Something New

I've been making the geography cards for a while now and I plan to continue until I have a set of cards for all 3 cycles of Classical Conversations. The response has been incredible and I'm so grateful to be able to share the fruit of my labors with others.

I love learning about other countries and cultures. I think I fell in love when I was around 8 or 9 years old. My paternal grandparents took me to a series of travelogues at their church. I remember learning about Norway, Greece and China and realizing that the world was much bigger than what I'd experienced in my short life living in a small town.

I was very blessed growing up. My mom taught me a little Spanish and when I was 16, I was invited to go along with family friends to Spain for 6 weeks. I was to help out with their daughters, who were younger than I, and to assist with translation when I could. At 18, my own family traveled to Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, France and Italy. We lived in Austria for about a month and visited the other countries on weekend excursions. I've never been to any place where the air smelled sweeter than in Innsbruck, Austria. I wish there was a way to bottle it up. After learning about classical music through my piano and violin lessons over the years, I was able to visit Vienna and Salzburg and walk along the banks of the famous Blue Danube river.

Parc Guell, Barcelona, Spain

El Alcazar, Segovia, Spain

Castle Tasso/Raiffenstein Castle, Vipiteno/Sterzing, Italy

A little over a year later, I was off to Mexico for a semester abroad. This was the longest I'd ever spent away from my family and I really grew up while I was away. I fell in love with the people and the culture. I had culture shock coming home -- my eyes were opened to how materialistic and shallow we are as a culture. I realized how much we rush around and how stressful our lives are because of it. I absolutely loved Mexico and think of it even now as my second home.

Hacienda Yaxcopoil, Yucatan, Mexico

House of the Magician, Uxmal, Mexico

Mercado Hidalgo, Guanajuato, Mexico

Just a few months after returning home from Mexico, I left for a short-term medical missions trip to Belize. We stayed in a village where people had huts with palm frond roofs and no running water. The generosity of these people who had so little was humbling. I laughed when the native people asked me if I was from Guanajuato, Mexico, because I had picked up so specific an accent. With my light skin, green eyes and light brown hair, I certainly didn't look Mexican, but I guess I must have sounded like it!

Patchakan, Belize

After Belize, I stayed home for a few years and finished up my degree. I graduated with a B.S. in Biology and a minor in Spanish. I took a year of Russian language and met my husband in our tiny little Russian class. I found that learning Russian as a third language was easy after learning Spanish. I had hopes to visit Russia as well, but after graduation, I started working and was married 2 years later.

My husband and I both have Irish and Scottish ancestry, so we decided to visit Ireland, Scotland, and Wales for our honeymoon. It was quite a change to visit a foreign country where they DID speak English!

Ballinatona Farm, Millstreet, Ireland

Muckross Friary, Killarney, Ireland

Edinburgh, Scotland

Since having children, we haven't left the country. I miss seeing new places and experiencing other cultures first hand, but I'm so grateful to have had the opportunities in my younger days to do so.

This brings me to the reason for this post. My degree is in Biology. So, as much as I love geography, I get super excited about science! When my children and I were going over the classification of living things during week 1, I had the idea to make Classification Cards featuring the Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus & Species of different plants and animals that my children know and a few they don't yet. Once the cards were finished (at least for now -- making them is kind of addictive!) I thought I'd share them with you. I used Wikipedia and other online sources for the classification and I certainly can't guarantee that I didn't misspell anything. These are certainly not perfect, but I thought they were fun.

You're welcome to use them however you like. I am using them simply to help my children understand how classification works and as a fun visual. If you find a great way to use these cards, leave a comment and let me know! Enjoy!

*Edited 6/23/2018 to add plan picture cards for Classical Conversations tutors to use in class for the Science portion of Cycle 1, Week 12.

Picture Only Classification Cards

Classification Cards