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ETA: Okay, this started off as a spin-off thread, but as I rambled on it took on a life of its own and I can't change the title!

 

I am looking to condense history a little bit from what we are currently doing. My dd's schedule has gotten way out of hand, because I planned her academic year and then at the last minute we enrolled her in public school for choir and band. And during the fall, marching band has taken over our lives. She has also joined the school's Speech & Debate team, and between those 3 activities, she is out of the house a minimum of 23 hours a week. This is a bit of a problem given the academics I had planned for her this year! It will get better when marching band is over, because Concert Band has no regularly-scheduled evening practices (and no football games or band competitions).

 

Obviously, my dd is overloaded and now, at 6 weeks into the school year I am looking to lighten her load but not have the learning be affected (ha, I know).

 

We are using TOG Year 1 Rhetoric. Fifth year with TOG, 1st year doing Rhetoric. It's not too hard for her; on the contrary, she is enjoying the literature selections very much. However, the history portion for the first half of the year is very limited - mostly reading the early Old Testament books. I would feel much better if she were working through SWB's History of the Ancient World (which I have).

 

Also, TOG makes liberal use of Norton's Anthology, but I would rather my dd read the whole work (The Iliad, for example). On the flip side, though, I am not good at discussing books (even if I read them), so I love TOG's discussion outlines.

 

So...I was thinking of changing to using HofAW as our spine, reading whole books, and organizing the TOG discussions to go along with what we're doing. This may not work well with History, because quite a bit of the discussions are based on their book (which of course, is mostly the bible right now and I do prefer to use TOG secularly), but I think the Rhetoric Literature discussions could work well.

 

Any thoughts on this? Too much reinventing the wheel, or does this make sense? I'd like to have my daughter only working on history 3 days a week instead of her current 6. I was thinking of having her read & outline the spine on Mondays (it's about 25 pages a week), complete mapwork/timeline on Wednesdays, and if we have a discussion, have that on Fridays.

 

For literature, she'd probably have to still read about every day, and then we can discuss on Fridays. This would cut about 2-3 hours out of her week, which is important right now. I've already dropped French down to .5 credit because Latin is her mastery language subject, which she wants to take through to the AP class (she wants to major in Classics). So that gave her about 2 hours a week of extra time.

 

Stress!!! :willy_nilly: (really need a "pulling out my hair" emoticon)

Edited by Elinor Everywhere
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Hmmm, well I'm just getting started with high school work too...and I don't use TOG (so I might not be much help :lol:) but I think your plans sounds great.

 

There are those time periods when our dc are doing so much outside of home that we have to let the workload at home lighten, but I've noticed that they are usually not as long-lasting as they first appear and then we're usually glad of the experience for dc. Does that make sense?:001_smile:

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I think discussing whole books is really important at this stage. I'm wondering if all that reorg. is going to be worth it. You are not finding the history to be a great fit at present, and you want to be using whole books, which TOG does not......

 

Perhaps doing the SWB history and then individual text guides for the lit you want to do? And just leaving TOG for a bit, as it's not meeting your needs.

 

FWIW, I did find the SWB ancient history quite dense and detailed when I read it. I would think hard before using it with an overloaded child.....

 

Love

 

L

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Hi Elinor,

 

Good morning. :001_smile:

 

If you are looking to tighten things up a bit, I would recommend that you focus on output rather than input. It's tough to do with all of the paperwork that comes with TOG, but output is the goal of any high school humanities program.

 

It's easier to understand if you've been through the whole high school trajectory at least once, but you can see the forest from the beginning. It is possible. But you have to remember to keep lifting your chin when the temptation is to see the days and the hours in 9th grade. The days and the hours support the big goals; don't forget that. ;)

 

Reading. Writing. Arithmetic. Really - sounds simple, but those are the still the goals in high school.

 

Reading - becomes a means of understanding. A way of gathering not just information, but a means toward critical thinking. Rather than gathering facts, reading becomes a way to gather arguments. Opinions. Facts. Structural arguments. Reading becomes a means to understanding. A switch for sure. But learning how to read in order to understand is really the next step for rhetoric-stage students. It's tough to do because they think they know how to read. ;) Teaching them to read with an eye toward nuance can be tough, but that's the goal in high school. Do they know when they are being had? Do they know a beautiful sentence when they see it? (It's a bit like walking through an art gallery. Are they flying through with more interest in the coffee shop at the end of the route or are they being brought up short to stare slack-jawed as they stroll through the rooms?) Can they spot a beautiful argument? Can they feel the weight of it? Kids at this stage can find the climax in a work of fiction. And they can feel it when the author begins that final push toward the climax. They can sense the switch in the text; they begin to read with more intensity - here it comes! Can they spot the same thing in a well-written work of nonfiction? Is the whole thing just a string of chapters and paragraphs or can they spot the arch? And can they spot the point where they started to hear the engine rev as it climbed the hill toward the climax? Ah-ha! Here it comes. :001_smile: Now they are learning to read.

 

Writing - becomes a tool to encourage critical thinking. Writing becomes a way of understanding - both for the author and those who read her work.

 

Between the two you find the discussion.

 

The TOG model (which of course they didn't invent): Read. Think. Write.

 

Just outlining and time-lining through HoAW won't get you there. Your daughter needs to practice her research and writing skills. Instead, I would recommend that you trade off weeks. Practice outlining Susan's arguments. I wouldn't have her outline the whole chapter every time. Sometimes you should outline with an eye toward the whole chapter: what is the big idea in this chapter and what are the supporting ideas? How does she transition between them? (Mark in the book.) Does she list the things she is going to cover? If so, where and how. Does she summarize at the end? If so, how? Does she insert her opinion/conclusions? When? How can you tell? Retrace her argument. Is it inductive or deductive? Are any of her propositions sketchy? Which ones? Does she tell you that she's not sure about this or that? Or does she gloss over it? Why?

 

But then sometimes you should spend your time magnifying a shorter section of the chapter. She does a great job with describing characters. Study that. Write your own description of someone you know using the techniques. Or she tells the tale of an event. She gives background. Then she slows down the narrative to focus on a particular event. Time flies by in the first paragraph and then slows to a crawl in the second. Why? How does this technique affect the reader. What points of view does she use to describe the event? In it? Over it? Through it? Can your daughter do the same? Pick an event. Try it.

 

Then the research. College kids need to know how to research a topic, develop a thesis, and write a paper. Over and over and over. Practice this. You dd will thank you. If you just spent time describing a character, give you daughter the option of choosing a character in history to research and write about. Help her go to the library and research. Find books. Find articles on Google Scholar. Scan. Develop a plan for writing about that person and DO IT! Or write about an event. Anything in the ancient world. If you're studying ancient Egypt, you could pick something from ancient Egypt, but you don't have to. It doesn't matter really. It's the process that matters. For example, undergrads get nebulous assignments all the time: "Discuss the roll of women in Genesis and the Odyssey." Learning to machete that thing down to a 3-5 page paper size with an actual thesis is no small task. But they are going to be asked to do it repeatedly. Teach them. Practice it. Till they can do it in their sleep.

 

No college prof is going to ask your daughter to outline a book. It's a necessary skill if your dd is going to understand the arguments of others and is going to generate them herself. But it's a tool. You wouldn't hammer nails into a board for an entire year. Nor would you play scales on the piano for a whole year. Yes, you play scales. Every day. But you also work on piano pieces. Eventually the child has that ah-ha moment, "Oh. That's why we do scales."

 

Make sure you give her some piano pieces to work on. Scales can be mind-numbing.

 

Peace,

Janice

 

Enjoy your little people

Enjoy your journey

 

P.S. Kids don't need to read the Iliad in its entirety to be well-educated. Excerpts really are fine. Read the Odyssey; it has more action which makes it more accessible. If she falls in love with Homer, you might go back and read the Iliad cover to cover. If I was short on time, I would just do the excerpts. No worries! Cranking out those short papers in 9th grade is what keeps the wolves away, not reading the Iliad.

Edited by Janice in NJ
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Hmmm, well I'm just getting started with high school work too...and I don't use TOG (so I might not be much help :lol:) but I think your plans sounds great.

 

There are those time periods when our dc are doing so much outside of home that we have to let the workload at home lighten, but I've noticed that they are usually not as long-lasting as they first appear and then we're usually glad of the experience for dc. Does that make sense?:001_smile:

 

Completely. :D and thanks for the reminder - once we get through October, things will slow down outside the house. When you're in the thick of it, it seems like it'll go on forever!

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I think discussing whole books is really important at this stage. I'm wondering if all that reorg. is going to be worth it. You are not finding the history to be a great fit at present, and you want to be using whole books, which TOG does not......

 

Perhaps doing the SWB history and then individual text guides for the lit you want to do? And just leaving TOG for a bit, as it's not meeting your needs.

 

FWIW, I did find the SWB ancient history quite dense and detailed when I read it. I would think hard before using it with an overloaded child.....

 

Love

 

L

 

Thanks, Laura, I value your advice as always. I agree that talking through books is very important, now more than ever. TOG does use mostly whole books, but there a a few that I want to focus on more than they do. Like SWB says, any book list of "must reads" will omit something along the lines, and I need to keep my eye on what is important to us.

 

I've been looking at SWB's book, and by only doing 25 pages a week we can be done by the end of the school year. Hmmmm....I'll read a few chapters and see if outlining every chapter will be too much. I suspect it will.

 

Thanks!

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If you are looking to tighten things up a bit, I would recommend that you focus on output rather than input.

 

Reading. Writing. Arithmetic. Really - sounds simple, but those are the still the goals in high school.

 

No college prof is going to ask your daughter to outline a book. It's a necessary skill if your dd is going to understand the arguments of others and is going to generate them herself. But it's a tool. You wouldn't hammer nails into a board for an entire year. Nor would you play scales on the piano for a whole year. Yes, you play scales. Every day. But you also work on piano pieces. Eventually the child has that ah-ha moment, "Oh. That's why we do scales."

 

Make sure you give her some piano pieces to work on. Scales can be mind-numbing.

 

 

 

Janice, I love all of what you wrote (as usual), and understand what you are saying. Love the piano scales analogy (I think in analogies), and I see that rote outline every. single. chapter. may be a bit ridiculous. In fact, that is the exact reason I strayed from TWTM method in the first place when the kids were younger - so much narration, week after week after week, year after year.

 

I love TOG, but I don't love the history portion of Year 1. Hence, my thoughts on using SWB's Ancients book to fill that gap. But I hear you, and agree with the writing projects. My dd is taking TOG's (Lampstand's) online writing class, and I am only teaching the history, literature, and philosophy portions.

 

So....should she be doing additional writing in history? I have LLC under her English credit. If she were in (real...hate that term, but you know what I mean) school, wouldn't she be doing history papers along with English papers? Or is her LLC writing enough? I believe they are doing a research paper this year, along with narratives, compare/contrast, and the rest of the arsenal.

 

Thanks so much for taking the time to answer - I've saved a lot of your TOG posts throughout the years, and I wish I had more than one time through high school to get it right! :lol:

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  • 1 year later...

Hi Elinor,

 

Good morning. :001_smile:

 

If you are looking to tighten things up a bit, I would recommend that you focus on output rather than input. It's tough to do with all of the paperwork that comes with TOG, but output is the goal of any high school humanities program.

 

It's easier to understand if you've been through the whole high school trajectory at least once, but you can see the forest from the beginning. It is possible. But you have to remember to keep lifting your chin when the temptation is to see the days and the hours in 9th grade. The days and the hours support the big goals; don't forget that. ;)

 

Reading. Writing. Arithmetic. Really - sounds simple, but those are the still the goals in high school.

 

Reading - becomes a means of understanding. A way of gathering not just information, but a means toward critical thinking. Rather than gathering facts, reading becomes a way to gather arguments. Opinions. Facts. Structural arguments. Reading becomes a means to understanding. A switch for sure. But learning how to read in order to understand is really the next step for rhetoric-stage students. It's tough to do because they think they know how to read. ;) Teaching them to read with an eye toward nuance can be tough, but that's the goal in high school. Do they know when they are being had? Do they know a beautiful sentence when they see it? (It's a bit like walking through an art gallery. Are they flying through with more interest in the coffee shop at the end of the route or are they being brought up short to stare slack-jawed as they stroll through the rooms?) Can they spot a beautiful argument? Can they feel the weight of it? Kids at this stage can find the climax in a work of fiction. And they can feel it when the author begins that final push toward the climax. They can sense the switch in the text; they begin to read with more intensity - here it comes! Can they spot the same thing in a well-written work of nonfiction? Is the whole thing just a string of chapters and paragraphs or can they spot the arch? And can they spot the point where they started to hear the engine rev as it climbed the hill toward the climax? Ah-ha! Here it comes. :001_smile: Now they are learning to read.

 

Writing - becomes a tool to encourage critical thinking. Writing becomes a way of understanding - both for the author and those who read her work.

 

Between the two you find the discussion.

 

The TOG model (which of course they didn't invent): Read. Think. Write.

 

Just outlining and time-lining through HoAW won't get you there. Your daughter needs to practice her research and writing skills. Instead, I would recommend that you trade off weeks. Practice outlining Susan's arguments. I wouldn't have her outline the whole chapter every time. Sometimes you should outline with an eye toward the whole chapter: what is the big idea in this chapter and what are the supporting ideas? How does she transition between them? (Mark in the book.) Does she list the things she is going to cover? If so, where and how. Does she summarize at the end? If so, how? Does she insert her opinion/conclusions? When? How can you tell? Retrace her argument. Is it inductive or deductive? Are any of her propositions sketchy? Which ones? Does she tell you that she's not sure about this or that? Or does she gloss over it? Why?

 

But then sometimes you should spend your time magnifying a shorter section of the chapter. She does a great job with describing characters. Study that. Write your own description of someone you know using the techniques. Or she tells the tale of an event. She gives background. Then she slows down the narrative to focus on a particular event. Time flies by in the first paragraph and then slows to a crawl in the second. Why? How does this technique affect the reader. What points of view does she use to describe the event? In it? Over it? Through it? Can your daughter do the same? Pick an event. Try it.

 

Then the research. College kids need to know how to research a topic, develop a thesis, and write a paper. Over and over and over. Practice this. You dd will thank you. If you just spent time describing a character, give you daughter the option of choosing a character in history to research and write about. Help her go to the library and research. Find books. Find articles on Google Scholar. Scan. Develop a plan for writing about that person and DO IT! Or write about an event. Anything in the ancient world. If you're studying ancient Egypt, you could pick something from ancient Egypt, but you don't have to. It doesn't matter really. It's the process that matters. For example, undergrads get nebulous assignments all the time: "Discuss the roll of women in Genesis and the Odyssey." Learning to machete that thing down to a 3-5 page paper size with an actual thesis is no small task. But they are going to be asked to do it repeatedly. Teach them. Practice it. Till they can do it in their sleep.

 

No college prof is going to ask your daughter to outline a book. It's a necessary skill if your dd is going to understand the arguments of others and is going to generate them herself. But it's a tool. You wouldn't hammer nails into a board for an entire year. Nor would you play scales on the piano for a whole year. Yes, you play scales. Every day. But you also work on piano pieces. Eventually the child has that ah-ha moment, "Oh. That's why we do scales."

 

Make sure you give her some piano pieces to work on. Scales can be mind-numbing.

 

Peace,

Janice

 

Enjoy your little people

Enjoy your journey

 

P.S. Kids don't need to read the Iliad in its entirety to be well-educated. Excerpts really are fine. Read the Odyssey; it has more action which makes it more accessible. If she falls in love with Homer, you might go back and read the Iliad cover to cover. If I was short on time, I would just do the excerpts. No w orries! Cranking out those short papers in 9th grade is what keeps the wolves away, not reading the Iliad.

Oh, my goodness, Janice! This post is more helpful than you can imagine! Thank you :001_wub:

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I'm not sure I can top much of the advice you've already been given.

 

One thing to keep in mind-not everything in Norton is abridged.  Some selections are actually in their entirety.  But with TOG it would certainly be easy to keep the literature choices if you like them and use individual books of the complete works. As a matter of fact TOG has dropped much of their use of Norton in recent revisions and gone with individual titles. 

 

Check out the books sold on Bookshelf Central ( http://bookshelfcentral.com/index.php?main_page=resources&year=1&units=all&LR=on&subjects=all&type=BSC ).  Some of those are still good choices for history and you might still want to use them to back up a spine like History of the Ancient World.  Another option would be to use SWB's book and take a look at the other choices she recommends in WTM for history and lit.  Pace it out similarly to TOG and use the lists of historical figures, geography, discussion questions, etc. from TOG at the appropriate point.  (I guess I said pretty much what your original post said...oops.  But it is basically what we did with a few TC lectures thrown in.)  Also, be sure you have some writing assignments, that background and experience will be more valuable every year.

 

 

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