SOTW Backwards?

[malyita]

I posted a while ago about our desire to do history in reverse chronological order. I've come up with a plan I like following our family history back as context, but am intending that for next year and have left history pretty much off our plate for this year. We had started a few chapters of SOTW, though, and DD really liked that, and I like the idea of just reading it gradually as a casual general overview this year. Would it work to start with the last chapter of the last book and work backwards? A little "foreshadowing" would be fine, but is it always referencing earlier stories? I appreciate any comment those who have worked with the book have.

 

Thanks!

 

Molly

[Rosie_0801]

I could imagine starting with an event in modern history and following the rabbit trails back, with older children and teens. For a general overview for small children who haven't a consolidated idea of consequences, it doesn't seem the best way. "This happened next" is easier for them to cotton onto than "this was caused by this, and this, and this, and this, and sort of this too."

 

But see the ages of my kids. What would I know? :tongue_smilie:

 

Rosie

[Down_the_Rabbit_Hole]

Yes, it mentions earlier stories and places. At least Vol. 1 does and at least the first 1/3 of the book. I cannot answer for the rest of Vol. 1-4.

[Homemama2]

I think it would depend on the ages of the children. The SOTW books cover topics in the later books that might be too much for younger children (this is what I've heard on the boards...I'm only in book 2, so you'd have to ask someone else about specifics.)

[redsquirrel]

I think it could be fun and educational for logic stage children who are already familiar with the flow and ebb of the story. That is the time for them to be thinking about cause and effect and making connections. You can't tell someone you are doing something 'backward' if they don't know what 'forward' is.

 

For SOTW, I think book 4 is written for older children. I am not sure one wants to discuss the holocaust with a first grader. And, the first two books are def. written for a younger audience. I know my son would have been rolling his eyes at the tone of SOTW 1 by the time he was a 4th grader. He delighted in it when he was a first grader. SOTW 1 and 2 are much more narrative for younger listeners and readers. SOTW 3 and 4 are laid out much more like a traditional history book for young people.

 

And yes, earlier chapters and earlier books are referenced in the later books.

[Jay3fer]

I think it wouldn't work with SOTW, at least at the grammar stage. As a pp pointed out, you might be able to do it for logic stage, depending on how much they remember.

 

I actually can't imagine this working well with any history curriculum. All the ones I like teach it as a STORY, as causes and effects that lead naturally into one another. For example, how would you go about teaching about Reconstruction without knowing about the Civil War - or the Civil War without knowing about slavery? Or slavery without knowing about Colonial Europe, and Pre-European Africa?

 

I'm sure some people are doing this most happily, but in my view, it would be very hard to connect it all together. I like the way we're doing it - 4 years seems like a long time, but I know it passes in the blink of an eye.

[Kathryn]

I've been trying to figure this out all day long. I'm coming up blank. WHY would you do this? I just can't comprehend what advantage there could possibly be to doing history backwards. I think there would be absolutely no understanding of cause and effect, no ability to understand the progression of events and time, no "big picture."

 

Now, I can see picking apart current events in the rhetoric or even logic stage by going back in time to look at causes, but only after a foundation of general understanding had been laid. I went back and looked at your previous thread. I can see your husband's angle for a high school student, or a strong middle level student. But, personally, I think this would be disastrous in the grammar stage. The early years are about laying a foundation of knowledge. Later, they will be able to pick apart and ask why and figure out what led to what.

 

And although I sometimes find it irritating when people throw out their degrees as proof of their "authority" on a subject, I feel the need to say that one of my post-graduate degrees is in applied history. This IS my field.

[malyita]

kebg11: I totally hear where you are coming from. Before I started talking to my husband about it and researching what he had to say, I thought all the same things. Now, he is mostly interested in slightly older ages, and wants to do much what you suggest; start with current events and work back, continually asking why. For the stage before that, I do still have some idea of maybe doing a more traditional overview in a forward-working way (but really just an overview, leaving details mostly for when we can connect the important ones to what is happening today). At this beginning point, though, I don't feel like history is in any way an understandable concept for a kindergartner, especially starting waaaaaaaaaay back before anything was in any way like what they know of. I think that starting with, "here's a description of what the world is like that you mostly understand", then moving to "and just a little before that, things were a little different", and so on would make much more sense to someone so very young. So I guess we're not exactly going for reverse history so much as zig-zag history :)

[FairProspects]

I've been trying to figure this out all day long. I'm coming up blank. WHY would you do this? I just can't comprehend what advantage there could possibly be to doing history backwards. I think there would be absolutely no understanding of cause and effect, no ability to understand the progression of events and time, no "big picture."

 

:iagree:I think you may be underestimating what your dc are capable of. My ds has had some great observations lately about why Julius Caesar was so power hungry and that a lot of it had to do with the success of Alexander the Great. He would never have had these connections had he not studied history chronologically to know who comes before whom and why that makes a difference. Similarly, I feel it is much more interesting to point out that the Bill of Rights comes from a tradition that begins with the Code of Hammurabi and the Magna Carta. He can access the significance his own country's documents more easily because he knows the big picture of world history.

 

Now, what you may be looking for is the "expanding world" concept of history which is the more traditional social studies curriculum for younger grades. This starts with family, moves to community helpers, cities, states, U.S history, etc. The idea being that young students can best understand what is most familiar to them.

 

Using the 4-year cycle to teach chronological history is a different philosophy altogether and I don't think it would work to treat it in reverse. It may just be a philosophy you don't want to pursue in your homeschool and that is ok too. :D

[malyita]

Now, what you may be looking for is the "expanding world" concept of history which is the more traditional social studies curriculum for younger grades. This starts with family, moves to community helpers, cities, states, U.S history, etc. The idea being that young students can best understand what is most familiar to them.

 

Using the 4-year cycle to teach chronological history is a different philosophy altogether and I don't think it would work to treat it in reverse. It may just be a philosophy you don't want to pursue in your homeschool and that is ok too. :D

 

Interesting, thanks for giving me that term. (Though I'll admit my brain threw up a big :eek: at the thought I might be doing something "traditional" :tongue_smilie:) I had sort of lost sight of the cycle aspect of it... Hmmm... I will definitely have to mull over which approach we'll end up going with. Thank goodness they're still so young and we have lots of time.