EKS Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 Do you have the info for the American Odyssey---author, ISBN, etc so that I know I'm looking for the correct thing? It's like pulling teeth to find out about the materials on the k12 site at times. The American Odyssey: A History of the United States Edited by Morton Keller Mary Beth Klee, Joshua Zeitz, and John Holdren ISBN 1-60153-034-X The one I have is paperback, but if you can find a hardcover (though I don't know if they exist) it would be much better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matryoshka Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 I is high school level but I was able to get it by telling them I needed to preview it before signing up for the course. How do you like it? Were you able to get the student and/or teacher guide as well? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 (edited) How do you like it? Were you able to get the student and/or teacher guide as well? There is no teacher guide, as it assumes that the kid will be taking the online course with their teacher and the student guide would be the online course as well. It has several "Key Questions" at the beginning of each chapter and that is it as far as suggestions for student output goes. I don't know if I like it yet. I've liked the chapters I've read. It is the only high school level American history text that hasn't made me cringe. I was resigned to using a college level text, which wouldn't have been the best choice for my son, until I found it. Edited June 19, 2010 by EKS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Capt_Uhura Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 EKS - Did you look at Spielvogel's Human Odyssey? If so, did that make you cringe and why? I see it mentioned often on the High School board. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 We used Spielvogel's Human Odyssey (maybe half of it). It's not bad to look at, but it is incoherently written, jumping around within a single chapter from topic to topic. It lacks focus throughout, though the non-Western civilization chapters seem a bit better. I think this might be because it is an abbreviated version of his Western civ. book. K12's Human Odyssey is everything Spielvogel's is not. I honestly think that people who sing Spielvogel's praises with regard to his Human Odyssey book haven't actually read large portions of it themselves. We will be using a book called Ways of the World by Robert W. Strayer along with the Big History lectures (excellent) from the Teaching Company for world history when my son is in 10th grade. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 K12 is a great resource and I wish we could make life easy and use all of their volumes for middle school. However, I think I messed that up by having ds do the work online and he thought much of the history was busy work. I agree with you that K12's output requirements tend towards busywork. I'm sorry to hear that they managed to ruin an excellent history book with their ridiculous assignments. We had to very seriously modify their 7th and 8th grade literature courses to make them reasonable, otherwise my son's head would have exploded, and you would have found me hanging from the rafters! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pam in MA Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 I've read about half of this thread so I don't know if this was mentioned, but the book is about problems with high school American History textbooks. Btw, we have used Spielvogel's Human Odyssey as our spine this last year and we all hate it. . . boring, disjointed. I just got a copy of his Western Civ, and it looks a lot better. So next year (10th grade) we're using a combination of that, Murphey Rhodes History of Asia, Tindall's America and the Teaching Company. But I'm still reading the Loewen book and considering. We've also been getting a lot out of a series called Taking Sides that offers opposing essays on controversial topics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EKS Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 I've read Lies My Teacher Told Me and it's great. But it's better if you've already had American history (been lied to), so my son will be reading it at the end of his American history course next year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrs Mungo Posted June 19, 2010 Share Posted June 19, 2010 Which issues? Not sure I even want a middle school history book dealing with gay marriage. The thing is? If you are hopmeschooling? Your middle schooler is extremely likely to be friends with kids are involved with politics on the conservative side. We know *lots* of middle schoolers who have attended anti-gay-marriage rallies and such. It's not really something you can avoid by that age, in my experience. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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