Jump to content

Menu

Omnibus,Trisms,TOG..ease of use??


Recommended Posts

There is only so much of a 'feel' that I am able to get from their websites. I am trying to figure out which is the most user friendly. TOG seems to be more involved, but it is difficult to discern.

Any personal experiences are appreciated.

 

Well... TOG is involved... its not a pick up and go curriculum for high school thats for sure... but its a great education...

 

I do not know about the others... :( but so far TOG has worked well for us... Im just looking forward to the redesign in a few more years... we use classic right now... year 3.

 

I would look to see if TOG will be at your State convention... then you can see and feel! *Ü*

 

Lisa~

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've been researching for 9th grade as well. I only have 1 child so I've been very reluctant to use TOG. It seems very involved, the week 1 sample on their has 56 pages so I didn't print it out just read it. It was way more work than I was interested in doing.

 

Omnibus seemed too much for my dd14 as well. She is not a highly academic child so I need to be real careful when choosing curriculum that I buy what she needs and not what I want.

 

I love Trisms. It is prefect to foster independence because it is researched based. And it uses IEW (which we have used for the past 2 years). I had to sign up at the Trisms yahoo group to be able to really see the curriculum (check the files section). That really gave me a great sample of actually how a unit of Trisms would work in our home. I'm leaning more toward this.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've used TOG yr 3 and have Omnibus 1 to use next yr. To me, Omnibus looks much easier to use. For one, it's much better organized, everything is in one section for you. To begin in Omnibus, just assign the reading in Omnibus before beginning the selection. Then that 1st day you begin reading and then discussion ?'s are assigned each day. The discussion in Omnibus is excellent as it its with TOG, but looks like it will take less time. Both programs give you the same credits for high school courses. I think there is more confusion and teacher prep for TOG because you actually have to choose which of a few books to read and which additional assignments to do. Omnibus is much more straightforward. Choose the book to read and go as directed in the book. Does that make sense?

The workload also looks much heavier in Omnibus (more reading assigned per day). This could be a good or a bad thing depending on your goals.

HTH, Michelle

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Piping up to add 2 more cents about Omnibus--

Remember, it's a Great Books curriculum, so your primary reading will be the GB's. I could be wrong, but it seems to me TOG assigns fewer GB's, but your child will still read "enough" of them to get a good feel of the times. It seems to me TOG assigns more historical fiction, but I could be wrong. We did Omni but added in some historical fic.

 

Some of the questions in Omni 1-3 are pretty light, but you are using a Logic stage resource with Rhetoric stage kids, and you are reading challenging material, perhaps for the first time. It fit us pretty well--used O1 with 16 yo, 02 with 17 yo. We didn't do all the reading, either.

 

Also remember, Omnibus gives 3 credits--as does TOG. This means a significant but not unreasonable time commitment. Figure 5 hours a week for each credit. That's about half an hour for discussion (often less) and time to actually read. Three to three and a half hours a day on Omnibus seems like a lot, but it is 3 classes. In public school, it's 50 mins a class per credit here, plus an hour of homework, so it evens out pretty well, in my estimation. I've seen people get freaked out over the time commitment, but it seems ok to me.

 

The assignments seem long (especially that first one in Genesis!) but they actually go rather fast.

 

Sorry this is written so poorly!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'll put my two cents in for Trisms. This is our first year using it (9th and 8th grades) and the boys are enjoying the independence. We plan to use it for another two years, at least.

 

I are using DAW or another level? When reading the yahoo group posts a few people mentioned that DAW was hard to use the first year because it required more research due to limited sources. Curious if you have found this to be true.

 

Thanks,

Beth

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've used TOG 3 & 4 so far - these are the classic versions, not redesigned.

 

How easy TOG is to use depends on how many you are schooling, what levels, and your goals. I am schooling 4 right now - rhetoric, dialectic, upper grammar, lower grammar (these are TOG distinctions - they're a bit different from WTM) - and without TOG I would be LOST.

 

Yes, there is teacher prep. I'm a former SL'er - and I miss those days, but I also had fewer to teach. SL only worked for me when I had 1, but I'm glad I have books. TOG teacher prep gets MUCH easier after the predicted "four-week fog". The reason it looks so complicated - let's face it - all of the materials for all the levels is a LOT to wade through. Once you know what you're looking for and how the flow of your week goes, it all clicks into place.

 

No, TOG is not GB heavy. Yes, they do read enough to get a feel. And yes, especially in lower levels, TOG is heavily historical fiction (much like SL) and for me, that is a terrific draw. I would say, from my limited experience, that TOG lit for high school is more of a "standard works" approach. Twentieth Century lit has included Ivan Denisovich (Solzhenitsyn), The Chosen (Chaim Potok), The Glass Menagerie (Williams), and the like.

 

Hope this post doesn't run on. I don't post much, but had a couple of moments and thought I'd chime in!

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...