The Renaissance Age

I’ve gathered all the Renaissance work into one place to make it (hopefully) easier to find.  We very much studied this era by studying the people who lived in it and experienced it first hand.  Leonardo Da Vinci, Fibonacci, Michelangelo and Gutenberg – we studied them all and learnt heaps about the renaissance at the same time.

Enjoy!

Week 1: Renaissance – resources

This post contains stacks and stack of resources, far more than you could ever need, for studying the renaissance:

Week 2: Renaissance: Tudor Social Classes

We looked at the different social levels as well as touching on social mobility.

Week 3: Leonardo Da Vinci: Introducing the Projects

This post outlines the projects each child is doing with regards to Leonardo Da Vinci, as well as including yet more resources for studying this fascinating man:

Week 4: Leonardo Da Vinci and his Ornithopter

In this group study we read some lovely picture books on Leonardo’s attempts at flight, as well as making out own ornithopter as well as attempting to invent our very own flying machine.

Week 5: Leonardo Da Vinci and his Printing Press

We read up all about this particular invention of Leonardo and then got to work building a replica from a kit:

Week 6: Leonardo Da Vinci and his Mona Lisa

This post outlines L’s project on the Mona Lisa.  She made a journal of notes; used her sister to try to recreate a living Mona Lisa and finally attempted a replica painting:

Week 7: Leonardo Da Vinci and his Horses

This was a group study into Leonardo’s fascination with all things equine.  We drew lots of horses, studying their form as we did so; we read this incredible book below and then followed the process (almost) exactly to make our very own cast bronze horse.  Ours was painted though…

Week 8: Gutenberg and his Printing Press Part 1

A study we actually did before we studied Da Vinci, looking at Gutenberg’s well-known printing press.  The children began to investigate the difficulties involved in printing letter accurately and the right way round(!):

Week 9: Gutenberg and his Printing Press Part 2

In this second post, T attempts to create his own printing press, modeled on the principals of Gutenberg’s invention.  Oh, and we attempted to make our own rag paper, which was the type of paper used back then.  We failed.  But we tried 🙂

Week 10: Fibonacci and his numbers

We went a bit mad with our mathematician study.  This posts contains our numerous resources as well as some investigation into the patterns Fibonacci saw in nature:

Week 11: Fibonacci, Da Vinci and the Golden Ratio

In this post we looked at how Leonardo used Fibonacci’s golden rule in many of his painting:

Lesson 12: Artist Study: Michelangelo

This was one of our best artist studies we have ever done.  We did all the usual – reading, watching a video on his life, painting upside down and soap carving.  What we really enjoyed, however, was making our own plaster and hessian plasterboard on which to paint:

After which the girls made some stucco and attempted to replicate part of the picture as closely as possible:

It was a great study!

I can’t believe a lot of this was done over a year ago!  How quickly time is flying.  So pleased I get to spend each day with my amazing children <3

For more of the same, visit my History & Geography Page