SotW/history rotation question -- multiple kids

[d.g.]

I'm new here, and to "official" homeschooling, with a question about the WTM history rotation and schooling multiple children. If you've BTDT with 2 or more, could you help me figure this out?

 

My older son will be starting history, almost certainly using Story of the World, next year. The problem is, his younger brother will be just turned 5 when the rotation starts over, and I don't want to throw him into history in the middle of the story, kwim? Not to mention, he'll be newly 8 when we reach the modern era, and I'd rather he have the extra year of maturity before we tackle that particular section of history.

 

In about 2 years, we'll be on the road for a good part of every year, living in a 5th wheel with my husband as he travels the country for work. (Right now, he works a good distance from home and "visits" on occasion...not very good for the family!) Basically, this means I need to plan ahead for a bare-bones and flexible setup for both boys, combining subjects whenever possible to conserve space and save time.

 

So on to my question, which would be better in this situation:

 

1) delay history by a year for my older son, covering something else in 1st grade and starting Ancients in 2nd;

2) start SotW as suggested, but expand on various topics to spread the 4 years into 5;

3) other ideas I haven't thought of yet?

 

TIA!!

[Omma]

You could do something like Galloping the Globe and/or Winterpromise's Animals and their Worlds first. We liked getting in a bit of geography and a study of various habitats before delving into the ancients (ie. it is nice to know a bit about Africa and the savannah vs. desert and then study about Egypt).

 

Brenda

[Sasharowan]

You could do it either way or you can stick a state history program in between. The elementary years are just an intro anyway, so if you want to start the youngest listening in and only doing the activities that he wants to for your oldest 2nd time through. Mine are all on the same time era. The 8th grader is doing Hakim's US history while my 3rd and 4th graders do SOTW. The 3yo plays at our feet and joins in on crafts when he wants and with the olders in imaginative play. Like today, we read about the cotton gin and made a simple one of our own (that didn't work). We had some fresh picked cotton that the took the seeds out by hand (it was hard). The 3yo participated in the cotton picking, but not coloring the map or the bingo game.

[Melissa in Australia]

I was in the same boat a few years ago. we just started SOTW. it is amazing how much the 5 year old picks up. and they will do 2 more rotations of ancients. the WTM has recommendations for starting with more than one child.

[whitestavern]

This is exactly what happened to me. I started DSjust5 on SOTW2 w/DD7. Both SOTW 2 and 3 have taken longer than one year because we took extra time on some of the Middle Ages and the Rev War. So by the time we go into SOTW4 my younger will be at least 7 1/2 and then 8 by the time we get into the more "gruesome" topics. I'm doing Biblioplan with SOTW4 so I have more age appropriate reading for both of them. He absolutely LOVED SOTW2 at 5.

[d.g.]

Wow...I got sick the day after I posted this, and then completely forgot to come back and check for replies. Thanks, ladies!

 

I'll be getting copies of all 4 SotW texts next week (got a good deal) so I'm going to read through and play with them a bit. I think it's also time to dig out my copy of WTM again...I haven't seen it for a while, obviously, because if I had, I probably wouldn't have asked this question. :001_smile: