Secular homeschooler with Tapestry of Grace envy... WWYD?

[Smithie]

OK, my ds will be doing kindergarten with the South Carolina Virtual Charter School, which contracts with K12 for the curriculum. I am fine with that choice. I feel the format is a good fit with his abilities and preferences, and I'm not really a big believer in kindergarten anyway. The main purpose of doing this is to give his sister another year to get old enough to follow along with SOTW and to give me another year to get my act together with our classical curriculum.

 

Having looked around at the various options, I have major, major Tapestry of Grace envy. Having a scope and sequence mapped out by a person who had BTDT would be so useful!

 

However, we are secular homeschoolers (well, Jewish, but we teach evolution etc. so the resources we draw from are mainly secular. The kids have a totally separate Religious School with its own curriculum). Has anybody run across anything like TOG that is secular? Or is this something I'd have to CREATE if I want it to exist? (Now there's a project for the next decade of my life!)

[Mama Lynx]

I've often thought about creating one, so if you want to, I'd love to help ;-)

 

However, since I've got children I've got to teach NOW, and not in a decade, I am using TOG. We are not Christian, but so far I have had very little trouble using TOG secularly. We don't do the church history. Most of the rest of the readings are not religious. There are occasionally some religious items in the discussion questions, or student activity pages, but there are more secular or neutral questions than religious questions. And frankly, most of the religious questions can easily be adapted to our own faith and worldview.

 

I expect that I will have more difficulty with Year 1. So far I have used Year 2 units 3 and 4, and Year 3 units 1 and 2.

[Smithie]

If my DH even sees a TOG book lying around, he will quite literally build a bonfire in the backyard and toss it on. So the sane, reasonable, sensible path of adapting TOG to a liberal Jewish worldview is not going to work for us. It was enough of a battle to convince him that you can't study the history of Western civilization without going into church history to the extent that SOTW does! :D (I mean, he does realize that church history needs to be taught if we want to raise socially literate human beings, it just gets him really emotionally worked up when he things of the heartbreak and bloodshed that occurred as part of the development of a worldview that he totally can't relate to. He's pretty much an atheist.)

 

I think I'd better start working on my own version. It's good to know there's interest out there - I'm sure I'd get tons of insanely useful feedback from these forums!

 

I'm very excited to get my new copy of WTM - hopefully the updated curriculum suggestions will have some more secular recommendations in the grammar area!

[homeschoolchic]

:001_smile:..keep us posted

[Mama Lynx]

If my DH even sees a TOG book lying around, he will quite literally build a bonfire in the backyard and toss it on. So the sane, reasonable, sensible path of adapting TOG to a liberal Jewish worldview is not going to work for us. It was enough of a battle to convince him that you can't study the history of Western civilization without going into church history to the extent that SOTW does! :D (I mean, he does realize that church history needs to be taught if we want to raise socially literate human beings, it just gets him really emotionally worked up when he things of the heartbreak and bloodshed that occurred as part of the development of a worldview that he totally can't relate to. He's pretty much an atheist.)

 

I think I'd better start working on my own version. It's good to know there's interest out there - I'm sure I'd get tons of insanely useful feedback from these forums!

 

I'm very excited to get my new copy of WTM - hopefully the updated curriculum suggestions will have some more secular recommendations in the grammar area!

 

I guess I don't completely understand. The religious stuff in TOG is very easy to leave out, or skip altogether. You just ... don't do those parts. It's not at all like ... er ... some other curricula on the market, that weaves worldview so tightly within the teaching that you cannot avoid it.

 

Good luck! I wish I had the time and energy to write one right now. I'm sure you would get tons of useful feedback from here. I'd certainly be glad to help. Keep us posted!

[LadyAberlin]

I don't know the age of you oldest, but I have an Orthodox Jewish friend that is using Trisms this year. It is put out by a christian co, but it is secular. If you are christian or catholic and want christian history you can purchase the separate supplements. So I think it would be easy enough to create your own Jewish supplement. Some friends of mine were discussing with me about us all requesting Trisms to make a Jewish history supplement. Have you looked at History Odyssey? It is secular. That is what I'm using this year. I plan on using it until my kids are the age where they can use Trisms.

Edited May 3, 2009 by LadyAberlin

[4wildberrys]

If my DH even sees a TOG book lying around, he will quite literally build a bonfire in the backyard and toss it on. So the sane, reasonable, sensible path of adapting TOG to a liberal Jewish worldview is not going to work for us. It was enough of a battle to convince him that you can't study the history of Western civilization without going into church history to the extent that SOTW does! :D (I mean, he does realize that church history needs to be taught if we want to raise socially literate human beings, it just gets him really emotionally worked up when he things of the heartbreak and bloodshed that occurred as part of the development of a worldview that he totally can't relate to. He's pretty much an atheist.)

 

 

Exactly though! All that "stuff" IS part of history---so how do you avoid it teaching history? Obviously, TOG or like someone else said Trisms that is not presently a worldview that offends you guys, but allows you to teach and broach these subjects that simply ARE part of history and teach your view and side of it to your kids. We are CAtholics, but use pretty much ALL Protestant materials---which of course only presents the Protestant take on history---but it allows for GREAT discussions on what really is the truth and "our" version of history. I understand your dh's emotional reaction because I used to get SO hot under the collar with some history books. BUT---I realized it allowed for "me" to insert and explain things to my kids, especially teaching them how textbooks write their own version of history without actually teaching the "truth". Plus I really didn't want our kids to have a lopsided view of history by avoiding the Protestant view.

[Michelle T]

I guess I don't completely understand. The religious stuff in TOG is very easy to leave out, or skip altogether. You just ... don't do those parts. It's not at all like ... er ... some other curricula on the market, that weaves worldview so tightly within the teaching that you cannot avoid it.

 

Good luck! I wish I had the time and energy to write one right now. I'm sure you would get tons of useful feedback from here. I'd certainly be glad to help. Keep us posted!

 

 

While it is probably easy to secularize TOG, it can still get very tiresome having to do so, and reading over the parts that are to be left out. I've used plenty of religious materials and just skipped parts, but it always starts to get on my nerves after a while. I understand the OP's hubby perfectly.

Michelle T

[Mama Lynx]

While it is probably easy to secularize TOG, it can still get very tiresome having to do so, and reading over the parts that are to be left out. I've used plenty of religious materials and just skipped parts, but it always starts to get on my nerves after a while. I understand the OP's hubby perfectly.

Michelle T

 

It got tiring for us, with Rod and Staff, and sometimes with Henle and Latina Christiana. It's also tiring for us to find material to use to teach about the Bible, that doesn't also preach, so we've done regrettably little in that area.

 

Compared to those, all I have to do with TOG is just skip books or questions. It's just really easy.

 

I'm not trying to talk anyone into TOG. I don't care one way or the other. I just find this interesting. For years I stayed away from TOG because people told me it was difficult to impossible to secularize. And I've been amused by how easy it is, in reality. In light of that, I thought the bonfire comment was ... just not justified for this particular curriculum. It's possible that there's some part of it that is terribly hard to secularize, that I haven't seen yet.

 

To each his/her own.

[Karen in CO]

Stephanie,

I agree that TOG is easy to remove the religious parts from, but I've only looked at year2. I had looked at the TOC for Year 1 and decided that I would use something else for that year when we get back around to ancients again. Have you used year 1 and was it as simple to secularize?

 

Thanks

[Karen in CO]

have you looked carefully at one or more of the 3 week samples with your husband? In your place, I would print out a sample, and go over it. It is very deep and rich and it is many great things, especially at the logic and rhetoric levels, but seeing for yourself how pervasive the religious content is helps more than anything else.

[iwka]

I use TOG (Y3 so far), although I don't agree with some of the worldview/religion premises that is presents, but they are minor. You can easily skip church history/worldview part.