Switching to Homeschool in 8th Grade - History Advice?

[magistrad]

We are switching to homeschool for the first time in the coming year.  We are giving it a try for the year, and - if it goes well - plan to continue for another year or beyond.  My daughter is 13 (rising 8th-grade).  Here is what she has covered in school so far:

• 3rd grade - a short unit on a handful of ancient civilizations & a short unit on local history
• 4th grade - Virginia history
• 5th grade - US history until Reconstruction
• 6th grade - completion of US history
• 7th grade - World Geography, part 1

I had her look at her geography textbook & it appears they covered mainly South America & Europe.  If she were to return to her school in 9th grade, she would be studying Ancient World History.

I am struggling with how to adapt the suggested progression in WTM to what she has studied, and what she has yet to study.  Should I use her existing textbook (McGraw Hill: Discovering World Geography, 2018) as a spine, and attempt to complete her geography course on my own, covering areas of the world she hasn't covered yet?  Or should I attempt to jump into the WTM progression, knowing that leaves some big gaps in her knowledge of the world?

I would be grateful for any insights or suggestions!  Thank you!

[HomeAgain]

Welcome to the board. 🙂

I think you should study a period she's interested in.  Give her this year of helping to plan a program that will work for her.  I tend to sit down with my kids and brainstorm, and then go looking for resources based on our conversation.  Then I bring the options I'm okay with to the table again, and have my kid pick from one of those (or be more explicit in what they want to study)

Now, about the WTM.  There's a reason for the history progression in the book but the more important part, IME, are the underlying skills taught in progressive order.  It's not exactly *what* is studied, but *how* it is studied, if that makes sense.  You can apply the same techniques of learning to study to whatever materials you'll be using for this year.  It sounds like 8th may be an odd year out for you guys, so the skill work would definitely be more important than the content work.

 

[magistrad]

HomeAgain, thank you so much for your very practical advice and for the reminder that the *how* is more important than the *what* at this stage!  🙂

[wendyroo]

2 hours ago, magistrad said:

We are giving it a try for the year, and - if it goes well - plan to continue for another year or beyond.  My daughter is 13 (rising 8th-grade). 

I just wanted to offer the standard caution/disclaimer about this idea. You are absolutely fine homeschooling just for 8th grade, but after that, taking it year by year might get much more complicated.

A public school has to enroll any appropriately-aged student who wants to attend, but they do not have to accept any previously earned credits - especially those earned in "dubious" ways like homeschooling. So if you were to homeschool your daughter in 9th grade, and then decided to enroll her in public school in 10th, the school could (and many will) force her to enroll as a 9th grader with no credits to her name and take all the standard 9th grade classes even if she covered that material at home the previous year. Other schools require students transferring in from homeschooling to test out of any courses that they want to "skip" because they did them at home.

Most homeschoolers view high school as all or nothing. If you decide to homeschool high school, it is good to assume that you will have to continue until the student graduates.

[PeterPan]

4 hours ago, magistrad said:

if it goes well

How far do you want to go to make it go well? Some people view 8th as the last year to have fun without the pressures of high school and transcripts. It can be a good time to do something unusual. I notice she had no medieval history, so you could do some kind of middle ages history plus literature (Lord of the Rings, etc.) type year, have tons of fun, if she was into that. 

Does she have skill gaps? Is she a strong student who could do anything you throw at her or does she have some particular needs? And what is she thinking for a high school progression? This is really the age you start to work backward. If she's going to want to DE or do some AP, you'll work backward for the timeline and the skills. High school goes very, very quickly.

5 hours ago, magistrad said:

I am struggling with how to adapt the suggested progression in WTM to what she has studied, and what she has yet to study.  Should I use her existing textbook (McGraw Hill: Discovering World Geography, 2018) as a spine, and attempt to complete her geography course on my own, covering areas of the world she hasn't covered yet?  Or should I attempt to jump into the WTM progression, knowing that leaves some big gaps in her knowledge of the world?

Veritas Press does a 5 year history progression and then two 3 year cycles (7th-9th, 10th-12th). So if you think of what she has done so far as one longer cycle (which it basically is), then what is flummoxing you is what you do while waiting for what the ps would do in 9th. What do they do in 8th? I really think you could do anything. You could start a cycle. You could do something out of the box. Since you said having a good year was important, talking with the dc about what they want and what they wish could happen will be part of that.

[Momto6inIN]

Echoing what @wendyroo said about hs'ing high school. Hs'ing high school is an amazing journey and I wouldn't trade it for anything, but it's best to start with your eyes wide open.

We jumped into hs'ing when my oldest was in 8th grade. He had done some slap dash history/social studies in public school but not anything comprehensive or extensive. I'd say study whatever she is interested in to make the transition to hs'ing as easy as possible. Then, if you decide to continue in high school, start on the 4 year history cycle at that point.

[magistrad]

Wendyroo, thank you for that insight!  We would probably return to the private school where they were enrolled previously rather than public, but it's good to have on my radar that this should be part of the conversation.  I wouldn't have thought about that.  Fortunately, I was also a teacher at the school they were attending, so we at least have a relationship established.

[EKS]

If you really want to do geography, the text Geography Alive! is well done.  I'd augment it with some supplemental reading about things that might be interesting to her and/or fiction set in the areas she is studying.  

[2_girls_mommy]

I agree with what  was said about  public school credits.  I would  check with your private school to see if they accept nonaccredited homeschool credits as part of their transcripts towards a diploma. Likely it depends on rules to do with whatever association they are accredited with.  It is good to know that.  I have seen many homeschoolers decide to enroll kids into public or  public charter schools here who had done a year or more of homeschool highschool and the schools only took their PE credits. All kids had to start over and retake all high school credits from the beginning in the public schools. 

But beyond that, I am different from what everyone else  has said.  I would jump in and start at the beginning of the WTM high school cycle and do ancients.  It is what her school would be doing.  It gets you started on the full four year cycle of WTM history a year early.  That has the benefit of not mattering too much if your school doesn't accept  it should you decide to enroll her, because ancients isn't usually required in high school anyway.  
If you continue  to homeschool you have five years to get through the four year cycle  for some wiggle room, or get it done in four  years and be done before senior year, which is good, because since it is required to graduate most places, it will already be done when you are applying to colleges.  

I don't see that she will have any gaps because the WTM cycle is a four year cycle.  You do geography along with history if you are following WTM, so it doesn't have to be  separate.  I nave gave mine a credit for geography, they just did mapwork throughout high school with history, and mine did do a a couple of reports for a geography co-op class (that wasn't enough for any credits towards geography, but  definitely enhanced her history credits.) 

Good luck!

[magistrad]

Thank you to everyone for your replies!  You've given me lots of good ideas to consider!