Mom in High Heels Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 I'm looking for US history that doesn't whitewash the whole thing. Most books seem to lean towards the settlers being kind and generous, and the founding fathers as the wisest, most wholesome men who ever lived. I'm looking for something more realistic. I don't mean anything that talks about them being horrible, but something that is not biased. Indy is in 7th grade, so that level is what I'm looking for. Any thoughts? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
allyphoe Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 Howard Zinn's A Young People's History of the United States. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom in High Heels Posted January 23, 2015 Author Share Posted January 23, 2015 Howard Zinn's A Young People's History of the United States. Thanks, I'll check it out. I just requested a sample sent to my Kindle app, so I can see if I think it will work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alte Veste Academy Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 Agree with the Zinn recommendation. Hakim also addresses injustice. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ethel Mertz Posted January 23, 2015 Share Posted January 23, 2015 Agree with both the Zinn recommendation and Hakim. You can also get other resource suggestions from the Zinn Education Project site. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
serendipitous journey Posted January 24, 2015 Share Posted January 24, 2015 Have you looked at OUP's Pages from History series? We haven't used this yet, but I'm looking at scheduling it for later middle school (A. will be doing Logic Ancients next year, and I'm hoping to add in some of the Pages books when we hit the correct time in our cycle). Amazon has Look Inside for some of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Murrayshire Posted January 24, 2015 Share Posted January 24, 2015 Agree with both the Zinn recommendation and Hakim. You can also get other resource suggestions from the Zinn Education Project site. Wow! Thank you for this link! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Momling Posted January 25, 2015 Share Posted January 25, 2015 If you use a textbook that is white-washed, you can add in more details: John Green's crash course us history, American Experience documentaries, Stanford history education group lesson plans. We constantly talk about bias in readings and how previous generations and our own generation portray different people and events in history. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pen Posted January 25, 2015 Share Posted January 25, 2015 To me it seems like to give a realistic view one needs more than one source in order to give a variety of perspectives. And also one needs to go into depth on certain topics to see that when one does that, what one discovers becomes more complicated and the people of history often multifaceted individuals. It also helps to compare the complexity of the present moment. We have used Zinn resources, which I think are excellent, but found that we also needed more than that because the Zinn sources often gave what seemed to be an alternative view, but assumed that there would also be a traditional approach at some point to which it is a counterpoint. With only Zinn, we seemed to get a great deal about certain subjects, but were still missing a good bit. We had the adult not children's version, so maybe this is different in the children's. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cottonwood Posted January 27, 2015 Share Posted January 27, 2015 DD is working through HIstory Odyssey's Modern Times for the Logic Stage and I find it to be pretty real so far. As I preview the literature selections she has to read I think ..um..ok. Then I talk to her about it and it doesn't bother her so she proceeds. Although I think she's more into the wartime stuff now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haiku Posted January 27, 2015 Share Posted January 27, 2015 I am a pinko lefty liberal, and I love Zinn, and I will be using his Young People's books for my dd's 8th grade history, but his writings are not a complete picture of American history. They are extremely biased (it happens to be a bias I love, but I still see it for what it is). If you want something comprehensive and more middle-of-the-road, I suggest the Drama of American History by the Collier brothers. I have found them to be the best resource for looking at both (or more) sides of an issues. There are a ton of books, and you don't have to read them all, as there is significant overlap. Best of all, they are about $5 a piece as Kindle downloads on Amazon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
momto2Cs Posted January 27, 2015 Share Posted January 27, 2015 Maybe K12's American Odyssey in conjunction with the Zinn book? Might give a fairly balanced picture of everything. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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