which means it comes in the third grade program cards. In the Ancient Egypt history cards, it is #30. Since the one I pulled out is the Bible card, it has a purple stripe at the top showing it is Bible 56, and a blue stripe below it, that shows #30 for the blue history set. Like I said, all the Bible cards are purple. However, if I were to go to my history set, and pull it, it would be EXACTLY THE SAME, but the blue stripe would be on top and the purple one below that. Now, this particular card is unique, because it is used in the history and Bible program, but the Bible program will go more in depth as the subsequent cards (which are not history cards) include Solomon given wisdom, writings of Solomon, the temple is built, the Queen of Sheba visits Solomon, and Solomon's reign comes to an end, so this is one of the very few cards that gets expounded upon in the following cards. But if you only did the history and not the Bible, you would still get an overview of Solomon, without the in depth stuff.
Now, to make things even easier for you (since, if you are like me, you will try to keep them in order, so you don't have to figure it out all the time, a lot of people put them on book rings, so you can just flip through), at the bottom of the card, it also says it is card #71. So, if you were to try to put all the history and Bible cards together to make an official timeline in the correct historical order, it would be the 71st card. So, you can teach by subject, by set, or by historical time period.
OK, back to Solomon.
Now, if you didn't want to stop there, there are some resources listed at the bottom of the card. There is a random number of resources listed for each card, and I haven't done this card yet, but I pulled it to demonstrate how the numbers work, and I think it shows up better on a higher numbered card.
So, now, on to the songs. I'll come back to the resources in a minute.
Like I said, you don't need the song, but they are sort of an audio timeline. We sing up to whatever card we have just finished talking about.
Now, on to the workbooks. Since this particular card is in both the history and the Bible program (almost half of the second grade cards are in both, as you move up, there are fewer and fewer), there is stuff to do with the card in both workbooks.
In the Judges-Kings workbook, these are the pages for this card:
1st page: artist rendition of what I think is supposed to be a very young Solomon on a throne. It is probably some famous painting, but art isn't my strong point. Also on that page are the following questions, each with space to write the answers in. 1. What is the scripture reference for this card? (see front of card for answer) 2. Who was Solomon's father? 3. What did Solomon request of God? 4. During Solomon's reign there was _________ in Israel. (Hint, the card says "now that there was peace in the land. . . " 5. Describe the temple. (Hint, these are my hints, not theirs, the card says "the temple was elaborately decorated with gold. it was built by the most talented worker and artists in the land and was located on Mt. Moriah. The innermost sanctuary, the Holy of Holies, was where the Ark of the Covenant was kept." So even if you didn't do any more than the card and workbook, you could still have an answer)
Page 2. Cont. of page 1. 6. Who came to visit Solomon and see the temple and his wealth? (Hint, card says ". . . that visitors came from distant lands to see his temple and his wealth. The Queen of Sheba came to ask him questions and see his wealth and was very impressed. . .") 7. Late in life Solomon was tempted by ____________ and he turned from __________ (hint, card says "but Solomon, tempted by foreign women, turned from God and became wicked before he died") 8. How long did Solomon reign? (Hint card says 40 years).
Page 3 Project 1--Bible reading (these projects are different for every card)
Read in 1 Kings 1 about Solomon's brother's attempt to take the throne instead of Solomon. The write a paragraph about what happened. Rest of page is lines to write answer.
Page 4 Project 2--Proverbs
Many of the Proverbs teach lesson about the character of a godly person and a foolish person. Fill in the blanks with a word or phrase that describes the characteristics of a godly person.
25:16
25:17
27:18
28:27
29:11
29:20
29:23
Many of the proverbs are addressed to a son. While most of the advice to the son be applied to women, Proverbs 31 gives a separate description of a woman of excellence. Write the characteristics described in the following verses found in Proverbs 31.
v. 15
v. 16
v. 20
v. 21
v. 25
v. 26
Test: Page 1
1. what is the scripture reference and date of Solomon's reign?
2. What did Solomon request of God?
3. What else did God give Solomon because he was pleased with his request?
4. Solomon built _____________. Describe it.
5. Why did the Queen of Sheba and other nobles come to visit Solomon?
6. What happened to Solomon later in life?
Page 2
7. How long did Solomon reign?
8. Who became king after Solomon?
Review (of previous cards)
1. Name 3 judges.
2. What was David taking to his brothers when he found out about Goliath's challenge?
3. Why wouldn't David kill Saul even though Saul was trying to kill him?
Also, if you are stumped, answers are in the back of the book, along with the copy of the front of each card that you can print out and fold in half with a lot of the same questions on it that you can use as a hand-out.
OK, moving on to the HISTORY workbook now, for the same card.
In the back of the history book, there are a big map that you can print out and put together the pieces with glue, and then there are little faint circles on it with a number for each card, and then little circle figures with a small picture and the number of the card, which you can then color and place on the map to see where each event in this book took place, and it's really cool. After that, there is a specific timeline for this book, one page per card, and then printouts of the student pages to copy and do an a history matching card game, and a board game and little fold out booklets and odds and ends.
OK, trying to get back to Solomon here. Abbreviating, cuz this is getting LONG.
Page 1.
1. What is the scripture reference. . .
2. What is the approximate date. . .
3. After David died, who became king?
4. in a dream, God asked Solomon, "what shall I give you". . . .
5. What plan of his father was Solomon able to carry out?
6. What famous queen. . . .
7. What happened with Solomon's relationship with God before he died. . .
Page 2. Project for turning a room into a replica of the temple. Includes decorating walls, making an altar covered with yellow paper (gold), and a gold table, and cherubim, and lampstands, etc.
Page 3, continuation of page 2.
Page 4. LONG fill in the blank activity. It starts like this: After _______ died, Solomon, his son, became the __________ of Israel. In a ________, God asked King Solomon. . . .
Pages 5, 6, and 7 are a project that first describes some of the artwork in the temple and then has the children put together a little booklet that is printable with the covers showing the temple, but then they are supposed to decorate the inside with what they think artwork inside the temple looked like.
Page 8 is the test. Page 9 is a continuation of the test, but the only thing it asks is:
List all events covered to date in chronological order. Place scripture references at the appropriate events. List dates for events numbered 9, 14, and 24.
So, we do the questions orally and pick and choose which activities to do.
OK, now back to the card. Cuz that wasn't enough, right?
Resources for this card are the Bible, plus:
5 pages from Children's Illustrated Bible, which is sort of a a brief summary of Bible stories, with some additional history comments and points and pictures added for detail.
Child's story bible 8 pages. This is sort of an Egermeier's type Bible, but I do like it better. It helps smooth over some of the longer passages from the Bible and condense it.
Greenleaf Guide to the old testament, 3 pages. This is mostly just more questions, which is sort of repetitive, but I do like some of the things that they want you to think about, or some important things that aren't in other places, but you could easily skip this book.
Journey through the Bible, 5 pages, which is sort of an archaeological viewpoint of the Bible and offers some unique viewpoints.
Streams of civilization--2 pages.
So, as you can see, you don't have to do any of these resources if you don't want to, but you can certainly add in as much or as little as you want. All you really need are the cards and the rest is just supplement.
Some of the projects are writing, some are crafts, some are readings or coloring pages, there is a LOT of variety in the books.
Some of the cards have more resources than others. For another quick example, I'll pull Bible card #4 (this is not a history card, just Bible) Enoch and Methuselah. The resources for this are Greenleaf Guide-1 page, child's story Bible 3 pages. That's it. Workbook pages are about the same in length and style, with the exception of the projects, to all the other cards.
Some of them have a lot of resources.
The Old Kingdom in Egypt is a history card (not a Bible card) and its list includes 11 different resources. Of course, you can do as many or as few as you'd like, and a lot of this is already covered in CHOW or SOTW. Or MOH.
If you want resources the ones I listed in the above post (not this one) are the ones we are using the most and finding the most helpful, but we are still where the history and Bible are talking about the same types of things, for the most part.
OK, I'm quitting there, but let me know if you have any more questions.
So, how VP works. That is a rather difficult question, and one that is going to take a bit to explain, and hopefully try not to violate any copyright laws at the same time. So, I will do my best to describe a few random cards that we have done so far to sort of give you a feel for the program.
Ok, there are 3 main components to the program. History and Bible work the same, and some of the cards are exactly the same. The cards are slightly smaller than half a sheet of paper, and on the front have a large picture of what the topic is, and a title, and perhaps a Biblical reference, or date. There are 32 in each Bible program and each history program. The cards are numbered and color coded (but all the Bible cards are purple, but the history ones are all different colors) to the topic. They are numbered 3 different ways. First, each card is numbered according to where it is in the set to which it belongs. I'll explain a bit more in detail below. I think they are SUPPOSED to be done at the rate of 1 per week, with 4 extra weeks for review.
The workbook has questions, occasional crafts and extra readings, and the like.
The CD has one or two songs on it, very long songs. They cover the titles of every single one of the cards, in historical order (as a sort of verbal timeline) and Biblical references for the Bible songs and so forth. There are some extras to them which are nice, for example, the creation part goes into what happens on each day of creation, and another song lists all the 12 tribes of Israel. Each time we cover a new card, we sing the song UP TO where we have learned, and then stop, because it makes it so much easier to learn a 10 minute song if you do it in parts. And it is always fun to see how many times you have to play it before you can say "the unification of upper and lower Egypt by Pharaoh Menes" without tripping over your tongue on the fast part.
Now, really, out of these three things, the only thing you really NEED is the history cards.
OK, the first card I am going to describe is Solomon's Reign.
Front of the card says
Solomon's Reign
I Kings 1-11
II Chronicles 1-9
Back of the card repeats this information, and then gives the dates:
c. 971-931 B. C.
Then, there is a section on the back of the card with 4 paragraphs summarizing Solomon's rule, from how he became so wise to building of the temple, to the Queen of Sheba, to his death.
Now, if you wanted to stop there, you certainly could.
As far as numbers go, Solomon is a history card, AND a Bible card. In the Bible program, it is card #56. Which means it comes in the third grade program cards. In the Ancient Egypt history cards, it is #30. Since the one I pulled out is the Bible card, it has a purple stripe at the top showing it is Bible 56, and a blue stripe below it, that shows #30 for the blue history set. Like I said, all the Bible cards are purple. However, if I were to go to my history set, and pull it, it would be EXACTLY THE SAME, but the blue stripe would be on top and the purple one below that. Now, this particular card is unique, because it is used in the history and Bible program, but the Bible program will go more in depth as the subsequent cards (which are not history cards) include Solomon given wisdom, writings of Solomon, the temple is built, the Queen of Sheba visits Solomon, and Solomon's reign comes to an end, so this is one of the very few cards that gets expounded upon in the following cards. But if you only did the history and not the Bible, you would still get an overview of Solomon, without the in depth stuff.
Now, to make things even easier for you (since, if you are like me, you will try to keep them in order, so you don't have to figure it out all the time, a lot of people put them on book rings, so you can just flip through), at the bottom of the card, it also says it is card #71. So, if you were to try to put all the history and Bible cards together to make an official timeline in the correct historical order, it would be the 71st card. So, you can teach by subject, by set, or by historical time period.
OK, back to Solomon.
Now, if you didn't want to stop there, there are some resources listed at the bottom of the card. There is a random number of resources listed for each card, and I haven't done this card yet, but I pulled it to demonstrate how the numbers work, and I think it shows up better on a higher numbered card.
So, now, on to the songs. I'll come back to the resources in a minute.
Like I said, you don't need the song, but they are sort of an audio timeline. We sing up to whatever card we have just finished talking about.
Now, on to the workbooks. Since this particular card is in both the history and the Bible program (almost half of the second grade cards are in both, as you move up, there are fewer and fewer), there is stuff to do with the card in both workbooks.
In the Judges-Kings workbook, these are the pages for this card:
1st page: artist rendition of what I think is supposed to be a very young Solomon on a throne. It is probably some famous painting, but art isn't my strong point. Also on that page are the following questions, each with space to write the answers in. 1. What is the scripture reference for this card? (see front of card for answer) 2. Who was Solomon's father? 3. What did Solomon request of God? 4. During Solomon's reign there was _________ in Israel. (Hint, the card says "now that there was peace in the land. . . " 5. Describe the temple. (Hint, these are my hints, not theirs, the card says "the temple was elaborately decorated with gold. it was built by the most talented worker and artists in the land and was located on Mt. Moriah. The innermost sanctuary, the Holy of Holies, was where the Ark of the Covenant was kept." So even if you didn't do any more than the card and workbook, you could still have an answer)
Page 2. Cont. of page 1. 6. Who came to visit Solomon and see the temple and his wealth? (Hint, card says ". . . that visitors came from distant lands to see his temple and his wealth. The Queen of Sheba came to ask him questions and see his wealth and was very impressed. . .") 7. Late in life Solomon was tempted by ____________ and he turned from __________ (hint, card says "but Solomon, tempted by foreign women, turned from God and became wicked before he died") 8. How long did Solomon reign? (Hint card says 40 years).
Page 3 Project 1--Bible reading (these projects are different for every card)
Read in 1 Kings 1 about Solomon's brother's attempt to take the throne instead of Solomon. The write a paragraph about what happened. Rest of page is lines to write answer.
Page 4 Project 2--Proverbs
Many of the Proverbs teach lesson about the character of a godly person and a foolish person. Fill in the blanks with a word or phrase that describes the characteristics of a godly person.
25:16
25:17
27:18
28:27
29:11
29:20
29:23
Many of the proverbs are addressed to a son. While most of the advice to the son be applied to women, Proverbs 31 gives a separate description of a woman of excellence. Write the characteristics described in the following verses found in Proverbs 31.
v. 15
v. 16
v. 20
v. 21
v. 25
v. 26
Test: Page 1
1. what is the scripture reference and date of Solomon's reign?
2. What did Solomon request of God?
3. What else did God give Solomon because he was pleased with his request?
4. Solomon built _____________. Describe it.
5. Why did the Queen of Sheba and other nobles come to visit Solomon?
6. What happened to Solomon later in life?
Page 2
7. How long did Solomon reign?
8. Who became king after Solomon?
Review (of previous cards)
1. Name 3 judges.
2. What was David taking to his brothers when he found out about Goliath's challenge?
3. Why wouldn't David kill Saul even though Saul was trying to kill him?
Also, if you are stumped, answers are in the back of the book, along with the copy of the front of each card that you can print out and fold in half with a lot of the same questions on it that you can use as a hand-out.
OK, moving on to the HISTORY workbook now, for the same card.
In the back of the history book, there are a big map that you can print out and put together the pieces with glue, and then there are little faint circles on it with a number for each card, and then little circle figures with a small picture and the number of the card, which you can then color and place on the map to see where each event in this book took place, and it's really cool. After that, there is a specific timeline for this book, one page per card, and then printouts of the student pages to copy and do an a history matching card game, and a board game and little fold out booklets and odds and ends.
OK, trying to get back to Solomon here. Abbreviating, cuz this is getting LONG.
Page 1.
1. What is the scripture reference. . .
2. What is the approximate date. . .
3. After David died, who became king?
4. in a dream, God asked Solomon, "what shall I give you". . . .
5. What plan of his father was Solomon able to carry out?
6. What famous queen. . . .
7. What happened with Solomon's relationship with God before he died. . .
Page 2. Project for turning a room into a replica of the temple. Includes decorating walls, making an altar covered with yellow paper (gold), and a gold table, and cherubim, and lampstands, etc.
Page 3, continuation of page 2.
Page 4. LONG fill in the blank activity. It starts like this: After _______ died, Solomon, his son, became the __________ of Israel. In a ________, God asked King Solomon. . . .
Pages 5, 6, and 7 are a project that first describes some of the artwork in the temple and then has the children put together a little booklet that is printable with the covers showing the temple, but then they are supposed to decorate the inside with what they think artwork inside the temple looked like.
Page 8 is the test. Page 9 is a continuation of the test, but the only thing it asks is:
List all events covered to date in chronological order. Place scripture references at the appropriate events. List dates for events numbered 9, 14, and 24.
So, we do the questions orally and pick and choose which activities to do.
OK, now back to the card. Cuz that wasn't enough, right?
Resources for this card are the Bible, plus:
5 pages from Children's Illustrated Bible, which is sort of a a brief summary of Bible stories, with some additional history comments and points and pictures added for detail.
Child's story bible 8 pages. This is sort of an Egermeier's type Bible, but I do like it better. It helps smooth over some of the longer passages from the Bible and condense it.
Greenleaf Guide to the old testament, 3 pages. This is mostly just more questions, which is sort of repetitive, but I do like some of the things that they want you to think about, or some important things that aren't in other places, but you could easily skip this book.
Journey through the Bible, 5 pages, which is sort of an archaeological viewpoint of the Bible and offers some unique viewpoints.
Streams of civilization--2 pages.
So, as you can see, you don't have to do any of these resources if you don't want to, but you can certainly add in as much or as little as you want. All you really need are the cards and the rest is just supplement.
Some of the projects are writing, some are crafts, some are readings or coloring pages, there is a LOT of variety in the books.
Some of the cards have more resources than others. For another quick example, I'll pull Bible card #4 (this is not a history card, just Bible) Enoch and Methuselah. The resources for this are Greenleaf Guide-1 page, child's story Bible 3 pages. That's it. Workbook pages are about the same in length and style, with the exception of the projects, to all the other cards.
Some of them have a lot of resources.
The Old Kingdom in Egypt is a history card (not a Bible card) and its list includes 11 different resources. Of course, you can do as many or as few as you'd like, and a lot of this is already covered in CHOW or SOTW. Or MOH.
If you want resources the ones I listed in the above post (not this one) are the ones we are using the most and finding the most helpful, but we are still where the history and Bible are talking about the same types of things, for the most part.
OK, I'm quitting there, but let me know if you have any more questions.
This is a very helpful blog post for anyone wanting to know more about these seemingly simple cards and their purpose. Thanks Veronica! -heartofjoy
ReplyDelete