Jump to content

Menu

Classical Historian/ Take a Stand (Ancient and/or Middle Ages)


Recommended Posts

I want to add a bit more to my logic stage history.

 

I like and may use History Detective book from CTC (using the "bonus" pages from the website right now). We're reading aloud from Human Odyssey books. Doing a few living books to correspond. Working through a brief Ancient History Geography workbook. All together, we spend maybe 45 minutes a week on History. We also read through the history parts of Lively Latin.

 

I feel like we need some writing to go along with it. We're doing some verbal narratives, but not nearly as much writing across the curriculum as last year.

 

Is anyone using some or all of this?

http://www.classicalhistorian.com/take-a-stand-ancient-civilizations-teachers-key-and-students-edition.html

 

From what I can see the "Complete Curriculum" for each level has several parts. I have zero interest in an $80 video teaching me how to use the Socratic Discussion, but the student book, "Take a Stand" looks useful for walking students through writing an essay. Has anyone used the Take a Stand books? Comments?

 

Thanks!

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I found a lightly used copy of the History Detective. I think it will be sufficient for Ancients for the rest of this year.

 

I will look seriously at the Take a Stand book for Middle Ages next year, though. They do have bundles at Homeschool Buyers Coop.

https://www.homeschoolbuyersco-op.org/classical-historian/?c=1

 

and Cathy Duffy reviewed the Classical Historian, and seems to have pulled out the "Take a Stand" books separately as one of her top picks:

 

http://cathyduffyreviews.com/history-geography/classical-historian.htm

 

I guess I'm surprised nobody's used it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I ordered it from HSBC for my oldest to use in 6th grade, but we never used it. The shipping time was incredibly long (weeks and weeks longer than the promised shipping time), and parts of my order were left out so I had to bug them for weeks to get them. Basically, I ordered in early August (since the shipping time listed on the website would have had the materials here before we started school) and I did not have the complete order until some time in October (after I had been forced to completely change my plan for history for the year). It was not the fault of HSBC, they passed on the order to the Classical Historian and they would email back claiming to have sent the package days before that, but when I finally got both packages they were postmarked well after the dates of the emails.

 

The Take a Stand book does walk the student through planning an essay. The essay topics are very specific, so you really do need to use the materials they recommend. I had hoped to use them alongside the program we currently use (the Dorothy Mills books), but it is very difficult to find the complete answers to the essay questions since the books do not focus on the specific things that the essay questions cover with the depth that would be required. The book would also require some adapting since it was intended for a classroom, and some of the activities for every essay involve using classmates.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Here's my take on it (we've been using it along with Oxford Ancient History and K12 Human Odyssey as a spine for the past 2 years):

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/514858-the-classical-historian/?hl=%2Bclassical+%2Bhistorian&do=findComment&comment=5653622

http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/523948-help-with-6th-grade-history/?hl=%2Bclassical+%2Bhistorian&do=findComment&comment=5840621

 

I highly recommend this history curriculum for middle school!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

No experience with it here, but the samples look pretty unimpressive and overpriced to me.

 

Have you checked out these free downloadable lessons? https://sheg.stanford.edu/world We've been using the US history book version along with document based questions like these: http://www.amazon.com/Document-Based-Assessment-Global-History-Grade/dp/0825163374/ref=pd_sim_b_3?ie=UTF8&refRID=03X52QQXQT8PDND5XQGP. I think they make a great supplement to history.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The book I'm looking at is $25 with the teachers manual, so not the whole big expensive package.

The Stanford materials do look interesting. I'll take a closer look.

 

ETA: They look very good. I did use the "Lunch Room" activity a year or so ago, but there seems to be much more content now.

Thanks for sharing!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

My very agreeable daughter, who will do almost anything I ask her of her, hated Classical Historian. She liked the history detective book, but the other stuff was just way too boring. This is one of the few programs we used only for half the year before jumping ship to another program.

 

We do like the Stanford materials very much.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...