enlarsh Posted May 15, 2011 Share Posted May 15, 2011 I am thinking of using this next year instead of SOTW. Can anyone share their experience? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dcurry Posted May 15, 2011 Share Posted May 15, 2011 I used this when my oldest two were in 3rd & 1st grades. We absolutely loved it. I held on to it to use with my younger ones, but we haven't gotten back to American History since. I would have to say that it was one of my very favorite curriculum that I've ever used. I still have their composition notebooks that we made that year. I followed the lesson plans exactly (I was fairly new to homeschooling), and not only did they love it and learn tons, but their books turned out really, really well. I've never used SOTW, though. So I can't compare. BF is definitely more "teacher intensive", but I would highly recommend it. I'd recommend doing all of your copying for the week ahead of time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Abbeygurl4 Posted May 15, 2011 Share Posted May 15, 2011 :bigear: I've been thinking about using Beautiful Feet also. Hope others will chime in! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mommatomany Posted May 15, 2011 Share Posted May 15, 2011 I've decided on BF for next year also. I'll have a dd in 2nd and K. It will be my first year using it but I'm REALLY looking forward to it. Would love to hear what other people have to say! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daisy Posted May 15, 2011 Share Posted May 15, 2011 I used this when my oldest two were in 3rd & 1st grades. We absolutely loved it. I held on to it to use with my younger ones, but we haven't gotten back to American History since. I would have to say that it was one of my very favorite curriculum that I've ever used. I still have their composition notebooks that we made that year. I followed the lesson plans exactly (I was fairly new to homeschooling), and not only did they love it and learn tons, but their books turned out really, really well. I've never used SOTW, though. So I can't compare. BF is definitely more "teacher intensive", but I would highly recommend it. I'd recommend doing all of your copying for the week ahead of time. :iagree: I used this with my 1st grader and 3-4yo. The 3-4 just listened to the books and my 1st grader did everything. Wow, that was almost 6 years ago. We LOVED it. The kids (even the one who was 4yo) remember a ton from that year and the books were read over and over again. I did all my copying a book at a time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daisy Posted May 15, 2011 Share Posted May 15, 2011 Just wanted to add one more thing. I really appreciated that this was just history. It was so much easier than using a program that combined everything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
enlarsh Posted May 15, 2011 Author Share Posted May 15, 2011 Thank you all! I have picked up most of the books from the library to preview and I am impressed! Looks like this will be a GO for next year! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cjgrubbs Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 Daisy and others.... I have loved MOH vol 1 so much this year and we are going to use MOH vol 2 this upcoming year. However, after that I am still so undecided about what to do. I would like to continue with MOH but even the author says that it will not be sufficient for American History. I am considering several options (this will be school year 2012-2013, so I know this is quite a way off.) Using MOH Vol 3 with only the then 7th grader and using American History program from Bright Ideas Press for all of us.(then 1st and 4th plus the 7th) I guess 7th grader would need to read or listen to MOH vol 3 and we would do some of the reading and activities. I'm also looking at Beautiful Feet. The one thing I'm unsure of is how I would make it work with this broad range. I don't want 3 kids having to read three different levels of books and I really like having a spine so to speak like MOH so if we don't get any of the extra reading done we are still getting our history in. I've also looked at the BF Science and BF Geography. How does this work...do you still use a more traditional science along with the BF program or is it really enough? I guess one problem is that the website doesn't offer very good samples. Any advice is really appreciated! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jenL Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 We've used SOTW for the past 2 years, but I felt something was lacking. SOTW is a wonderful program, but ds was enjoying the additional reading suggestions more than SOTW itself. We ended up taking rabbit trails with living books more often than not. Knowing this, I wanted something more literature based, so I began researching, and I've chosen BF for next year. I'm really excited at how simple it is, and how rich the reading is going to be. I've discussed it with several veteran hs moms who have told me the BF year of history is one of their favorite memories of the elementary years. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
renabeth Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 This is the only history "I" have ever liked!:) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ruthie in MS Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 Check out the reviews on http://homeschoolreviews.com/ They have great reviews with very different opinions. It's what has helped me make MANY curriculum decisions. I don't buy anything without checking reviews first. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MeganW Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 To be fully utilized as intended, your child needs to be able to write sentences and color more complicated pictures. My going-into-kindergarten- 6 year olds are NOT quite ready. I'm sure it is a great program as it gets great reviews, but just be ready to modify if necessary. The one other thing to be prepared for is that the book "America's Providential History" is, um, I don't know how to say it, so here's Amazon's description: "based on the assumption that all history is Providential (i.e., it reflects God's purposes) you'll learn how God's presence was evident at our nation's founding in the hearts and minds of the men who fought for independence and shaped the Constitution." That theme is woven throughout everything. Depending on your faith background, you may or may not be comfortable with that. I didn't really understand when someone told me that, but now I get it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tabrett Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 Are the pictures to be colored in the teachers guide? Is that what is to be copied? Is there'd a sample of the pictures? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beth in SW WA Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 I own this and we will do it along w/ our CC US History cycle this year. The BF Elementary books are delightful. I'll keep these for the grandkids. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kidsnbooks8 Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 Are the pictures to be colored in the teachers guide? Is that what is to be copied? Is there'd a sample of the pictures? They do have the pictures as a download on the site now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Aurelia Posted June 22, 2011 Share Posted June 22, 2011 I couldn't use it because it was too religious for my taste and I don't think there's a way to get around it, but I am planning to use some of the books when we study US history next year. They look excellent. I have a question about the Your Story Hour CDs, do they integrate religion as deeply as the lesson plans, or is there just an occasional mention of God, etc? I assume it would be the latter based on the lesson plans they go with, but I'm looking for some good audio stories for Ariel to listen to. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
walkermamaof4 Posted June 23, 2011 Share Posted June 23, 2011 We just finished it. It is by far my favorite year ever of history in our schooling. We loved it. The kids begged me to create more coloring pages. The coloring pages are copies from the D'Aulaire books. I just copied more from there and from the Stories of Pilgrims. My then 5 y.o. joined in, could answer any questions I asked as well as the others, and loved it. I wrote his picture captions. Your child DOES NOT need to be able to color well or write to glean much from this. I added SL3 for my older girls and they gleaned much more from BF than SL3 I believe. You could skip America's Providential History if you'd like, still have a fabulous year, and really learn a lot. We used SOTW last year and really enjoyed this year more. I am not a big library fan, so implementing this and owning the books was a plus. The coloring was a plus. The book choices were superb. The amount of reading was perfect for us. I must add that I did create a book basket time and spread weekly choices on gutter shelves. They read 30 minutes of that a day. Those correlated well to the BF reading of the week. But this wasn't necessary, just a bonus. I own Time Travelers from Homeschool in the Woods and we didn't get to much of them. I wish we had. My only regret is that BF doesn't have a similar program for the following year!!! It has been hard to move from that and pick something for next year! I think we've decided on MFW. Hope you enjoy it too! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sahamamama Posted June 23, 2011 Share Posted June 23, 2011 I've decided on BF for next year also. I'll have a dd in 2nd and K. It will be my first year using it but I'm REALLY looking forward to it. Would love to hear what other people have to say! I have also been thinking about using BF Early American next year for one 2nd grader and twin K'ers. We are doing Around-the-World Geography this year, and would like to take one or two years to study US history before launching into our world history cycle. :bigear: My 1st grader read nearly all the D'Aulaire biographies this year and really enjoyed them. I've also been looking at BF's Geography through Literature course, using the Holling C. Holling books, and possibly the IEW course that goes along with this set. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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