Histroy curriculum suggestions

[bluebonnetgirl]

Does anyone have a history (social studies) curriculum suggestion for a teen boy with autism with a 4th grade reading comprehension level and who needs lots of visual support? 

 

Thank you!

 

Beth

[Starr]

I would look at Story of the World and add in visual maps and activities form the activity guide. You could watch some movies and documentaries. You could add to it but he would be able to do his own reading. 

[bluebonnetgirl]

Thank you Starr!

[Greta Lea]

History of US has lots of pictures, but can be distracting for some.

[Heather in VA]

How would he do with something like the self-paced VP history? They are interactive, visual and have games for review/reinforcement. The information is good too. I learned a bunch from them. 

 

Heather

[kbutton]

My Aspie likes America the Beautiful by Notgrass. It is geared toward 5th-8th graders, but you can see samples online to see if the reading level is okay or not. The samples are very representative of the whole curriculum. I've heard people talk about how this curriculum is on the low end for that range, so ymmv. It has a lot of pictures that are engaging (my son loves that part). There are several components to the curriculum, and you don't need to use them all for history--it has literature, for example. We do the maps, timeline, and most of the literature (at least some of the literature would be beyond a 4th grade reading level). There are also workbooks that have puzzles and games or fill-in-the blank stuff. The nice thing is that it's pretty cut and dry (but interesting) for my son, and he likes that. Each lesson lists what other components need to be done with that lesson, so if you use the maps, for instance, the mapwork for that lesson is listed at the end of the lesson, not in a separate guide or in the front.

 

Does he learn well with videos? My son loves documentaries for history.

[OneStepAtATime]

My dyslexic/dysgraphic son with vision issues, who is in 4th grade but not reading at a 4th grade level yet just started Veritas Press Self-Paced history (like Heather in VA suggested) yesterday (at his request).  He loves it.  But it randomly throws in a spelling quiz on a word that has not been explicitly taught (like Crete) and is not phonetically spelled.  This stressed him out a bit, but we ended up with me working nearby and helping out where needed.  The actors are a bit goofy but it was easy for him to navigate and there was really not that much reading without auditory support.  The reading that was required he was able to handle really well, for the most part.  It is definitely not even remotely secular, in case that is an issue.

 

I have not used it yet, but DD13 (dyslexic) is planning on handling history with Education Portal World History starting maybe this summer or in the fall.  She looked it over and liked it. Instruction appears to be mainly video based, followed by a quiz after each video of the course.  I have not done a quiz yet, so I don't know how much reading is required without audio support.  Access is still free at the moment but they plan to start charging a fee later on.  Anyone currently signed up, though, will not have to pay the fee (at least not for a while).  You might sign up even if you don't intend to use it as a full curriculum just so you have free access to this resource.

 

http://education-portal.com/academy/course/high-school-world-history.html

 

The link is for the World History High School course.  It honestly doesn't seem to require much reading.  The course isn't complete yet.  They are still working on it (58% done).  But it may be finished  by the time he would need the rest.  There is a quiz after each video.  Don't be intimidated by the High School label.  Watch the videos, see what you think....