Supplementing SOTW for more biblical content

[Gailmegan]

I am going to begin using SOTW next year. Our local library has the Activity Book 1, so I was looking through it. It looks like fun and I'm excited. Although the guide does recommend the Bible and other appropriate biblical books as related to the topic, as a whole it doesn't integrate as much of the Bible as some of the other programs I have considered. For those who have decided to supplement with more focus on scripture, are there any resources you have used that you would recommend to use alongside SOTW? Some I have considered are Victor's Journey Through the Bible, Streams of Civ, History Through the Ages, and Greenleaf guides. I would love some input on these or any others that you have found helpful.

 

TIA! :001_smile:

[Sue G in PA]

For us, we wanted a curriculum that already had the Biblical view integrated into the design. We used MOH1 and supplemented w/ SOTW b/c besides the lack of biblical view (SOTW was purposely designed to appeal to many religions), I and the dc really like SOTW. The 2 were/are a perfect fit. While my olders got a lot out of MOH, the youngers enjoyed the "story" approach that SOTW takes. For me, this approach was easier than trying to find the appropriate chapers/lessons in Victor Journey or Streams. My other suggestion would be to check out MFW Creation to Greeks package b/c it uses both Victor Journey and Streams for biblical content AND SOTW1. It's all mapped out for you in the TM so you don't have to mesh the 3 books yourself, KWIM. Just a thought b/c it was what I immediately thought of when you mentioned using all 3 resources!

[chai]

I've tried to add Bible and church history to our studies. One of the easiest ways to do this is to get Biblioplan. It schedules Bible readings with SOTW.

 

For ancient history, I just correlated Egermeier Bible Story readings with SOTW. It was all we needed to tie the two together.

 

For the next years, I've used Trial and Triumph and brought in the stories as they fit our history lessons. T&T is pretty graphic though, so I am going to use the series that starts with Peril & Peace this next time. They have four books that cover church history through modern times.

 

ETA: I just wanted to add that I have Victor's Journey Through the Bible. As much as a I like it, I rarely use it. It's probably my own failing, not an issue with the book

[Denise in IN]

I second the recommendation for Biblioplan. Inexpensive, easy to use, flexible, good book choices.

[Musical Belle]

I guess I'm adding another vote for Biblioplan; this was the first year I used it (we are on SOTW 4), but I will probably use it again when we revisit the Ancients next year. It also provides helpful multi-level resources, if that is a need.

[Beth in Central TX]

I know you are looking for a supplement, but for an ancient Biblical history spine, I would highly recommend The Story of the Ancient World by Christine Miller: http://www.nothingnewpress.com/guerber/ancient.html

[ELaurie]

and also read through The Child's Story Bible with them last year. I didn't try to coordinate them, but it happened that they coincided very nicely.

 

If you want to use SOTW, as I did, this may work for you as well.

 

If you have another Child's Story Bible that you prefer, that might work well too.

[Carol in Cal.]

It was excellent.

 

The Bible has an essay at the beginning of each book that tells when it was written, the likely author, when the events happened, etc. It also has great maps in the back, from different times in Bible history, and also lots of notes and essays throughout.

 

It is conservative but scholarly.

 

It made it really easy to coordinate it with SOTW 1.

 

I wish that I had written down how I did this, but I didn't. It's really not that hard, though.

 

I covered all the history books, selected psalms, familiar prophecies, Jonah, Jeramiah, the story of Job, some of the proverbs, parts of Phillipians (joy), Hebrews (faith), Ephesians (faith/justification), I Cor (love), James (service), and Revelation (Canticle of Heaven). We did not go over and over through the early laws, but we did read one set to show how important morals and proper worship are to God.

[KYHokiemom]

We added in MOH and actually use it as our primary spine with SOW as the supplement and the activities.

[Gailmegan]

The problem with finding the right homeschool curriculum certainly isn't about lack of options. LOL.

 

It seems Biblioplan is the concensus in this thread. I checked it out and it looks very thorough with the biblical material. But from the TOC it doesn't seem to be as comprehensive with other civilizations as SOTW. (I was looking at Ancient History since that's what we're doing next year.) Does it use every chapter of SOTW, or just bits and peices? It didn't mention the SOTW Activity Book either, so I wasn't sure if any of still used the Activity Book along with it. Also in the updates section it says that there is a brand new (March 2008) History version which includes references for MOH. I couldn't find any more information than that and am hoping that didn't mean MOH was replacing SOTW. If anyone knows anything about the new version, that would be great.

 

Sue G - I looked at MOH before and IIRC it breaks up the time periods a little differently than SOTW. *scratching head* I had heard of MFW but hadn't looked into it, so I found their website too. Like Biblioplan it seems to really focus on scripture first and then draw form history of civilizations as they relate to the Bible narratives. I do like the biblical feast emphasis - I just may have to order the book recommended for that. I did notice however that it doesn't appear to draw on SOTW at all. It does use Victors and Streams, though. Maybe I'm just missing it. *shrug*

 

ELaurie - yeah, duh, you think I would have mentioned actual Bibles - LOL. We have The Child's Story Bible and The Jesus Storybook Bible as well as the Student ESV, so we are covered that way.

 

I guess I have more reading and praying to do. If anyone has any other suggestions, this is still wide open, so lay 'em on me.

 

Thanks! :001_smile:

[Gailmegan]

Three more replies while I was typing away LOL. So more votes for MOH and MFW. And a new study Bible suggestion. And my husband wonders why I am banging my head. LOL.

 

Thanks.

[Cornerstone Classical]

If you are interested in using SOTW1 with MOH I am using this guide from Paula's Archives that lines up the two chronologically. I also am reading Egermeier's Bible Story Book chronologically. They have a guide for that as well.

 

Here is the link

http://www.redshift.com/~bonajo/sotw2moh2.htm

 

HTH:)

[Cornerstone Classical]

Whoops! Sorry! I just noticed that was for SOTW2. Here's the link for SOTW1 and others as well...

 

http://www.redshift.com/~bonajo/SOTWmenu.htm :tongue_smilie:

[MelissaMinNC]

We're doing it now, and it's got Bible/Church history/Worldview all incorporated, and it schedules SOTW, also.

 

http://www.tapestryofgrace.com

 

We are loving our Bible study this year (read this as, MAMA is loving learning Bible history in context for the first time ever! :D).

 

:)

Melissa

[Donna T.]

I'm doing the same thing that Cornerstone Classical is doing. I'm using the schedule from Paula's Archives to add SOTW 1 to MOH. I am also reading through Egermeier's Bible Story Book. We do MOH and SOTW during our regular school time and read the Bible Story Book at bedtime. We're using lots of other books also. Titles from Sonlight's Cores 1 and 6 and library books chosen from the SOTW and MOH book lists. It's working great so far. I like MOH on it's own just fine, but really like the convenience of having the narration questions from the SOTW AG. So, it just made sense to go ahead and use all of SOTW. I already owned it, but if I didn't, I would have just used MOH with extra books from Sonlight. The two together do provide a rich study.

 

MFW is good but it does not include SOTW in CtG. They start using SOTW the next year.

[Trivium Academy]

We had a Bible curriculum, history and we read Egermeier's and honestly for younger kids, it's too much.

 

1. Pick a curriculum that already has Bible and history correlated.

options: Mystery of History, Tapestry of Grace, Biblioplan. This is the easiest path for your child and you in the long run.

 

2. Pick to correlate Bible with History but don't use a Bible curriculum in addition.

 

3. Use a Bible curriculum, do SOTW as it is and expand the Christian topics in SOTW with supplement books. There are fabulous picture books to read, Paul Maier is one author, Moses The Long Road to Freedom is another book. You can keep it on your child's level and still provide Christian history even more so than SOTW provides. I would also consider skipping the SOTW Christian stories and just reading from the Bible or your chosen book for Bible stories.

 

I would really consider all the reading aloud you're going to be doing in all subjects. I learned the hard way not to complicate things, esp. in during the grammar years.

[KYHokiemom]

Donna,

 

A question about how you organize MOH and SOTW. Do you keep all of the tm's, activity pages, book lists separate or do you have any advice on how to organize? I am using both, but have to spend a good bit of time picking and choosing even though I do use Paula's archives for chapter linking. TIA

[neesek]

I am just getting ready to start ancient history next year with a 3rd grader and 1st grader, so I am on the same search as you are. It looks like your children will be 2nd and K next year, is that correct? (I saw that on another thread, I think.) If so, then MFW CTG might possibly be too old for your children. I bought it, then sold it again because it is really geared for a minimum age of 4th grade for the oldest. Sure, I could have made it work, but I decided that with all the other options out there, that I shouldn't have to. I have used MFW Adventures and ECC, and I love the concept, but it really does look to be a big step up to CTG. Streams of Civilization is actually a high school text, but SOTW and MOH are written to younger children, which is what I wanted.

 

I do have the 2008 version of Biblioplan, although I still haven't decided exactly how I am going to use it. Both SOTW and MOH are scheduled in it, though it looks like it is geared more for SOTW. (It is listed as the spine, while MOH is listed as an optional spine.) I am thinking about using SOTW for both of my children, then adding in some MOH for my 3rd grader, but I am just not sure yet. Let me know if you have any other questions about Biblioplan. Like I said, I haven't used it yet, but I can try to answer any questions about the new version.

 

HTH

[Ali in OR]

It seems Biblioplan is the concensus in this thread. I checked it out and it looks very thorough with the biblical material. But from the TOC it doesn't seem to be as comprehensive with other civilizations as SOTW. (I was looking at Ancient History since that's what we're doing next year.) Does it use every chapter of SOTW, or just bits and peices? It didn't mention the SOTW Activity Book either, so I wasn't sure if any of still used the Activity Book along with it. Also in the updates section it says that there is a brand new (March 2008) History version which includes references for MOH. I couldn't find any more information than that and am hoping that didn't mean MOH was replacing SOTW. If anyone knows anything about the new version, that would be great.

 

Just thought I would try to answer your Biblioplan questions. It does schedule every chapter of SOTW but it does change the order. I actually prefer Biblioplan's order because they stay with a particular culture for an extended period of time instead of hopping between cultures as SOTW does. You should also know that SOTW has 42 chapters and Biblioplan has 36 weeks, and in some places like the Nation of Israel unit, there are no SOTW chapters to be scheduled. That means that there must be other times when 2 or even 3 chapters of SOTW are scheduled in one week. It wasn't a problem for us, but then we just read--we don't add in activities. Also, I do use the AG with Biblioplan. It isn't scheduled, but it doesn't really need to be. We just pull it out and use the coloring page and map page whenever a chapter of SOTW is scheduled. And we use the AG list of books for additional reading from the library. I am sure that MOH has just been added to the schedule as another possible option, not replacing any other resources. Biblioplan schedules more than you can use (or more than I can use anyway!) so just pick and choose which resources you want. We always used SOTW, the Usborne Encyclopedia, Victor Journey Through the Bible, and a children's Bible story book for any listed Bible passage. Plus the k-2 readers and some of the family read-alouds.

 

Hope that helps some.

[anewday]

I know you are looking for a supplement, but for an ancient Biblical history spine, I would highly recommend The Story of the Ancient World by Christine Miller: http://www.nothingnewpress.com/guerber/ancient.html

 

This is what we use as well. It's very thorough and well written.

[Brenda in FL]

With the ages of your children - I'd go with SOTW and the activity guide and supplement with Egermiers Bible Story Book using the schedules at Paula's Archive (someone has already posted the link) or creating your own.

 

This is what I did with my 1st grader and PK4 when we first started - and it was a perfect fit. Very fun for the kids, and easy for mom! I decided to save the other options (MOH, TOG, Story of the Ancient World, etc.) for our second time through the cycle. We'll start that next year, and I decided to use TOG.

 

Hope this helps.

[Donna T.]

Donna,

 

A question about how you organize MOH and SOTW. Do you keep all of the tm's, activity pages, book lists separate or do you have any advice on how to organize? I am using both, but have to spend a good bit of time picking and choosing even though I do use Paula's archives for chapter linking. TIA

 

 

 

KYHokiemom,

 

I've just been following the schedule that is there at Paula's archives. We do one history lesson everyday. So, whatever is next on the schedule is what I do. If we are doing SOTW that day, I read the chapter, do an oral narration and attempt a written narration (not going so good, but getting better there) using the questions in the SOTW AG. If there is a coloring page in SOTW, we will do that but we skip alot of them. I use a set of ancient history maps for any map work. I can not remember who publishes those. I like them because they are already marked. So, we color a map and talk about it but aren't doing the marking ourselves. It was too frustrating for us to try to do our own marking. I learned this after spending too much $$ on atlases.

 

If it's a MOH day, I read the lesson, do an oral narration and we do an activity if it's simple and easy. When we get to the lessons in MOH that are scheduled for the memory cards, we will do just that for that day. And, we will do the mapping as it comes up but not if it's redundant. I prefer the activities in MOH to SOTW because there is really no prep and I can just decide that day what we will do.

 

As for other books, I don't schedule them. I don't like most of the suggestions in SOTW anyways. We don't really like to get into the pagan stories. We have plenty to read without getting into the myths and fairy tale kinds of stories. I generally look ahead a week or so at the time (looking at both MOH and SOTW plus our Sonlight books) and decide what I will be reading from for the next couple of weeks. I have an awesome public library and I reserve books online from them. I don't try to match our reading up exactly with MOH or SOTW. I do like for the books to be related to something that they are familiar with but not necessarily the same week we covered it.

 

For example, we covered archaeology but it was two weeks later before I got around to reading Archaeologists Dig for Clues.

 

 

What else?

 

Oh yea, I use the SOTW AG to determine when to read from the Usborne IL History Book. I generally give that to my oldest son for him to read to himself.

 

Long story short - I just do the next thing and keep plugging along! I think between SOTW and MOH, there is plenty of reading and the extra books are just that... extras. I sort of decide each day what we will do. I just work with them... reading, coloring, doing a map, looking at an extra book or two... whatever, until I lose their interest. Then, we stop and I rarely go back for anything. If we don't get it done, I don't stress about it, I just keep going forward. So, we certainly are not doing anywhere near everything but it's plenty. More than plenty but worth it.

[Paula in MS]

for 1st grade. Find a reliable list of dates for ancient bible/historical events (I'm still looking), and read excerpts from a children's bible as needed. We will notebook/narrate these and stick in our notebook. I am going to skip ch1. (The First People) and spend a few weeks on Genesis and then head into Egypt (ch2) and Exodus. I would like to be able to put other bible figures/events into their proper place as well throughout the study...Elijah, Daniel, etc.

 

This should be rather easy with a good timeline, but I think the actual study of SOTW1 with Bible history will take more than a year unless I do something differently than suggested.

 

This is one of the reasons that I chose to homeschool...to give my daughter (and me) a better understanding of how the Bible fits into history.

 

If anyone has a link to bible/ancient history dates that is fairly reliable(as much as can be), please let me know.

 

Thanks,

 

Paula

[Gailmegan]

Thank you all so much for providing me with such a wealth of resources. I followed every link and printed sample pages and TOC from every site, then sat down on the living room floor with my printouts, SOTW AG, and some "grown-up" history resources spread out all around me. I managed to roughly split up each time frame with SOTW chapter number and which sections of scripture relate to that time period. I figure that I will follow SOTW during our history time (3x week for 1 hour) and then discuss the biblical narratives of the same time frame as the SOTW topic in our Bible time (30 min each day). Paula's Archives did have a chart that gave Vos's chapters coincinding with SOTW, so while I haven't looked at that extensively, I'm sure I will use that too. I think that will be sufficient since the boys will be 2nd and K. When we cycle through the next time around at 6th and 4th I may choose to add MFW or MOH or SoC.

 

Just one side question if anyone is still following this thread: How have you handled the 42-week aspect? Are there some weeks that seem to be shorter that could be combined (maybe the ones with the biblical narratives since I will be covering that in Bible time? I also thought that maybe I could hold off on China and India (6 lessons worth) and do them over the summer as a *bonus* unit. Any ideas are welcome.

 

Thanks again!

[KYHokiemom]

Donna,

 

Thank you so much for taking the time to post! It sounds like we are doing pretty much the same. It was helpful to hear that you don't stress if you don't read all/some of the extra literature. I feel that MOH is meaty enough for my ds9, dd8, dd5 esp. with usbourne IL and KFHistory along side, but can easily feel that I am shorting the kids with fun reading. ALso helpful to hear that you use your own maps. I have been using the STOW maps for corresponding units and that has worked fine, though I plan to really dive into some geography next year!

 

Do you do the timelines? That has been a favorite part for all of us!

 

Again, thanks so much.

[Brenda in FL]

I guess I did a little of both! I did plan on combining some chapters that didn't have alot of extra resources per the activity guide to get to 36 weeks. However, It still took us longer so I skipped Indoa and China and when we started SOTW2 I went back and did the SOTW1 chapters for India and China before doing the SOTW2 chapters. (Then it took us a year and a half to finish SOTW2!!)

[siloam]

Three more replies while I was typing away LOL. So more votes for MOH and MFW. And a new study Bible suggestion. And my husband wonders why I am banging my head. LOL.

 

Thanks.

 

LOL! I did MOH with SOTW on audio. It was a fun combo.

 

Heather

[Carol in Cal.]

I just pretty much did not worry about it. It took us about 1 1/2 years to get through SOTW1. I did not see any particular reason to hurry. I wanted to 'do the next thing' pretty consistently, so that is what I did. We did spend more time on some sections than on others, and we overlapped our supplemental reading a bit. So, for instance, when the Greeks were coming up, we started to read the Greek myths before we reached the Greeks, and then continued after we were finished with them. Same with the Romans. Otherwise we would not have been able to enjoy some of our favorite supplemental books, like "The Wanderings of Oddysseus" and "Black Ships Before Troy" and "Greek Myths" and "Roman Myths" and "In Search of a Homeland".

 

We also would occasionally go back and read a whole history of a particular country just to pull that strand all together. So when we were done with the Bible history, I read DD a history book with the entire history of Israel in it. I think that we did the same with Rome and maybe Egypt.

 

I would verbally remind her that we had covered some of this before, and sometimes we would briefly look up an old story, so she never got confused.

 

We were so lucky with the Egyptian artifacts--King Tut came to within easy distance of our home a year or so after we finished SOTW1, and then the Hatshepsut exhibit came came to San Francisco, and we also visited the Rosicrucean Museum here in town and the Palace of the Legion of Honor in SF to see some more artifacts.

 

Anyway, I never really figured on the 4 year rotation being more important that drinking our fill of the material. It's a treasure trove, really.

[Nestof3]

My husband reads The Child's Story Bible by Catherine Vos to us. I am okay with Story of the World not having so much biblical focus because the boys receive so much of that outside of "school" time if you know what I mean.

 

I think this retelling is great for the younger ones.

 

Our boys also listen to Your Story Hour Old Testament CDs and watch Animated Bible videos from Nest.