History reading assignments....

[LNC]

I'm using SOTW 3 with Truthquest. I love having the freedom to pick and choose - rather than using a pre-planned history curriculum. Our library has a lot of out of print treasures that Truthquest recommends.

 

However, in order to finish AHYS 1 this year we need to keep moving. What ends up happening is that for each topic we'll read some of the spines OR read a loud historical fiction OR a reader or two. Rarely all three. Does that make sense?

 

For example, this month for the French and Indian War I read from our spine -A Child's Story of America. They took a multiple choice test and made 100% on it. They worked on some pages for their history notebooks. I checked out some non fiction Indian Wars books from the library but we didn't get to those. They are reading several Indian captivity novels. I'm reading Matchlock Gun to them. We listened to audio books for Calico Captive and Sign of the Beaver. We own several more non fiction chapter books for that time period. I just think we could get really bogged down if we don't move on. That is the only drawback about not having a schedule.

 

What I've done is placed asterisks next to the titles on our history reading list that we own but didn't get to. They can read them this summer. There are about 8 titles for this semester. We've read dozens though - bc we read a lot of nonfiction picture books from the library too.

 

Does this sound familiar to anyone? I can't make rigid schedules during that summer (like TOG or Sonlight), bc I don't know what books I'll want to assign for sure until we check them out from the library and look them over. I checked out 5 books about Daniel Boone that were recommended by Truthquest. I chose the Daugherty biography bc it was so well written. But, I needed to read a little bit of all of them before I could decide what to assign :). Is this what some of you refer to as the book basket method? Does anyone else cover history like this?

[Narrow Gate Academy]

Spines, fiction, or readers...

 

We never do all three. I either choose a spine or a reader to read aloud together. Any additional readers, especially the biographies, I choose 1 or 2 to assign the girls to read, then narrate orally. O the fictional books that I like the best, we pick one to read aloud together. The remaining fictional books are optional, but the girls generally do read most of these.

 

Choosing books...

 

I try to check out books at least a few weeks ahead of time to look over and make choices. This also gives me time to ILL if I need to do so.

 

HTH

[RhondaM.]

For TQ our spine was the Guerber books. I made up a schedule, dividing up the book to finish so many chapters per week over the entire year. My ds read the spines himself. He had the choice to spread out a weeks worth of chapters over the entire week, or to read them all in one day. (This was for 5th and 6th grade)

 

I then would look at the topics for a three week period and see what topics were discussed and what book suggestions were offered. I wrote down the ones in my sons reading level. Then I checked to see if Ambleside or SL or any other group used these books as well. The I'd check Amazon to see if there was a good description as well as a chapter of the book I could look at to get a feel for the writing style.

 

From that I'd come up with an idea of which book I wanted to assign for him to read over that 3 week period. Then I'd grab a few more fictions and non fictions to toss in the 'book basket' in case the book didn't work, or in case he read it sooner than 3 weeks.

 

Last year I bought most of the assigned books, but the others came from the library. It was just as good as getting a SL box, but with a less rigid schedule to follow.

 

I also used my MapQuest CD to print up maps to use.

 

It all worked really well.

[LNC]

Rhonda ~

Did you just have your child read straight through Guerber? Or did you use the TQ schedule? She schedules selections of Guerber a bit out of order.

[LNC]

Rhonda ~

Did you just have your child read straight through Guerber? Or did you use the TQ schedule? She schedules selections of Guerber a bit out of order.

[Sheila in OK]

:lurk5: Wondering this too. I'm trying to figure out how to schedule our history readings for the rest of the school year. We're doing AHYS I with the Guerber books and we need to speed it up a bit, it is taking FOREVER.

 

Rhonda ~

Did you just have your child read straight through Guerber? Or did you use the TQ schedule? She schedules selections of Guerber a bit out of order.

[mcconnellboys]

I do over-list and check out lots of books for review, then decide which ones we'll cover. Over-listing ahead of time allows for books that I can't get because someone else has checked them out, lost or stolen books that are no longer available when I want them, etc. By over-listing I know that I'll have at least some books I want when I want them during the school year for every topic we cover.

 

I do try to keep within the schedule I've set for us in order to keep moving on, as you say. Sometimes we get bogged down with a book or two from one period that we haven't quite finished yet before moving on to the next, but I do try to keep us moving ahead. So sad that we can't read ALL the great books out there, LOL!