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domchurch3
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| Posted: May 25 2008 at 10:20pm | IP Logged
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I'm thinking about next year's curriculum and where I'd like to go. For years before I was even needing to think that far ahead on the subject, I was sold on the Well-Trained Mind's chronological view of teaching history. Now, I'm not so sure that's the best route for us. I'm interested in knowing how those who don't follow a chronological order approach history studies. Do you study history in the context of whatever read-alouds you do or do you start off with plans to study certain periods in depth but allow for rabbit trails? The thought of chronological history was intriguing and it makes sense, but I found myself putting off reading books that I was yearning to share with my daughter simply because I thought, "No, I can't introduce the Little House Books until the 4th grade." Yes, I know, totally faulty thinking. I'm thinking that a Book of Centuries along with a timeline will help put each era were studying into perspective. I'm also thinking it might serve us more to spend more time on Geography than History this year. Has anyone put off History studies until after 1st grade?
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folklaur
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| Posted: May 25 2008 at 10:48pm | IP Logged
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IMO....
a first grader doesn't need formal history. I mean, you can do general time periods, like study Egypt and make sugar cube pyramids and a pyramid out of a box and they can decorate the inside, and write their name in hieroglyphs....and you can touch on Middle Ages and make a castle and design a coat of arms and have a feast, etc...stuff like that for a 1st grader. Hands on stuff.
I have the Usborne First Encyclopedia of History - the first encyclopedia is totally geared to this age. I am using it as a springboard for my first grader (plus it is internet linked so there are more ideas online through the Usborne website for printable pages and other websites, etc) and reading books to go along with - like Magic Tree House and Magic School Bus and Good Times Travel Agency. And picture books. Lots of picture books.
Kids don't seem to need chronological history. I think it appeals to us Moms because it makes sense to us  . Kids seem to do fine, especially if you have a timeline so they can "see" it.
I mean...a first grader is roughly 6 years old. How much do you really remember from your school work from when you were six? 
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JodieLyn
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| Posted: May 25 2008 at 10:57pm | IP Logged
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We do 2 types of reading.. I have a list with books going chronologically and then whatever sounds good.
So we'd probably be starting with Bible stories (where else do you start history but with Creation? ) but then also reading different books that might be particularly interesting to the child.
The fun thing is that you connect the dots as you go.. so for instance.. we'd read some of the American Girl books about WWII and then read the Narnia books.. and we could connect the dots.. remember the war in Molly that made Emily come and stay with her. It was that SAME THING that made the kids have to go to the country in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
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domchurch3
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| Posted: May 26 2008 at 6:13pm | IP Logged
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cactus mouse wrote:
IMO....
I mean...a first grader is roughly 6 years old. How much do you really remember from your school work from when you were six? |
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Which is exactly my reason for wanting to put off a more formal emphasis for a later time. At the same time, I don't want her to miss out on the fun of sugarcube pyramids and so on, so I think what I'll do is just do some history from whatever it is were reading from our Read-Alouds and Scripture study. I'm doing a combination of Mater Amablis, Simply Charlotte Mason and Sonlight Read-Alouds. MA has 1st graders begin a 3 year study of US history and SCM rotates 6 modules, so a 1st grader would have a broad survey of all of history in 6 weeks increments. For some reason, that I can't pinpoint, neither of those options appeals to me.
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K&Rs Mom
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| Posted: May 28 2008 at 2:24pm | IP Logged
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JodieLyn wrote:
| We do 2 types of reading.. I have a list with books going chronologically and then whatever sounds good. |
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This is what we do too, for the same reason you mentioned - I found I was putting off a lot of stuff I wanted to do because it didn't fit into our time-focus. We're using the WTM plan for history, and some of the books recommended to go with that, but have other books at the same time. So my dc are reading about the ancients for school, but we just finished reading Heidi (late 1800s Switzerland) and started Thimble Summer (early 1900s America). Since we usually do our schoolwork in the morning, if they ask me to read in the afternoon we'll pick up our other book. They remember info out of both, and ask me questions randomly through the day that show they're processing both, so I guess it's working!
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mom3aut1not
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| Posted: May 28 2008 at 3:43pm | IP Logged
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Have you seen First Timeline from RC History? It would seem to be a nice framework for an easy history study.
In Christ,
Deborah
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Sparrow
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| Posted: June 16 2008 at 10:35am | IP Logged
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I picked up the story of the world vol. 1 off ebay, but we won't be doing a strict history curriculum. I really just want her to begin to have a general introduction to the major ancient civilizations (and I LOVE that stuff myself) and do some fun projects. We're going to do basic American history, too (we do 18th century historical re-enacting so it's not like it's a totally foreign thing to her). I'll be re-introducing all of this in more depth as the years go on, too, so I don't feel any pressure to make sure she knows it all by heart.
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MarilynW
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| Posted: June 16 2008 at 11:54am | IP Logged
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I have moved away from the WTM approach. My first graders did not find the Ancient History so interesting when we did it (they were just 6)
I think reading lots of living books and using a Book of Centuries/timeline book is good.
I use the timeline notebook and cds from Homeschool in the Woods - the little ones just color in pictures from the cd, the big ones color in and stick in the timeline notebooks. We print out saints etc from the internet to stick in the notebooks.
I can find a link to a printable pdf Book of Centuries if you are interested.
The website Reading Your Way Through History is a good source of books - also Sonlight, MODG, Emmanuel Books catalog etc
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hopalenik
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It really depends on the child. My first who is 8 1/2 loves history. She can't read enough about different time periods-american, Egyptian, Greek, and the middle ages. But my twins who are 7, don't get it. So I quit. The oldest reads and reads. I am working on the continents with the twins in a Montessori like way. We are using a Montessori continent map and some animal printouts and some pictures of cultures and stuff. And I am reading through Setons American History Grade 1, as a read aloud because I realized that they had never picked up on who Abraham Lincoln was, etc. We started doing some History Pockets work with a Childs History of the World but the twins retained nothing. With the first we read through the first 2 volumes of STOw and she LOVED it, LOVED it, Loved it. With her reading I have let it be all over the place historically and at the moment I am just hardly reading at all because I have to regain control of reading time-the hearing impaired child makes reading out loud an excruciatingly painful event...
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4Real Forums : Across Time and Place
Topic: History for 1st grader?
