Class Offerings

In Children’s Choir, students age 7 to 12 will sing and perform hymns, folk songs, and other classic choral works. Students will learn the basics of vocal technique, sight-reading, and music theory, along with musical games. The program will focus on music appreciation, fun, and the glorification of God through music. Choir class will meet weekly and choir students will participate in special performances once or twice a year.

In this interactive, multi-sensory, hands-on class, Form I Students delve into phonics and cursive penmanship, discover and apply spelling rules with grade-level spelling words, learn parts of speech, practice oral reading, and hear and recite classic works of poetry. With our commitment to incorporate the best of both classical tradition and contemporary research, this course uses researched-based best practices for helping students of all abilities and grade levels. Instruction will be individuated for students at various levels within Form 1. As space allows, parents of younger students are encouraged to sit in as often as possible to enjoy learning and engaging in the activities together with their students.

This class keeps it kinetic as students use large motor skills to draw cursive letters and multi-letter phonograms in salt boxes and to water-paint them on sidewalk before moving on to fine motor skills with pen and paper. Students will play games and relays, compose original sentences, and listen to beautiful literature read aloud.

Learning outcomes include growth in the foundational operations of language—listening, speaking, reading, and writing—as students learn to read so they can read to learn.

Instructor, Corrie McCloy, believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every child and that every child has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it. After being homeschooled through high school, Corrie graduated with degrees in writing and English from Houston Baptist University where she coordinated writing tutoring in the university academic success center, edited for literary journals, and earned multiple awards for academics and leadership. Corrie comes to BHSC after teaching at a classical school in Chicago. She loves to see children freely engage with the world of ideas through art and literature, and she seeks to come alongside students as they practice habits leading to discovery.

In this 2.5-hour block class taught by Mrs. Abbotoy, our youngest learners will enjoy a kaleidoscope of delights for the mind, ear, eye, heart, and hand:

Folksong, Hymn, and Solfa—Students will learn folksongs and hymns to sing together. We focus on one hymn and one folksong for 4 weeks and we listen to a variety of folksongs on rotation. The folksongs generally follow the AmblesideOnline Curiculum rotation.

Recitation—Students will recite Scripture together. We focus on one Bible passage for 8 weeks and this passage will also be recited together in the Lunch Assembly. Each week students are invited to prepare a short poem, Bible verse, or passage of interest to recite for the class.

Nature Study—Students will take nature walks outside and also observe and study objects from nature brought to class by the teacher. Students are encouraged to bring specimens from nature for study also. We will study the specimens through discussion, nature journaling, and interaction with the object.

Artist & Composer Study—Students will study classical music and works of art through observation (attentive looking and listening) and discussion. They will also practice copying master paintings both by sight and from memory as they are able. We generally follow the AmblesideOnline curiculum rotation for Artist & Composer Study.

Handicrafts—Students will learn a variety of handicrafts and the proper techniques that apply to each. We spend 4 weeks on each handicraft, but students are encouraged to take supplies home to continue working on a handicraft at home. Some handicrafts we have done in the past have included: origami, kirigami, sewing, embroidery, rock painting, weaving, loom knitting.

Math Games—Students will play a variety of math games to reinforce math concepts that they are learning at home. We use the RightStart Math Games curriculum.

In this multi-sensory and interdisciplinary class, students will learn Latin through song and play, hear and narrate living history stories, study art and artists related to the history they are studying, and make their own original works of art in response.

Using interactive and conversation-driven learning, this course will lay the foundation for learning to speak Spanish fluently. Students will enjoy a multi-sensory approach to learning as they sing, make art, converse, and maybe even try making authentic Mexican food. In order to gain mastery and grow toward fluency, students will be expected to complete some work outside of class each week such as playing Spanish games online, listening to Spanish songs and passages, and completing some light coursework. 

With Mrs. Cook, students will explore a variety of art media and techniques and deepen their understanding of the elements of design as they respond to historical master artists with their own original work. Each week, students will learn a new visual art technique and create original imaginative work with a variety of mediums such as oil, acrylic, and tempera paints, ink, pastel, crayon, metal, and clay. They will come to understand the elements of design through practice. Students will evaluate their own work based on simple rubrics, and seek to improve as they are able. Students will also have the opportunity to present and share completed artwork outside of class on their own.

During the first semester, students will practice different ways of making landscapes while learning from masters such as daVinci and Van Gogh. During the second semester, students will practice painting from different perspectives to understand the difficulties artists like Michaelangelo faced when creating beautiful work for God.

Students encounter works by master artists and composers in this multi-sensory class. Over the course of the year, students learn about the lives of 4–8 artists and 4–8 composers and study multiple works from each. Students gain a listening repertoire of over a dozen classical scores and receive over a dozen full-color art prints, which they study in class through group discussion, written narration, and notebook drawings.

Instructor Corrie McCloy is passionate about the connections between big ideas and everyday life. She believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every student and that every student has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it.

In Children’s Choir, students age 7 to 12 will sing and perform hymns, folk songs, and other classic choral works. Students will learn the basics of vocal technique, sight-reading, and music theory, along with musical games. The program will focus on music appreciation, fun, and the glorification of God through music. Choir class will meet weekly and choir students will participate in special performances once or twice a year.

In this course, Form II students will learn and apply spelling rules, review parts of speech, begin diagraming sentences, practice penmanship, practice oral reading, and read and recite classic works of poetry. With our commitment to incorporate the best of both classical tradition and contemporary research, this course uses researched-based best practices for helping students of all abilities and grade levels. Instruction will be individuated for students at various levels within Form II.

This class keeps it kinetic as students use large motor skills to first draw cursive letters and multi-letter phonograms in salt boxes and to water-paint them on sidewalk before moving on to fine motor skills with pen and paper. Students will play games and relays, compose original sentences, and listen to beautiful literature read aloud. Learning outcomes include growth in the foundational operations of language—listening, speaking, reading, and writing.

Instructor, Corrie McCloy, believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every child and that every child has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it. After being homeschooled through high school, Corrie graduated with degrees in writing and English from Houston Baptist University where she coordinated writing tutoring in the university academic success center, edited for literary journals, and earned multiple awards for academics and leadership. Corrie comes to BHSC after teaching at a classical school in Chicago. She loves to see children freely engage with the world of ideas through art and literature, and she seeks to come alongside students as they practice habits leading to discovery.

With instructor Michael Pearcey, the geography class will read, narrate, and discuss portions from Prisoners of Geography: Our World Explained in 12 Simple Maps as well as other living geography read-aloud books. Each week students will spend some time working on maps. Students will have opportunity to research and present on one country in a year-end World Fair.

Both beautiful and useful, handicrafts allow students of all ages to develop skills while improving habits of attention, orderliness, and tenacity. Mrs. Estes and Mrs. Cook will help students experiment and develop skills with several different handicrafts over the semester beginning with weaving corn husks and fabric and moving on to paper crafts, such as quilling, and then to hand sewing and crafts from leather and wood. The instructors will work with each student to personalize projects at the student’s level of ability and experience. By the end of the semester, students will have created both decorative and practical items including an item for charitable donation and/or gift-giving. This class meets every other week alternating with Geography.

This course will provide a lively introduction to the Latin language and the culture of Roman Britain with a highly illustrated mix of comic strips, stories, and myths. The course text centers on a real family who lived at Vindolanda in 100AD and features many of the artifacts and writing tablets from the Vindolanda excavations. Students will follow the antics of Flavius, Minimus the mouse, Vibrissa the cat, and their Roman family. Roman and Greek myths are intertwined with the family’s story, along with photos of artefacts from Roman digs to bring the culture of Roman Britain to life.

Latin instructor Hannah Phelps, again and again finds herself captivated by the power of language. Having studied Latin for going on ten years, she has also taught Latin and other subjects in homeschool group classes and currently tutors peers through the Houston Baptist University Academic Success Center where she has worked since 2018. Hannah is also a member of the HBU Honors College, and she plans to graduate in May of 2021 with a bachelor of arts in Latin and a minor in writing. She has read and translated selections from The Aeneid, Cicero’s speeches, Seneca’s letters, the Vulgate, and Augustine’s writings, among others. At the Classical Association of the Midwest and South (CAMWS) conference in 2020, she presented her paper “Stilicho: Barbarian Blood in a Roman Heart,” which was one of nine undergraduate papers selected.

Delightful games and healthy competition will help Form 2 students gain speed and accuracy with basic math facts. Students will learn strategies to aid them in deftly solving mental math problems, and the class will read aloud inspiring stories of real-life mathematicians.

This course does not replace the student’s main, traditional math class but rather serves to deepen and enrich the student’s understanding and appreciation of math. This class has no homework.

Prerequisites: understanding of the four basic operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) with single-digit integers.

Instructor Corrie McCloy is passionate about the connections between big ideas and everyday life. She believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every child and that every child has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it.

Students in the Medieval & Early Modern History class will build beautiful keepsake Record of Time notebook binders and follow the narrative of history through The Story of the World, Volumes 2 & 3. They will read, narrate, and discuss passages from Story of the World and possibly other living history texts. In addition, students may work on developing outlining skills as they build their timeline of world history with illustrations and notes. There may be some at-home reading assignments given so that the students will be able to complete the time period under study by the end of the academic year.

Bluebonnet Scholars offers history on a rotating three-year cycle with studies synchronized across Forms 1 through 4 (grades K through 12th) so that all students are studying the same time period together. Spine texts for Form 2 (grades 4–6) History are included below:

• Cycle Year 1: Ancient through Early Medieval History (creation to c. 860 AD)—The Story of the World, all of Vol. 1 & part of Vol. 2
• Cycle Year 2: Medieval through Early Modern History (c. 860 AD to 1797)—The Story of the World, part of Vol. 2 & part of Vol. 3
• Cycle Year 3: Modern History (c. 1797 to today)—The Story of the World, part of Vol. 3 & all of Vol. 4

Each week after a short drawing lesson with Mrs. Cook, students will study a landscape or an object from nature to capture in a nature journal. On every “tolerably fine day,” students will be encouraged to take their journals outdoors to explore, observe, and record details from trees, flowers, bushes, birds, insects, rocks, or any other natural creation that intrigues them. When weather prevents outdoor frolic, Mrs. Cook will bring specimens into the classroom for study. Students will gain experience working with a variety of drawing mediums such as graphite, charcoal, pen, marker, pastels, and water color pencil. Students will also paint with watercolors using an aqua brush. Additionally, students will have the opportunity to present and share nature journaling pages they completed outside of class on their own.

On alternating weeks, we will read, narrate, and discuss passages from Plutarch’s Lives and Shakespeare’s plays. In 2020-21, students will read and study Plutarch’s lives of Julius Caesar and of Brutus as well as Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors and Julius Caesar. Students will have opportunity to dramatically read selected passages, to reenact key scenes, and to prepare and recite optional memory work.

Instructor Corrie McCloy is passionate about the connections between big ideas and everyday life. She believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every child and that every child has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it.

Using interactive and conversation-driven learning, this course will lay the foundation for learning to speak Spanish fluently. Students will work through Spanish for You!, a theme-based curriculum that engages students through a variety of activities and techniques for both new and experienced students together in the same class: “Students learn how the language works so they become language users. They learn vocabulary, verb conjugation, and grammar concepts as language components to be put together in different ways to understand, speak, read, and write in everyday life.”

In order to gain mastery and grow toward fluency, students will be expected to complete some work outside of class each week such as playing Spanish games online, listening to Spanish songs and passages, and completing some light coursework. 

Discover and be amazed at the wonders of the ancient world while learning to write with structure and style!

The Institute for Excellence in Writing’s Ancient History-Based Writing Lessons “offers writing topics that explore the civilizations of Sumer, Egypt, Israel, Babylon, Greece, Rome, Asia Minor, and Asia—the people’s ideas, traditions, systems of government, feats, and wonderful skills.” Upper-elementary students will participate in activities aimed to inspire a love of words, sentences, and word-play. With the support of guided group discussion, brainstorming, and critique, students will learn to write with appropriate structure while enlivening their prose with stylistic flare.

Over the course of the year, students will gain a growing awareness of sentence structure and grammar that goes hand-in-hand with their growing ability to amplify and manipulate the parts of a sentence. We will focus on developing vivid vocabulary and sentence variety in a range of compositions including both fiction, non-fiction, and poetry. Students will also have the opportunity to participate in ongoing reading and typing challenges to develop skills and habits essential to competent communicators.
To receive the full benefit of the writing class, students will need sufficient time and a handful of supplies. In addition to weekly class sessions, students should plan to spend another half an hour to 1.5 hours each week completing assignments at home.

This course is taught by Jen Hartenburg, a published author who has been teaching literature and writing since 1997. She is an Accomplished Instructor with the Institute for Excellence in Writing.

In this course students study algebra through imaginative applications and clear problems derived from the real world. Technology tools are used to assist with time-comsuming calculations and to integrate graphing and problem-solving skills. Students will study expressions and equations, operations with negative numbers, distributing: axioms and other properties, harder equations, some operations with polynomials and radicals, quadratic equations, expressions and equations containing two variables, linear functions/scattered data/probability, properties and exponents, more operations with polynomials, rational algebraic expressions, radical algebraic expressions, inequalities, functions, and advanced topics. To add to the wonder and creative problem-solving side of math, Mrs. Panam will supplement the traditional textbook approach with additional challenge problems drawn from sources such as The Art of Problem Solving curriculum.

Exploring different mediums, students will learn various advanced techniques while focusing on color theory and composition. Techniques presented in this course include printmaking, cyanotypography, soft sculpture, drawing, and painting. Depending on time and interest, more techniques may be covered in this course. Students will present their work to the class and describe their inspiration behind their work. The main objectives of this course are to help students develop their eye for beauty while engaging in new mediums, and to further develop the artistic skills they may already have with familiar mediums.

Students encounter works by master artists and composers in this multi-sensory class. Over the course of the year, students learn about the lives of 4–8 artists and 4–8 composers and study multiple works from each. Students gain a listening repertoire of over a dozen classical scores and receive over a dozen full-color art prints, which they study in class through group discussion, written narration, and notebook drawings.

Instructor Corrie McCloy is passionate about the connections between big ideas and everyday life. She believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every student and that every student has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it.

This Earth Science course is designed to draw middle-school students into close engagement with the subject matter and provide a solid education while fostering a sense of wonder and responsibility for God’s amazing world. Within the context of the fascinating study of landforms, minerals, and planetary phenomena, many other timely and important topics are covered including conservation of natural resources, climate change, pollution, environmental justice, with the current scientific consensus concerning geologic history.

Much more than learning about rocks and mountains and the seasons, this Earth Science course with instructor Michael Pearcey invites students to ponder God’s mandate to steward and exhibit vice regency over creation. Author Kevin Nelstead regularly draws the reader to appreciate the intricacy and excellence of God’s works, tying in scripture without becoming heavy-handed.

This class will be offered if a minimum of six students is enrolled by June 26, 2020. Full tuition refunds will be made if the class is cancelled due to low enrollment. UPDATE: This class has met minimum enrollment and is a go! The class will be capped at 9 students in 2020-21 to allow for social distancing.

In this college-preparatory literature and composition course, highschool students (and advanced eighth-graders) will explore elements of literature and develop beginning skills in literary analysis as they read and write upper-level essays and critiques.

Focus works, including novels, short stories, poems, and drama, have been selected for literary quality, interest, and for their place in the historical development of literature. Students will gain an understanding of the development of literature and will practice the skills of close literary analysis through essays, approach papers, and other evaluative writing.

Prerequisites: Prior IEW experience or writing class with Mrs. Hartenburg, or by permission

With instructor Michael Pearcey, the geography class will read, narrate, and discuss portions from Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Explain Everything About the World. Each week students will spend some time working on maps. Students will have opportunity to research and present on one country in a year-end World Fair. This class meets every other week alternating with Handicrafts.

Both beautiful and useful, handicrafts allow students of all ages to develop skills while improving habits of attention, orderliness, and tenacity. Mrs. Estes and Mrs. Cook will help students experiment and develop skills with several different handicrafts over the semester beginning with weaving corn husks and fabric and moving on to paper crafts, such as quilling, and then to hand sewing and crafts from leather and wood. The instructors will work with each student to personalize projects at the student’s level of ability and experience. By the end of the semester, students will have created both decorative and practical items including an item for charitable donation and/or gift-giving. This class meets every other week alternating with Geography.

In this tuition-free class led by Dr. Gary Hartenburg, students will develop critical thinking, listening, and discussion skills as they grapple with foundational questions of faith and existence. Students will read and discuss a variety of classic literature along with selected works of the writers known as the Inklings, especially C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien, as well as similar-minded contemporaries such as Dorothy Sayers and G. K. Chesterton.

Students will be expected to complete reading assignments in preparation for class, and there may be optional writing assignments.

Both new and experienced Latin scholars will be challenged in this class where students will read and study a novel written entirely in Latin. Students will enjoy reading about the antics and adventures of a Roman family in the 2nd century A.D. while they learn an impressive amount of vocabulary and grammar through a natural language-learning approach. With twice the vocabulary of many Latin textbooks, Lingua Latina helps students begin to read and speak Latin with ease from the beginning. Lingua Latina is so rich that we will spend two years completing the text.

Advanced Latin students will supplement their studies with additional reading and exercises. All students should plan to spend about an hour a day on Latin homework three or four days per week.

Latin instructor Hannah Phelps, again and again finds herself captivated by the power of language. Having studied Latin for going on ten years, she has also taught Latin and other subjects in homeschool group classes and currently tutors peers through the Houston Baptist University Academic Success Center where she has worked since 2018. Hannah is also a member of the HBU Honors College, and she plans to graduate in May of 2021 with a bachelor of arts in Latin and a minor in writing. She has read and translated selections from The Aeneid, Cicero’s speeches, Seneca’s letters, the Vulgate, and Augustine’s writings, among others. At the Classical Association of the Midwest and South (CAMWS) conference in 2020, she presented her paper “Stilicho: Barbarian Blood in a Roman Heart,” which was one of nine undergraduate papers selected.

Each week after a short drawing lesson with Mrs. Cook, students will study a landscape or an object from nature to capture in a nature journal. On every “tolerably fine day,” students will be encouraged to take their journals outdoors to explore, observe, and record details from trees, flowers, bushes, birds, insects, rocks, or any other natural creation that intrigues them. When weather prevents outdoor frolic, Mrs. Cook will bring specimens into the classroom for study. Students will gain experience working with a variety of drawing mediums such as graphite, charcoal, pen, marker, pastels, and water color pencil. Students will also paint with watercolors using an aqua brush. Additionally, students will have the opportunity to present and share nature journaling pages they completed outside of class on their own.

On alternating weeks, we will read, narrate, and discuss passages from Plutarch’s Lives and Shakespeare’s plays. In 2020-21, students will read and study Plutarch’s lives of Julius Caesar and of Brutus as well as Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors and Julius Caesar. Students will have opportunity to dramatically read selected passages, to reenact key scenes, and to prepare and recite optional memory work.

Instructor Corrie McCloy is passionate about the connections between big ideas and everyday life. She believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every child and that every child has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it.

In this tuition-free class taught by Dr. Gary Hartenburg, students will continue working through Socratic Logic, by Peter Kreeft, which presents the complete system of classical Aristotelian logic, the natural logic of the four language arts (reading, writing, speaking, and listening). Students will practice interpreting ordinary language, analyzing and also constructing effective arguments, smoking out hidden assumptions, making “argument maps,” and using Socratic method in various circumstances. Exercises in the text expose students to many classical quotations, and additional chapters introduce philosophical issues in a Socratic manner and from a commonsense, realistic point of view. This course prepares students for reading Great Books and models Socrates as the beginner’s ideal teacher and philosopher. Student should expect to spend half an hour to an hour each week completing assigned homework.

Prerequisite: Students must have completed the BHSC spring 2020 Logic class or have special permission.

In this class with Mrs. Hartenburg that incorporates both report-style and descriptive writing, students will learn the structure and style of various essay formats and will produce original essays including integrated quotations, MLA in-text citations, and a properly formatted “Works Cited” page. An intensive overview of style elements will assist students in developing vivid vocabulary and sophisticated sentence variety. Throughout the course, students will gain an awareness of sentence structure and grammar that goes hand-in-hand with their growing ability to amplify and manipulate the parts of a sentence.

In addition to basic report-style essays, students will learn a five-step process for developing a thoughtful thesis statement that interacts with the great conversation of ideas. By attending to sources and engaging in group discussion, students will be able to find their own voice as they search for the truth through their reading and writing.

In addition to weekly class sessions, students should plan to spend another one to three hours each week completing assignments at home.

In Algebra II, students will broaden their knowledge of quadratic functions, exponential functions, and systems of equations. In the class textbook, algebra and trigonometry are presented as a study of special classes of functions. In the process, relationships betwen theory and real-world applications are thoroughly explored, bringing the material to life. To continue kindling wonder and creative thinking, Mrs. Panam will supplement the traditional textbook approach with additional challenge problems drawn from sources such as The Art of Problem Solving curriculum.

Exploring different mediums, students will learn various advanced techniques while focusing on color theory and composition. Techniques presented in this course include printmaking, cyanotypography, soft sculpture, drawing, and painting. Depending on time and interest, more techniques may be covered in this course. Students will present their work to the class and describe their inspiration behind their work. The main objectives of this course are to help students develop their eye for beauty while engaging in new mediums, and to further develop the artistic skills they may already have with familiar mediums.

Students encounter works by master artists and composers in this multi-sensory class. Over the course of the year, students learn about the lives of 4–8 artists and 4–8 composers and study multiple works from each. Students gain a listening repertoire of over a dozen classical scores and receive over a dozen full-color art prints, which they study in class through group discussion, written narration, and notebook drawings.

Instructor Corrie McCloy is passionate about the connections between big ideas and everyday life. She believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every student and that every student has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it.

In this college-preparatory literature and composition course, highschool students (and advanced eighth-graders) will explore elements of literature and develop beginning skills in literary analysis as they read and write upper-level essays and critiques.

Focus works, including novels, short stories, poems, and drama, have been selected for literary quality, interest, and for their place in the historical development of literature. Students will gain an understanding of the development of literature and will practice the skills of close literary analysis through essays, approach papers, and other evaluative writing.

Prerequisites: Prior IEW experience or writing class with Mrs. Hartenburg, or by permission

With instructor Michael Pearcey, the geography class will read, narrate, and discuss portions from Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Explain Everything About the World. Each week students will spend some time working on maps. Students will have opportunity to research and present on one country in a year-end World Fair. This class meets every other week alternating with Handicrafts.

In Geometry, students strengthen their mathematical reasoning skills in geometric contexts. The comprehensive content and varied real-life applications covered give students a strong mathematical foundation. This series introduces students to theory and application of formal and informal reasoning, as well as to synthetic, coordinate, and transformational approaches. This comprehensive course covers Points/Lines/Planes/Angles, Deductive Reasoning, Parallel Lines and Planes, Congruent Triangles, Quadrilaterals, Inequalities in Geometry, Similar Polygons, Right Triangles, Circles, Constructions and Loci, Areas of Plane Figures, Areas and Volumes of Solids, Coordinate Geometry, and Transformations. The course emphasizes logic and offers a good amount of worked-out examples, hands-on activities, real-world applications, exercises, chapter and mixed reviews, and a technology strand that includes calculator and computer applications for geometry. To continue kindling wonder and creative thinking, Mrs. Panam will supplement the traditional textbook approach with additional challenge problems drawn from sources such as The Art of Problem Solving curriculum.

Both beautiful and useful, handicrafts allow students of all ages to develop skills while improving habits of attention, orderliness, and tenacity. Mrs. Estes and Mrs. Cook will help students experiment and develop skills with several different handicrafts over the semester beginning with weaving corn husks and fabric and moving on to paper crafts, such as quilling, and then to hand sewing and crafts from leather and wood. The instructors will work with each student to personalize projects at the student’s level of ability and experience. By the end of the semester, students will have created both decorative and practical items including an item for charitable donation and/or gift-giving. This class meets every other week alternating with Geography.

In this tuition-free class led by Dr. Gary Hartenburg, students will develop critical thinking, listening, and discussion skills as they grapple with foundational questions of faith and existence. Students will read and discuss a variety of classic literature along with selected works of the writers known as the Inklings, especially C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien, as well as similar-minded contemporaries such as Dorothy Sayers and G. K. Chesterton.

Students will be expected to complete reading assignments in preparation for class, and there may be optional writing assignments.

Both new and experienced Latin scholars will be challenged in this class where students will read and study a novel written entirely in Latin. Students will enjoy reading about the antics and adventures of a Roman family in the 2nd century A.D. while they learn an impressive amount of vocabulary and grammar through a natural language-learning approach. With twice the vocabulary of many Latin textbooks, Lingua Latina helps students begin to read and speak Latin with ease from the beginning. Lingua Latina is so rich that we will spend two years completing the text.

Advanced Latin students will supplement their studies with additional reading and exercises. All students should plan to spend about an hour a day on Latin homework three or four days per week.

Latin instructor Hannah Phelps, again and again finds herself captivated by the power of language. Having studied Latin for going on ten years, she has also taught Latin and other subjects in homeschool group classes and currently tutors peers through the Houston Baptist University Academic Success Center where she has worked since 2018. Hannah is also a member of the HBU Honors College, and she plans to graduate in May of 2021 with a bachelor of arts in Latin and a minor in writing. She has read and translated selections from The Aeneid, Cicero’s speeches, Seneca’s letters, the Vulgate, and Augustine’s writings, among others. At the Classical Association of the Midwest and South (CAMWS) conference in 2020, she presented her paper “Stilicho: Barbarian Blood in a Roman Heart,” which was one of nine undergraduate papers selected.

Each week after a short drawing lesson with Mrs. Cook, students will study a landscape or an object from nature to capture in a nature journal. On every “tolerably fine day,” students will be encouraged to take their journals outdoors to explore, observe, and record details from trees, flowers, bushes, birds, insects, rocks, or any other natural creation that intrigues them. When weather prevents outdoor frolic, Mrs. Cook will bring specimens into the classroom for study. Students will gain experience working with a variety of drawing mediums such as graphite, charcoal, pen, marker, pastels, and water color pencil. Students will also paint with watercolors using an aqua brush. Additionally, students will have the opportunity to present and share nature journaling pages they completed outside of class on their own.

On alternating weeks, we will read, narrate, and discuss passages from Plutarch’s Lives and Shakespeare’s plays. In 2020-21, students will read and study Plutarch’s lives of Julius Caesar and of Brutus as well as Shakespeare’s Comedy of Errors and Julius Caesar. Students will have opportunity to dramatically read selected passages, to reenact key scenes, and to prepare and recite optional memory work.

Instructor Corrie McCloy is passionate about the connections between big ideas and everyday life. She believes that the best literature and art belongs in the hands of every child and that every child has the capacity to understand, appreciate, and even love it.

In this tuition-free class taught by Dr. Gary Hartenburg, students will continue working through Socratic Logic, by Peter Kreeft, which presents the complete system of classical Aristotelian logic, the natural logic of the four language arts (reading, writing, speaking, and listening). Students will practice interpreting ordinary language, analyzing and also constructing effective arguments, smoking out hidden assumptions, making “argument maps,” and using Socratic method in various circumstances. Exercises in the text expose students to many classical quotations, and additional chapters introduce philosophical issues in a Socratic manner and from a commonsense, realistic point of view. This course prepares students for reading Great Books and models Socrates as the beginner’s ideal teacher and philosopher. Student should expect to spend half an hour to an hour each week completing assigned homework.

Prerequisite: Students must have completed the BHSC spring 2020 Logic class or have special permission.

In this class with Mrs. Hartenburg that incorporates both report-style and descriptive writing, students will learn the structure and style of various essay formats and will produce original essays including integrated quotations, MLA in-text citations, and a properly formatted “Works Cited” page. An intensive overview of style elements will assist students in developing vivid vocabulary and sophisticated sentence variety. Throughout the course, students will gain an awareness of sentence structure and grammar that goes hand-in-hand with their growing ability to amplify and manipulate the parts of a sentence.

In addition to basic report-style essays, students will learn a five-step process for developing a thoughtful thesis statement that interacts with the great conversation of ideas. By attending to sources and engaging in group discussion, students will be able to find their own voice as they search for the truth through their reading and writing.

In addition to weekly class sessions, students should plan to spend another one to three hours each week completing assignments at home.