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History for kindergarten?


kristinannie
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My DH and I are history geeks. I can't imagine not doing some sort of history in kindergarten. I had planned on using Beautiful Feet's Early American History. The more I think about it though, the more I might just want to start SOTW. That way, we will have 5 years to get through the 4 levels. How easy is it to get through an entire level in a year? I know there are lots of extra books you can sprinkle in to make it last longer. I would love to hear your opinion on this! Thanks!

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We did SOTW for kindy and there are others here who did too. I think it just depends on your expectations about it. I see that my kids would have retained more overall if we had waited until 1st, but that can probably be said of any year to year. Plus, we really enjoyed it. Also, doing it "early" allows us to take a year off from SOTW for US history, which we're doing next year for 2nd.

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We are doing SOTW 1 this year, in one year. No, I don't think she is getting everything out of it that she would have if we had waited a year, BUT she does like history. She enjoys the stories and does retain some of it. She dressed up as an Egyptian for Halloween this year and still loves all things Egypt. I don't regret the choice, we've had a lot of fun.

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I think it can definitely work for K, especially if you're willing to slow it down. We have to keep a pretty quick pace with it to finish within the calendar year, so if you stop and just dwell a bit in a few places, it can easily be 1.5 years. The main reason I would want to take extra time, though, is because of getting to year 4 early. That can be pretty intense even for 4th graders, from what many say.

 

If you'd like another option, we used K last year as a geography year. We went around-the-world using stories and food, all the while finding places on the globe and learning about different cultures. It has made this year a bit easier, as she had some familiarity already with the different ancient places we've visited. I, too, was so excited to start SotW, though, that waiting was tough. But my 1st grader has a younger sister, and I didn't want to have to do two levels or be too far ahead for her to comfortably join in later.

 

Good luck deciding!

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I did half of SOTW1 for K for my older dd. It gave us lots of time to add in picture books and crafts. It really made history fun. We just followed the AG and I got lots of books from the library. It is still her favorite period in history.

 

This is exactly what we are doing this year. In fact, we just went to see a mummy exhibit at a local museum last night and my ds was so impressed because he knew what he was looking at and how to interpret some of the hieroglyphics & recognize various gods.

 

Although, I should clarify that ds is really the age of a 1st grader (6.5), and was red-shirted, so that may make some difference in his comprehension level. I probably would not have started SOTW with a young 5 y.o., but that is just me.

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I'm planning geography and a bit of prehistory for K. It seemed to me a good idea to work on the idea that people in other places do what we do (eat, sleep, go to work, play with toys etc) before moving onto the idea that people in other times did all those things too. We're only going to do jigsaw puzzles of maps, play with a globe and that sort of stuff to familiarise them a bit. "Auntie Hanka lives in Poland, that's here. We visited her when you were a baby. Cousin Stephane lives in France, that's here but he came to Poland to see us when we were there. Marianne lived in Kenya for a while, that's here." I figure those sorts of conversations will provide some pegs to hang more stories on when we actually start history.

 

It isn't possible to ruin your child for life by reading them history stories in K so if you're all that enthusiastic, have at it!

 

:)

Rosie

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We're doing SOTW 1 for K and it's going very well. I will say I'm glad we have the SOTW audio; ds listens to it once or twice a week during quiet time as a gentle review.

 

We decided to go forward with it for several reasons, with the prime two being that ds & older dd requested it (so they could study the same time period), and so we could take a year in-between SOTW 3 & SOTW 4 to focus solely on American history. With dd, we supplemented heavily for US history, with the result that we didn't cover the world history in SOTW 3 & 4 quite as thoroughly, and I wanted to avoid repeating that.

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I think it just depends on your expectations about it. I see that my kids would have retained more overall if we had waited until 1st, but that can probably be said of any year to year. Plus, we really enjoyed it.

:iagree: As long as your not expecting retention of details, I could see it working. I chose to wait until 1st grade to start. However, my oldest son will be following along with SOTW2 in his kindergarten year. In the long run, it will be fine either way. Depending on your child, you might want to focus more on short picture books and activities than on the SOTW text.

Your goal? As my daughter said, "Oh yay! I like Egypt!" Mission accomplished:)

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My DH and I are history geeks. I can't imagine not doing some sort of history in kindergarten. I had planned on using Beautiful Feet's Early American History. The more I think about it though, the more I might just want to start SOTW. That way, we will have 5 years to get through the 4 levels. How easy is it to get through an entire level in a year? I know there are lots of extra books you can sprinkle in to make it last longer. I would love to hear your opinion on this! Thanks!

 

I regret not using BF for my oldest in K and I switched it up for my younger two. I love the BF books and that would be all I would do--reading, doing crafts, enjoying the stories together. I would not use SOTW for K because I don't think they retain it when they are older. It jumped around too much to keep a thread for little minds. That was my experience anyway.

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I think it'll depend a lot on the child too and what their interests are. DS got ancient history by default. He's not homeschooled but his older brother is and we were doing SOTW. Older DS would read STOW to younger at bedtime--for fun--and he got a lot out of it. He has a fondness for Egypt, so we'd check books out of the library and read those too. I would say both the boys have a strong Ancients background thanks to SOTW. And we had the same experience a the museum too, when we came to the Egypt exhibit, the boys would explain the stories to us and tell us what was going on. (I think they really impressed some of the other visitors there too, not every day you have a 6 year old accurately describing an Egyptian relief--I know I was impressed since I didn't even realize he had been absorbing all that.)

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Sorry to hijack.... People keep saying they did "pre-history". What exactly did you use for "pre-history"?

 

Many of us pinch ideas of Satori's blog ;) I'm going to buy a few nifty things off Charlie's Playhouse and probably get some DK Eyewitness books. The info will probably be over their head at that age, but the pics are cool.

 

Rosie- hasn't done it yet, but is planning :)

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I regret not using BF for my oldest in K and I switched it up for my younger two. I love the BF books and that would be all I would do--reading, doing crafts, enjoying the stories together. I would not use SOTW for K because I don't think they retain it when they are older. It jumped around too much to keep a thread for little minds. That was my experience anyway.

 

 

Did you do the early American history with BF? That was what I was thinking of doing. My sister lives in Boston and we live close to Williamsburg so I was thinking that we could see some of the sights we are learning about (I don't know if he would really get it at age 5 or not). Are the crafts part of BF or did you do them on your own?

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Have you looked at Winterpromise? Their kindergarten program uses SOTW to do an overview of world history with sort of a highlight on the most interesting points along the way...if I understand it correctly. I always wished I had found the program when I still had a kindergartner to use it on. It sounds fun to me. A broad sweep of world history then you follow it up with 4 years of more indepth study filling in the details each year. Maybe someone else will chime in who has actually used it:)

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Sorry to hijack.... People keep saying they did "pre-history". What exactly did you use for "pre-history"?

 

My prehistory curriculum is in the "About" section of my blog. We were definitely inspired by what Angela did with Satori but I made my curriculum for an entire school year (I don't believe Angela covered a year with weekly lessons but I may be wrong).

 

We have LOVED it and DD has learned so much. :)

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Have you looked at Winterpromise? Their kindergarten program uses SOTW to do an overview of world history with sort of a highlight on the most interesting points along the way...if I understand it correctly. I always wished I had found the program when I still had a kindergartner to use it on. It sounds fun to me. A broad sweep of world history then you follow it up with 4 years of more indepth study filling in the details each year. Maybe someone else will chime in who has actually used it:)

 

 

This looks really neat. I am going to consider this one! Thanks for sharing!

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Did you do the early American history with BF? That was what I was thinking of doing. My sister lives in Boston and we live close to Williamsburg so I was thinking that we could see some of the sights we are learning about (I don't know if he would really get it at age 5 or not). Are the crafts part of BF or did you do them on your own?

 

Yes, I did the BF EAH with my youngest two. I would have LOVED to be able to go to Williamsburg for such a study! They have a homeschool day. You might find out when that is because it is either free or much reduced. My two oldest dds went with their grandparents and by Providence landed there on that day! It was such fun for all of them. We have done crafts via the Homeschool in the Woods Colonial Life Time Travelers (http://www.homeschoolinthewoods.com/HTTA/TTS/ColonialLife.htm) They have a fantastic lapbook that corresponds well with all the BF books. I am a big believer in making history for the young grades (well, all grades, frankly) as interesting and engaging and lively as possible. It is so exciting to be learning about our country and its founding people.

:001_smile:

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