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Using SOTW and SL together for a 1st grader?


Guest overseasmommy
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Guest overseasmommy

I'm drawn to SOTW but also to SL. I'm having trouble deciding what would be best for our family. Here are my questions. Thanks for your thoughts!

I'm planning for next year - will have a 1st grader (6yr) , PreK (4yr) and baby (1yr).

 

 

1. Can I take 2 years to go through each volume of SOTW?

2. For each chapter of SOTW , would it be sufficient to just use the SOTW text, the Usborne Ency and the activity guide? (I live overseas , so to get all the extra books here would be difficult plus expensive. I do have access to a lot of SL books though).

3. Can I use read-alouds from SL ? Any one have a plan of how you did this?

4. What about fun read-alouds (unrelated to history - like Charlotte's Web) ?

5. If I pursue a classical education, can I leave out the latin component? We lie overseas and my children are already learning a foreign language.

 

Thanks!!

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1. Can I take 2 years to go through each volume of SOTW?

2. For each chapter of SOTW , would it be sufficient to just use the SOTW text, the Usborne Ency and the activity guide? (I live overseas , so to get all the extra books here would be difficult plus expensive. I do have access to a lot of SL books though).

3. Can I use read-alouds from SL ? Any one have a plan of how you did this?

4. What about fun read-alouds (unrelated to history - like Charlotte's Web) ?

5. If I pursue a classical education, can I leave out the latin component?

 

Well, the answer to all of these is you can do whatever you want. You get to decide. ;)

 

1. Lots of people take more than one year to do a sonlight core, and lots of people take longer to do a SOTW volume. I used SOTW and CHOW together during my years with Sonlight. It wasn't overkill for us but might be for you, so you need to decide that. Here is a correlation of the chapters of SOTW and CHOW.

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

 

When we did both, I would read CHOW to them myself and listen to SOTW in the car on audio. Jim Weiss on the SOTW CDs is a very good storyteller.

 

2. Absolutely IMHO. SOTW is meant to stand alone really and be sufficient. Anything you add to it - AG, Usborne, CHOW, other books, is gravy.

 

3. In the early years, the read-alouds for SL don't correlate all that much to the history period being studied. You will have no problem plugging them in to whatever you choose.

 

4. ?? Not sure I understand this one. Charlotte's Web is in one of the SL cores. You can pick and choose the SL readers/read-alouds, do all of them, none of them .... If you are asking if it will just be too much, again that depends on your family. When the sheer amount of reading seemed a bit much for me, I used unabridged audiobooks.

 

5. Again, you are the boss in your school. Lots of people leave out Latin.

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:iagree: I've always combined SL and WTM.

 

My preference in the early grades (1-4) is to use SL as the spine curriculum and fit in the WTM recs where I can.

 

For the logic stage (grades 5-8) I use WTM as the spine and use SL where I can.

 

Each SOTW volume has 42 chapters. If you want to study just one chapter per week you'll still get through the volume in a calendar year.

 

About the Latin: You can leave out anything you want, because it's your homeschool. However, you may find, as I did, that you want to study Latin. Your own education and reasons for homeschooling are going to grow and change as you go. I started with rigorous but traditional homeschooling, eased my way into a more classical approach, and now I can't imagine leaving Latin and Greek out of our homeschool day.

 

On the other hand, some people never do get around to Latin. That's fine, too.

 

Don't think you have to go all-or-nothing. Start with what you like and what matters to you, and never stop researching and learning.

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Guest overseasmommy

Can you explain more what you mean by using SL for grades1-4 and the WTM recs. Do you mean WTM recs for Language Arts ? And can you share why you prefer SL in the early grades? I'm very new to homeschooling (son just started K this fall) and honestly all of it can be overwhelming.

 

One of my options is to do FLL , WWE and OPGTTR , math, with the SL history read-alouds. The other option is to do SOTW history. Trying to figure out what's best for us. My son goes to a local school in the AM (we are overseas) and then comes home at lunch. So we can only do English homeschool in the afternoon. And I"ve been told time and time again that LA and Math are the most important subjects in the beginning, so that's freeing!

 

Thank you!

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Can you explain more what you mean by using SL for grades1-4 and the WTM recs. Do you mean WTM recs for Language Arts ? And can you share why you prefer SL in the early grades? I'm very new to homeschooling (son just started K this fall) and honestly all of it can be overwhelming.

 

One of my options is to do FLL , WWE and OPGTTR , math, with the SL history read-alouds. The other option is to do SOTW history. Trying to figure out what's best for us. My son goes to a local school in the AM (we are overseas) and then comes home at lunch. So we can only do English homeschool in the afternoon. And I"ve been told time and time again that LA and Math are the most important subjects in the beginning, so that's freeing!

 

Thank you!

 

Oh, there's a wonderful name for what you're about to do! :D "Afterschooling." We even have a forum for that here, so people who have done the same thing can give you great advice about how to make the best use of your time.

 

I've only full-time homeschooled, so my thoughts aren't as pertinent to your situation. My opinion would be that you are right to focus on math and LA above everything else (depending on how well his school covers those subjects, of course).

 

A nice way to handle history would be to just use SOTW and do one chapter per week. Read the chapter one day and do questions and narrations, do the map another day, and maybe on Friday do some of the activities.

 

And then just go through the Sonlight books that are available to you, doing read-alouds one at a time as bedtime stories and letting your child read the ones he's able to read on his own. They are just really, really good books that you and your child can enjoy together.

 

If you want to go through the trouble to match up some of the Sonlight books with the period of history you're doing with SOTW, here's a list:

 

Sonlight Titles Arranged in WTM 4-year Cycles

 

I hope you'll keep reading and posting here, and I hope the forums will be helpful to you.

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Oh, there's a wonderful name for what you're about to do! :D "Afterschooling." We even have a forum for that here, so people who have done the same thing can give you great advice about how to make the best use of your time.

 

I've only full-time homeschooled, so my thoughts aren't as pertinent to your situation. My opinion would be that you are right to focus on math and LA above everything else (depending on how well his school covers those subjects, of course).

 

A nice way to handle history would be to just use SOTW and do one chapter per week. Read the chapter one day and do questions and narrations, do the map another day, and maybe on Friday do some of the activities.

 

And then just go through the Sonlight books that are available to you, doing read-alouds one at a time as bedtime stories and letting your child read the ones he's able to read on his own. They are just really, really good books that you and your child can enjoy together.

 

If you want to go through the trouble to match up some of the Sonlight books with the period of history you're doing with SOTW, here's a list:

 

Sonlight Titles Arranged in WTM 4-year Cycles

 

I hope you'll keep reading and posting here, and I hope the forums will be helpful to you.

Thank you so much for posting this list. It is awesome!!

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