bluebonnetgirl Posted March 24, 2016 Share Posted March 24, 2016 I am looking for a good civics and government curriculum for my high school son with ASD who has significant language processing disorder and hyperlexia. Need lots of pictures and language around the 4th-5th grade level. Would especially like to cover the voting process with the election coming up. He really does best with paired audio and video, but a colorful and simpler language textbook/workbook could also work. I am considering Uncle Sam and You by Notgrass, and would love feedback on that program for those that have used it with students with learning challenges, as well as any other curricula that comes to mind that could work. Thank you! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OneStepAtATime Posted March 24, 2016 Share Posted March 24, 2016 Well, there is this one: http://www.wiesereducational.com/products/j_social-studies/42-j_government/ags-united-states-government-mm8031.htm You can see samples of the pages on that site but I would buy through Amazon or Abe books used. Much cheaper that way. There are also these: http://www.amazon.com/National-Government-Kids-Guide/dp/1432927132/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458830180&sr=1-1&keywords=kids+guide+to+government http://www.amazon.com/Local-Government-Kids-Guide/dp/1432927116/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458830210&sr=1-2&keywords=kids+guide+to+government http://www.amazon.com/State-Government-Kids-Guide/dp/1432927124/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458830210&sr=1-3&keywords=kids+guide+to+government http://www.amazon.com/Governments-Around-World-Guide-Government/dp/1432927108/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1458830210&sr=1-6&keywords=kids+guide+to+government I am thinking that someone somewhere is going to put together a really cool homeschool friendly curriculum for this specific coming election at some point but I haven't seen anything yet. Have you checked with Currclick? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lauranc Posted March 24, 2016 Share Posted March 24, 2016 Take a look at this link for a sample of a book from Attainment Company http://www.attainmentcompany.com/sites/default/files/pdf/sample/ESS-Student-Level%202%20Sample.pdf Here's the link to their website http://www.attainmentcompany.com/ --Laura 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tshirtyogapantmama Posted March 24, 2016 Share Posted March 24, 2016 Notgrass is definitely easy to adapt for children with learning challenges. Uncle Sam and You could be a good choice, we did the first book and counted it as a semester worth of work. My oldest was a strong reader but struggled with writing at the time so the student workbook was a major plus for us along with multiple choice question tests. We did not use the lesson review book nor the literature books (so we skipped the "Literate" activity after each lesson. After each lesson in the main textbooks they have lesson activities, we didn't do all of the them. A lot of times for the "Thinking Biblically & Vocabulary" we would just discuss orally. On the "Creative Writing" I would have him pick 1 to do each unit. I felt spending time on drafts, editing, and preparing a good final copy was better then overwhelm him with it each lesson. I allowed the "Picture This!" activities to be completely optional. I counted it as a Middle School Social Studies/History course. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluebonnetgirl Posted March 24, 2016 Author Share Posted March 24, 2016 Thank you all for the many great suggestions. OneStep, I knew about the AGS Government book, but,other than the color photos, it looks kind of dry, especially the workbook. Have you used it, maybe it is better than I thought? The Amazon books look interesting but I wish there were samples to see! Have you used any of them? Laura, that Attainment Company book looks really promising! I need to check out this company in general, it seems they have a lot of nice materials for older learners needing life skills curricula. Have you used any of their materials? TShirty, I agree that Uncle Sam and You looks very do-able. WOuld you suggest just the textbook and workbook, and skip all the other materials? I just want my son to get a nice overview of US government and citizenship, including voting. Son will be eligible to vote this year so it is an important issue. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OneStepAtATime Posted March 24, 2016 Share Posted March 24, 2016 Thank you all for the many great suggestions. OneStep, I knew about the AGS Government book, but,other than the color photos, it looks kind of dry, especially the workbook. Have you used it, maybe it is better than I thought? The Amazon books look interesting but I wish there were samples to see! Have you used any of them? Laura, that Attainment Company book looks really promising! I need to check out this company in general, it seems they have a lot of nice materials for older learners needing life skills curricula. Have you used any of their materials? TShirty, I agree that Uncle Sam and You looks very do-able. WOuld you suggest just the textbook and workbook, and skip all the other materials? I just want my son to get a nice overview of US government and citizenship, including voting. Son will be eligible to vote this year so it is an important issue. I haven't used the AGS textbook. I just knew they had one from previous research. As for the other books, I actually liked them for a very quick but fairly thorough overview of our government at the city, state and national level. Great for reference material without getting bogged down in quite a bit of text. Lots of pictures. The ones I linked are the revised ones, though, and I have not seen those. I have the older edition. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tshirtyogapantmama Posted March 25, 2016 Share Posted March 25, 2016 Thank you all for the many great suggestions. OneStep, I knew about the AGS Government book, but,other than the color photos, it looks kind of dry, especially the workbook. Have you used it, maybe it is better than I thought? The Amazon books look interesting but I wish there were samples to see! Have you used any of them? Laura, that Attainment Company book looks really promising! I need to check out this company in general, it seems they have a lot of nice materials for older learners needing life skills curricula. Have you used any of their materials? TShirty, I agree that Uncle Sam and You looks very do-able. WOuld you suggest just the textbook and workbook, and skip all the other materials? I just want my son to get a nice overview of US government and citizenship, including voting. Son will be eligible to vote this year so it is an important issue. Yes, I would just do the textbook & workbook. I think it would give the overview of government, elections, voting etc that you are looking for your son. Since you are considering the AGS Government book too. I just wanted to share my experience using AGS textbooks. I have tried to use several AGS textbooks with my son but we found them to be too traditional for us. The textbooks were overwhelming distracting for him, filled with assignments and chapter reviews that were to be completed on separate notebook paper. The companion workbooks I found to be very plain and not very creative.The biggest plus is they are written at a 4-5 reading level. We ended up going with textbooks that were created for home schoolers and written in a more narrative style, colorfully but not textual busy, and very open and go for the parent with zero to no lesson prep/planning. Notgrass has fit the bill for us. No matter what you settle on, just remember you can always tweak it :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluedanube Posted March 25, 2016 Share Posted March 25, 2016 (edited) n/m Edited March 25, 2016 by bluedanube Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluebonnetgirl Posted March 25, 2016 Author Share Posted March 25, 2016 Notgrass' Uncle Sam and You looks very promising for my son. The color and the layout look very nice. I showed samples of it to my son online and he agreed it is something he would like to try. It seems very homeschool friendly and parent freindly. I totally agree with you about the AGS Texts being not so ideal for homeschoolers, just from the looks of them. The other books that OneStep recommended from Amazon are a possible back up if I can see samples, and the Attainment Company social studies books that Laura recommended also look like nice alternatives. Thanks everyone! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lauranc Posted March 25, 2016 Share Posted March 25, 2016 I've used their Explore Math books which my daughter liked pretty well, and was useful for using some of the math that she has learned. Also used the US Geography Reader and Explore American History book. All the books we've had from them have lots of photos and fairly simple sentences. We used the geography book as a supplement, but it was kind of fun for her to read and learn about different points of interest in the U.S. We still have the American History book, and haven't done much with it because she kind of lost interest. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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