Biblioplan AND Connecting with History?

[spinsane]

Hello,

I've been lurking on these forums for 5 years now, and have usually been able to glean answers to my questions without starting a new thread, but that isn't the case this time.

 

I am in the process of converting to the Roman Catholic Church and ironically am finishing up the Middle Ages with my kids.  I have been using Biblioplan with SOTW, and planned to use it for Early Modern Times as well, but I am not familiar enough with Church history to know if something is in error, or omitted.  I also have the Connecting with History vol. 1, 2, and 3, but I can't quite figure out a way these would work together.  I have the newer version with the lesson guides in them.

 

Has anyone tried this before?  Is there a better way to use BP without making unintentional errors?  My oldest is 9, starting 4th grade and I have a 2nd grader, and a 1st grader I'm teaching this year.  Any help is much appreciated.

 

Thank you

[misty.warden]

Fellow mid-conversion family here, I weighed these options as well and decided to stick with CWH simply to cut down on the stress of trying to research any faith conflicts in the curriculum or explain author bias to my 7yo. I'm sure it can be done with time and pre-reading the BP and SOTW materials, but I felt more comfortable choosing a Catholic company.

 

 

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Edit: absolutely don't recommend we hide away from the issues, I just prefer to do my own research when I'm not trying to teach it at the same time.

Edited August 26, 2016 by misty.warden

[spinsane]

I've thought about using cwh exclusively, but I have a couple reservations. First, if I follow vol. 3 we will repeat some things that we have already covered recently, and we also won't get to American history until next year. Second it seems like it's very western centric, where Biblioplan covers WORLD history. Finally, she only has the first 3rd of the vol. 4 out right now, so what do we do when we finish vol. 3? She also said that vol. 4 ends at the civil war, which means there will be 5+ volumes and we can only get through history 2.5 times instead of 3x. That's a little nitpicky I know, but it means we won't touch on American history, government, and whatnot in high school unless I change curriculum again.

 

I'm not trying to be argumentative. I've been wrestling with these things here at home, (and driving my husband nuts), and haven't found a happy medium.

[misty.warden]

Modern and American history don't worry me as much as far as faith conflicts in texts about earlier periods (reformation et al) and are something I see heavily covered and less expensively (Seton for example has tons of American history). My philosophy is tuned more to understanding relationships between countries and governments over time gives a greater understanding of American history once you do get there.

 

I sympathize about the world vs western history issue though, and there not being any perfect curricula out there. I'm relying on the history/geography section at our library to fill in the eastern hemisphere gaps right now.

 

 

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[spinsane]

Thank you. Right now I'm leaning toward using cwh vol. 3 and then moving into Biblioplan early modern times once we get to 1600 A.D. And will sub in Saints for young readers instead of the missionary studies. I've read that others have used things like MODG, but I can't wrap my head around their lessons :). If nothing else, at least I know I'm not the only one struggling with this.

[Syllieann]

I've used the first 3 volumes of CWH, and this year I made my own American history using secular resources but adding some Saint biographies. I don't think you will run into a lot of issues with a secular American history. Unfortunately, there isn't much available in that arena, which is why I had to make my own. Renaissance and reformation are where it will be important to do your homework on the Catholic perspective. The Protestant programs also seem to overlook a bunch of super important stuff that happened between the fall of Rome and the reformation. I expect that we'll use sotw4 for younger and Light to the Nations for the older for modern history.

 

For this year, I think you should get volume 3 of CWH (syllabus only) to see where issues might arise, then just start wherever you left off last year and move into American history from there. That eliminates the repeating issue and allows you to get to early American history this year, leaving modern world history for next year. The Betsy maestro books are forming the spine of my early American plans this year. Check those out. The only problem I've found in there is page 8 of Exploration and Conquest where she says the priests forced the natives to convert. I'm using the True Book Spanish Mission book to give some perspective to that statement. The Footsteps of the saints series for grammar stage kids are good to purchase, as are the vision series for logic stage kids. You could probably use the sotw ag for activity ideas if you feel like you need that, but the internet is brimming with American history activities.

 

Btw, adoremus books is running a sale. They carry the vision series Saint biographies.

[spinsane]

I'm more than a little overwhelmed. Before I make a decision, is there anything I need to watch out for in the 3rd volume of SOTW/Biblioplan?

 

I'm thinking about doing units 4-7 of CWH, and switching back to Biblioplan. I'm planning to go through Tell Me about the Catholic Faith with notebooking pages from Catholic icing so I don't need something with religion rolled in right now. I'm also a big picture person so part of this is that I'm trying to process what we will do for years to come...

[ktgrok]

Just to throw out another option...Catholic Textbook Project books are excellent and engaging as far as textbooks go. A different approach, instead of the 4 year cycle, but still excellent. 

[Syllieann]

I'm more than a little overwhelmed. Before I make a decision, is there anything I need to watch out for in the 3rd volume of SOTW/Biblioplan?

 

I'm thinking about doing units 4-7 of CWH, and switching back to Biblioplan. I'm planning to go through Tell Me about the Catholic Faith with notebooking pages from Catholic icing so I don't need something with religion rolled in right now. I'm also a big picture person so part of this is that I'm trying to process what we will do for years to come...

I've only read the first two volumes of sotw in their entirety so I'm not sure on volume 3. Fwiw in volume 2 I didn't find anything that was hateful or an outright lie; it was more like I wanted to give a broader understanding. When I was trying to decide between CWH and sotw, I found this blog with notes and suggested supplements. Maybe it will help you out. Note that the column header says sotw 2, but that is a typo; it should say volume 3. http://www.sevenkids.net/files/story-of-the-world-iii-1.pdf

[spinsane]

Ktgrok, thank you. I've looked at those, and I'm thinking of using them once my oldest starts 5th or 6th grade. I know that Light to the Nations is used with CWH in the upper levels too. They are beutiful textbooks, and I read some of the samples following my husband around the house with, "Did you know...?" And "Hey, look at this!" :)

 

Thank you Syllieann for that link. I'm not worried about presenting differing viewpoints in the long run, but while we are in the process of converting, I don't want to confuse the kids more than necessary.

 

I've decided that I'm going to use CWH for volume 2 unit 4 on, and the volume 4 that's available, then switch back to Biblioplan for now. That will give me plenty of time to make a decision on where to go from there.

 

Thank you everyone for your help, it's definitely helped.

[Syllieann]

Glad you got it worked out. And welcome to the Church and the forum. Hope your family has a great year!