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My dd is  going to do a Human Geography course for 9th gr this year. I have the Great Courses Human Geography course to use and have started getting together activities and articles etc to add to it. I just keep thinking I need something else too. I don't want to use one of the usual texts they use for AP courses because they are so dry and tedious. I have been looking and looking for an interesting text but so far no luck.

I'm thinking of also having her learn the world's countries etc so wondered if you had any good suggestions for resources for that.

I would also like suggestions for any good living books we could use.

Basically if you have any good suggestions for me for this course that would be great. We're not going to do the AP exam because I don't think she is quite ready for that, and also I have not found any colleges that give credit for it.

Thanks for any and all advice and ideas!

Edited by TCB
If you have any past threads you could link that would be great too. I tried searching and couldn't see any.
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For learning the countries, Sheppard Software is great and free. When I was in 10th grade, they made us freehand draw the entire world on butcher paper for a 10th of your final grade for the year. That was... motivating. And also easy to manage.

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13 minutes ago, Farrar said:

For learning the countries, Sheppard Software is great and free. When I was in 10th grade, they made us freehand draw the entire world on butcher paper for a 10th of your final grade for the year. That was... motivating. And also easy to manage.

Thanks for the ideas!

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I never found a human geography textbook that I liked.  I would use the course guidebook for suggestions on supplemental reading, and for output, I'd have her do projects.  I wouldn't have her memorize where the world's countries are--it's not really relevant for a human geography course.

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1 hour ago, EKS said:

I never found a human geography textbook that I liked.  I would use the course guidebook for suggestions on supplemental reading, and for output, I'd have her do projects.  I wouldn't have her memorize where the world's countries are--it's not really relevant for a human geography course.

Thanks! I hadn't thought about reading suggestions from the course guidebook but was going to have some of the questions as essay prompts. I know the countries thing isn't strictly part of Human Georgraphy, but having seen a video clip of people failing to be able to recognize any country I feel like I definitely want to make sure that isn't the case with my kids lol!

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9 minutes ago, rjand6more said:

We followed this schedule:

https://homeschoolinghelper.wordpress.com/ap-human-geography/

The textbook was a bit boring.  Not sure there's anything high school/college level that's not boring, though.

They all seem boring to me too and because we don't really want to do the test I'd like to avoid the dull dryness if at all possible. Thanks for the link!

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DD isn't doing Human Geography exactly, more of a World Cultures/Religions class with a little geography thrown in for good measure, so these might not meet your needs. But if you're just trying to generate some ideas ...

She is reading a few chapters from BJU Cultural Geography, all of a National Geographic book called Peoples of the World, and all of World Religions by DK. She will make several recipes from Eat Your Way Around the World. She will read a biography of a missionary to each continent. And she will read modern-day fiction/biography from each continent except North America. Well, not Antarctica either but that's only because she's already read Shackleton, otherwise I would have included that. Those titles are: Kon-Tiki, Cry the Beloved Country, I Am Malala (I know the Middle East is not a separate continent, but thought it deserved its own book choice ?), The Queen of Water, Between Shades of Gray, Mao's Last Dancer. She is also doing Seterra online geography games.

She's pretty excited about it, so hopefully it's not too dry. I didn't like most geography textbooks either, although the BJU one isn't *too* terribly bad. But that's why I'm only having her read a few chapters from it and then using it as a reference and using the National Geographic/DK books as spines.

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9 hours ago, Momto5inIN said:

DD isn't doing Human Geography exactly, more of a World Cultures/Religions class with a little geography thrown in for good measure, so these might not meet your needs. But if you're just trying to generate some ideas ...

She is reading a few chapters from BJU Cultural Geography, all of a National Geographic book called Peoples of the World, and all of World Religions by DK. She will make several recipes from Eat Your Way Around the World. She will read a biography of a missionary to each continent. And she will read modern-day fiction/biography from each continent except North America. Well, not Antarctica either but that's only because she's already read Shackleton, otherwise I would have included that. Those titles are: Kon-Tiki, Cry the Beloved Country, I Am Malala (I know the Middle East is not a separate continent, but thought it deserved its own book choice ?), The Queen of Water, Between Shades of Gray, Mao's Last Dancer. She is also doing Seterra online geography games.

She's pretty excited about it, so hopefully it's not too dry. I didn't like most geography textbooks either, although the BJU one isn't *too* terribly bad. But that's why I'm only having her read a few chapters from it and then using it as a reference and using the National Geographic/DK books as spines.

Ooo, do you mind sharing your plan? I just got done scheduling out BJU Geography and it seems a bit tedious and is making me feel bogged down already. What you're describing sounds perfect. 

 

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10 hours ago, Scuff. said:

Ooo, do you mind sharing your plan? I just got done scheduling out BJU Geography and it seems a bit tedious and is making me feel bogged down already. What you're describing sounds perfect. 

 

2 weeks General Geography & Antarctica - BJU ch 1-4 and 24 - National Geo (NG) book Intro and World Religions (WR) book preface - I would schedule Shackleton here if they haven't already read it

2 weeks North America - NG North America section - WR Christianity section and Native Religions section also read encyclopedia.com section on indigenous religions - recipe from Eat Around the World

4 weeks South America - NG Central and South America sections - Queen of Water - book of Cameron Townsend - recipe - writeup or presentation about some aspect of culture and how it influences their worldview

4 weeks Africa - NG Subsaharan Africa section - Cry tthe Beloved Country - bio of Mary Slessor - recipe - writeup or presentation 

4 weeks Europe - NG Europe section- WR Ancient Religions section (Greek, Roman, Norse, Celtic) - Between Shades of Grey - bio of Brother Andrew - recipe - writeup or presentation 

5 weeks Middle East - NG North Africa and Middle East section - WR Ancient Religions section (Egyptian, Zoroastrianism), WR Judaism section, WR Islam section - research Baha'i - I Am Malala - recipe - writeup or presentation 

7 weeks Asia - NG Asia section, WR Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Chinese Religions, and Japanese religions sections - Mao's Last Dancer - bios of Amy Carmichael and Hudson Taylor - recipe- writeup or presentation 

4 weeks Australia/Oceania - NG Oceania section - resesrch on aboriginalculture.com - Kon Tiki - bio of Florence Young - recipe - writeup or presentation 

4 weeks - final written project compare/contrast essay on 2 or 3 world religions

She will also do Seterra online geography games once/week to make sure she knows where the countries (and maybe capitals) of the world are

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  • 3 months later...

I just wanted to give a little up-date on our Human Geography course so far.

 

We aren't going to do the AP exam but are doing a year of Human Geography. We are using the Great Courses Human and Cultural Geography and I found a shorter, more concise text book to go with it by John Rennie Short.

My dd watches a lecture and reads the text but the thing we have found most useful is that we are doing a sort of project based learning. I found a project on the internet called a PING Project and have adapted it to suit us. Dd chose a developing country - she chose Brazil - and after each lecture of the course I have her do an activity using the concept covered in the course relating it to her chosen country. These activities vary from writing a paper, making maps or graphs, reading and summarizing a newspaper article, to making a power point presentation. For instance - we just covered epidemiology in the lecture so I am having her research the Zika virus in Brazil and write a paper describing the way it was investigated and cause found and containment measures, treatment etc. I think I am also going to have her fill in a world map showing the countries the disease has been found in.

We have found relating the concepts she's learning in a really practical way, by using them in the study of her chosen country, to be a good way of learning them .

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What you are doing sounds neat!  Very interesting work!

My dd took a APHG course in 9th grade.  I think it's a very interesting course and wish these kinds of courses got more cred.  It is true that it is only counted as an elective for high school, but she did get elective credit at her college.  Her college almost counts no AP courses and they have to retake most of the classes except basic English classes, which they have to prove by testing. 

So really I there is no point in taking the AP exams.  Having said that it is a very doable exam and my DD got a 5 on it.  It's  a confidence booster.  

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  • 2 years later...
6 minutes ago, Farrar said:

It's an AP prep course, but not an CB approved AP course it seems?

Right, but couldn't private homeschoolers get their syllabus approved? I don't know how that works. We will just use the test score for UCs for a-g purposes. 

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I’d never heard of this provider before, but the American History course says 120-150 hours per semester. A that seems a bit high to me, but then again, I’ve heard of people spending 10 hours a week on some other classes, so maybe not?

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14 minutes ago, stripe said:

I’d never heard of this provider before, but the American History course says 120-150 hours per semester. A that seems a bit high to me, but then again, I’ve heard of people spending 10 hours a week on some other classes, so maybe not?

It seems high for a non AP class. I can see a student spending that amount of time for AP USH. 

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