History choices will drive me insane..

[michaeljenn]

I am going crazy trying to decide on a history program!!!  I used Sonlight Core D last year, and while it was good, I feel like my kids need to be separated for history now, and I feel like they need some accountability by way of actual question needing to be answered on paper, and paper maps.  My 7th grader has actually requested this;)

 

I had considered Biblioplan Y2 since they have the new Remember the Days for K-6.  My 4th grader could use that book, while my 7th grader could use the companion.  Then they both have map work and questions to answer.

 

Mystery of History looks good and seems easy to implement.

 

BUT, then I saw Notgrass Adam to Us and I really like the looks of it and my 7th grader likes it A LOT.  We borrowed it from a friend to look at and she likes it.

 

Soo... here is the deal.  Notgrass looks so easy to implement, but would I be selling my daughter short?  I mean, it is a one year world history, so it obviously isn't going to go too in-depth.  But then I wonder, hmmm, does it truly matter for 7th grade?   Is it ok for her to just get a general flow of history, or should we really be studying in in depth?  

 

Part of me feels like I should go with Biblioplan and do the 4 year sequence, which she would not finish until 10th grade.  Then the other part of me thinks I should go with Notgrass and do Adam to Us for 7th, America the Beautiful for 8th and then continue on with Notgrass for High School.   But then I come back to "am I selling my daughter short"..... 

 

She enjoys history, but it isn't her favorite thing to do by any means.  

 

Help me make a decision PLEASE!! LOL!!!

[scbusf]

Yes, it will drive you insane. Researching history choices sent me over the edge!!!!

 

I decided on Biblioplan Year 3 - they don't have Remember the Days yet for that one, so my 1st grader is just going to follow along with whatever. I got all the different Cool Histories and Maps and whatever for my 5th and 3rd graders.

 

And now, I don't even look at other history choices!

[SilverMoon]

BUT, then I saw Notgrass Adam to Us and I really like the looks of it and my 7th grader likes it A LOT.  We borrowed it from a friend to look at and she likes it.

 

Soo... here is the deal.  Notgrass looks so easy to implement, but would I be selling my daughter short?  I mean, it is a one year world history, so it obviously isn't going to go too in-depth.  But then I wonder, hmmm, does it truly matter for 7th grade?   Is it ok for her to just get a general flow of history, or should we really be studying in in depth?  

 

Part of me feels like I should go with Biblioplan and do the 4 year sequence, which she would not finish until 10th grade.  Then the other part of me thinks I should go with Notgrass and do Adam to Us for 7th, America the Beautiful for 8th and then continue on with Notgrass for High School.   But then I come back to "am I selling my daughter short"..... 

 

She enjoys history, but it isn't her favorite thing to do by any means.  

 

Help me make a decision PLEASE!! LOL!!!

 

If a kid who isn't terribly interested in history liked Notgrass A LOT and it looks easy for me to implement I'd be handing over the Notgrass. No questions asked.

 

A one year world history summary is not shortchanging anyone. Frankly it can be very helpful to future history studies to have that overall timeline already in your head. The four year sequence is one method of doing history well, but certainly not the only way.

 

FWIW, my rising 8th grader will be doing a world survey this year, based on the history of science. He had a full cycle in lower elementary, a world survey based on the development of ships, aircraft, and spacecraft (6th), a geography year (7th), and now he's back to a world survey with a different focus (8th). He's a STEM kid with a pretty good grasp of history. This has not shortchanged him. Shortchanging him would look more like forcing him into a one size fits all history driven education with STEM in the backseat. Then I could say the opposite for his older brother. :001_smile:

Edited May 18, 2016 by SilverMoon

[Ellie]

 

BUT, then I saw Notgrass Adam to Us and I really like the looks of it and my 7th grader likes it A LOT.  We borrowed it from a friend to look at and she likes it.

 

Soo... here is the deal.  Notgrass looks so easy to implement, but would I be selling my daughter short?  I mean, it is a one year world history, so it obviously isn't going to go too in-depth.  But then I wonder, hmmm, does it truly matter for 7th grade?   Is it ok for her to just get a general flow of history, or should we really be studying in in depth?  

 

Part of me feels like I should go with Biblioplan and do the 4 year sequence, which she would not finish until 10th grade.  Then the other part of me thinks I should go with Notgrass and do Adam to Us for 7th, America the Beautiful for 8th and then continue on with Notgrass for High School.   But then I come back to "am I selling my daughter short"..... 

 

 

 

I say go with Notgrass. I don't know in what way you would be "selling [your[ daughter short." :confused1:  As you say, she's just 12. Why wouldn't it be ok for her to get a general flow of history? She has six more years of history at home, right? Well...

[Calm37]

My goal was always that my students would graduate LIKING history. I can honestly say I didn't really care how much they knew or mastered history. If they graduate never wanting to ever read history again, what good is that? 

One of my daughters told me a few weeks ago that her favorite year of history was the one where she read Churchill's "History of the English Speaking People" which I bought at at a thrift store for $4. That was 9th grade for her and she chose it. 

 

I think history is a great subject to keep "delight-directed" all the way through.

[Guest]

My oldest did the 4 year cycle with Biblioplan in grades 5-8 and loved it. I too went nuts, nuts, nuts trying to find history that we really liked for the middle grades and it wasn't easy.

I was very excited when Notgrass released Adam to Us!  This came out just in time for my youngest to use for middle school. We are now huge Notgrass fans - using all of their history curriculum for both middle and high school! :)

My youngest is still reading SOTW on her own, but we are not scheduling it with Notgrass. We tried to do that, and I realized we would enjoy Adam to Us and get much more out of it just by using it as written. We will continue through SOTW and use it as summer reading.

I would recommend both Biblioplan and Notgrass. I think it just depends on which one is a better fit for your student. If Adam to Us was around 4 years ago, then Notgrass would likely have been my #1 choice at that time.

 

[michaeljenn]

I think there is so much emphasis on the 4 year cycle of history in the homeschool world, that I feel like I HAVE to do it too!  UGH!!  That is where my pressure is coming from.  But, my daughter is just plain tired of everything being so centered on history!   She just wants it to be another subject.  All of our read alouds and all of her readers have been history based.  Then most of her papers/summaries have been about history.  I think she just wants a change.  She LOVES when I read aloud, but has requested some "fun" books.... or really just any books that are not focused on history! LOL!!  

 

Thank you for the advice!:)

[Peaceful Isle]

I do use/ will use SOTW for anywhere from k- 8th grade in someway or another. It's my absolute favorite. It is actually used in the 6th and 7th grade cores for Bookshark.

[kentuckymom]

I've never been there/done that, but I've finally settled on From Adam to Us next year, for my first year homeschooling my son who will be a sixth grader. I looked really seriously at Bookshark and some other lit based programs, but, in the end, I decided I neither wanted history to take up so much of our day nor so much of our homeschool budget. At first my son, who has always been in public school, wasn't keen on the idea of the textbook, but, once he looked at actual samples of this particular textbook, he loved it. No, you're not going to get as much depth as you'd get covering just one period of history, at the same time, you won't get as much depth doing that as you would, say, studying the history of just 16th century England for a year. And you wouldn't get as much depth with that as you'd get just studying The Great Depression in the U.S. for a year. See my point? You have to stop somewhere. It sounds like From Adam to Us will give your daughter what she wants next year, and it looks like a wonderful, interesting, survey for middle schoolers, so I say go for it.