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Topic: How Do you Approach History??

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JennGM
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Posted: May 31 2010 at 7:21pm \| IP Logged

I'm trying to plan our year. I need to see a big picture of where we are going with our history. We're doing 2nd grade level next year (I'm getting anxiety just seeing that in print).

I know nothing is etched in stone, but I want our approach to be thought-out and not willy-nilly.

From what I'm reading, Charlotte Mason approach was to have national history alongside with world history every year. Did she approach world history chronologically? 3 or 4 or more year cycles?

What is the typical approach for classical method?

So, how do approach history in your house? Chronological? Cyclical? Both? Where does American History fit into your big picture?

And then the next question I have is how do you divide your time periods. What are the eras or periods? Are there typical periods, like Ancient, Middle Ages, Renaissance and Reformation, and Modern Times? Or do you break it down differently?

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JennGM
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Posted: May 31 2010 at 7:54pm \| IP Logged

Clarifying, what I really want to see is a big picture, like

We cover American history these years
World history is covered in ___ year cycles, with a breakdown of

Grade 1:
Grade 2: Ancients, covering prehistoric to New Testament times ....

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guitarnan
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Posted: May 31 2010 at 8:27pm \| IP Logged

We cover American history by field trips and in 7th-8th grades (1.5 years plus .5 year of state history/civics), and again in high school (1 year U.S. history). We did state history a couple of times (grade 4 for dd, a little later for ds). Again, field trips were a big part of this process.

My children are far apart in age, but we did history together until ds hit high school. It was much easier for me to only teach one time period! It looked a little like this:

Grade 5/K (ds/dd): Ancient Rome (we were in Italy)
Grade 6/1: More Rome (still in Italy) and ancient Greece
Grade 7/2: U.S. History (ds) and ancient Egypt (dd)
Grade 8/3: U.S. History (ds), WV history (both), Ancient Rome, Greece and Bible Lands(dd), civics (both)
Grade 9/4: World History (ds), MD history and European medieval/Renaissance history, California history via field trips (dd)
Grade 10/5: World History 1900-present (ds), MD and
Grade 11/6: Econ/Civics (ds), Area Studies (Japan, Canada, Hawai'i, including some history) (dd)
Grade 12/7: U.S. History (ds, community college), U.S. History (dd)

As you can see, the sequence depended on where we were, physically, for most of the first couple of years and for state history. When we

I deliberately took 1.5 years for jr. high U.S. history because that is how I studied it in school and we got all the way to the present day. No one seems to manage that in a one-year course.

I know this looks very jumbled, but we're military and have had the chance to travel to Europe as well as explore the mid-Atlantic states. We do California history whenever we visit family.

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Posted: May 31 2010 at 9:26pm \| IP Logged

JennGM wrote:

From what I'm reading, Charlotte Mason approach was to have national history alongside with world history every year.

She did and frankly I just can't manage, we get whiplash.

What we do is one term (10 weeks) of national history each year and the rest on a time period of our choosing. I know many do the 4 year cycle method but well.. I'm not that disciplined. So we tend to spend 5 weeks + on an area of current interest. Although currently we are working our way through Vol 4 of History of the World (a whole 'nother post)

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leanne maree
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 6:54am \| IP Logged

WE have worked our way through history from the ancients. we are still there. we will move to medieval next year. We followed Mater Amabilis, with history.

we do 10 week block each year on our nations history.
We will expand this to world histoy as well.

It seems to work. I use living books as well as history texts to give us sufficient information.
I invisage to be cycling back in 2 years.

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Maryan
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 7:22am \| IP Logged

A *little* off the topic Jenn, but he year that I had RC history Vol. 1 all set ended up being a crisis year. My oldest was in 2nd grade. I think it would have been too early for him anyway. I wish I did World Culture instead: studying maps, making passports of the places we visited, making fun lapbooks of all those places, eating the foods, studying their saints,... and studying a little bit of each country's history as we did each one.

Then... when we began World history, he'd be familiar with all the different places.

So far in American history, we've studied the Indians, Lewis and Clark, and the American holidays in mini-unit studies.

I don't have a plan, but I'd like to study two years of world history and two years of American history. Dont' know if it'll happen.

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Angel
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 7:22am \| IP Logged

I don't know that there is a "typical" approach for the classical method. The WTM recommends a 4 year cycle (ancients, medieval, early modern, modern), but Drew Campbell's recommendations in The Latin-Centered Curriculum are different: national history alongside classical (as in ancient - Greek/Roman) history/lit every year until high school. Other places break the early years down into Greeks/Romans/Egyptians (focusing on each culture's history for a whole year), then doing national and modern history in the upper elementary grades.

I like to have everyone on the same page for history because we do a lot of read alouds, but some of my kids will follow rabbit trails that lead them into other periods of history at the same time. I can't do that formally, though, because I need history to provide at least a loose framework for our year.

I didn't start out with any "big picture" for history, but sort of tried to make one when my oldest was about 4th/5th grade. We do the Ancient/Medieval/Early Modern/Modern system with some variations. For instance, it is taking us longer to get through the medieval period right now so that really we are doing one year medieval/one year Renaissance/Age of Exploration.

What it's come down to, based on my oldest, is:

K: brief overview of world history based on interest (ships, for him)
1: more overview, based on interest (this was actually chronological) -- American history, mainly Revolution
2: Ancient history (Greeks, Romans, Egyptians)/American History (continuing from Revolution to Laura Ingalls Wilder books)
3: More American History, including in-depth study of Native American cultures and the rest of the Laura Ingalls Wilder books
4: finishing up American History (a really long time on the Civil War)
5: 20th Century History (World Wars 1 and 2, Great Depression, Cold War)
6: Ancient History
7: Medieval History, from Fall of Rome to Crusades

(projected)

8: Renaissance/Age of Exploration
9: Early Modern/Colonial America/American Revolution
10: Modern/American History to 20th century
11: Twentieth Century
12: History/Social Studies elective (govt and econ will be mixed in every year) -- at this point, it looks like he may want to study archaeology intensively somewhere along the way

My other kids who will be following this plan will end up with totally different projections for high school, though, because their starting points were different. So I thought I had it worked out that my dd would be doing a 4 year cycle in high school 9th-12th, but now that I look at it, I don't know.

Anyway, we tend to use our "big plan" more as a guideline than as any hard and fast rule. Basically, I break each time period down into units and the kids choose units by interest. If they're really interested in a certain culture/time, we take longer. If not, we do the overview and move on. I have all the SOTW books on CD, which has worked better for us than actually reading the books and provides a good chronological, big picture framework for each period. (We discuss any anti-Catholic bias along the way.)

Others may disagree with me but I have found that up until about 4th grade or so, my kids are perfectly happy to hop around in history based on interest. It's cultivating the interest that's most important then, IMO. Then, in the upper elementary years, they're ready to organize their knowledge a bit more.

So I wouldn't worry about trying anything in 2nd grade and then changing your mind later on. 2nd grade is still very young. You won't ruin him by spending some time on American history then switching to ancient and later on deciding to do a classical rotation.

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Maryan
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 8:18am \| IP Logged

Here's Susan Wise Bauer's classical opinion: A Classical Approach to History

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Maryan
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Maryan
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 1:25pm \| IP Logged

Angela and Nancy thanks for your detailed breakdowns!

And Jenn, I forgot this interesting free source that I stumbled upon for the Ancients: Myths, Maps and Marvels

Here's the resource list: here

She has many downloads for 36 week curriculums (5 days - not good for me). This one is minus the study on evolution and uses Gombrich instead of SOTW: Curriculum using A Little History of the World

ETA: Click around she as several other options and links.

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JodieLyn
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 1:38pm \| IP Logged

I started with a 4 year cycle.. quickly realized that the closer we get to modern that the more things I wanted to include. So I take a time period when the interest is there.. and we spend a bit of time "connecting the dots" in an informal way.

For instance we haven't done the reformation/renassiance period at all.. we started with ancient and then had a child intensely interested in the Revolutionary War.. and I now have a child intersted in the Civil War..

Well I know that when you're really interested you actually remember things for much longer than any other method.. so I go with it. Now I'm not talking a whole year on the Civil War rather.. we take the time period of interest and go out on both sides to a "period"..

So I've been collecting resources for this coming year to be the 19th century.. hitting on the War of 1812, Civil War, Spanish American War, Lewis and Clark, and pioneers.. being sure to hit the Mountain Man era before the rush westward (my mom is starting a business in costumes with that period)

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ekbell
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 2:54pm \| IP Logged

I've ended up cycling through history.

With my younger children (grades one to four) it's fairly informal, some of my read-alouds happen to progress chronologically and occasionally they color a picture which is placed in the appropriate section of our Book of Centuries.

I started with my oldest by reading bible stories plus stories about the other places that were around then, moved to Saint stories plus books about the timeperiod they lived in and then moved to books focusing on our country's (Canada) history when we came to that point.

However my main focus during these years is on geography and world culture.

So my planning for the younger years goes like this.

Grade one -Overview of Canada (include older children in section on voting) plus listening to historical read-alouds

Grade two -overview of world geography and culture organized by continent plus listening to historical read-alouds

Grade three-more focused study of the child's choice of countries plus listening to historical read-alouds

Grade four -study of Canadian natives which focuses on the effect of physical geography on lifestyle; plus further study of current Canadian Geography. plus listening to historical read-alouds

When my oldest child was finishing grade four, I started thinking about starting more serious history studies with her. We'd managed to read our way through to the modern age so I decided that we might as well start with the Ancients.

So her formal study has been

Grade five: Ancients to the time of Christ

Grade six:Time of Christ to high Medieval (first to 11th century)

And I'm planning to continue with
Grade seven:High Medieval to (hopefully) Early Modern (11th to 17th century)

[I have a guide for corrolating Canadian history with American and world history which should make studying National and World history along side each other easier.]

I haven't decided exactly what form our studies will take once we've finished this formal overview but I'm leaning towards a more focused look at historical periods of the student's choice.

JennGM
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 3:07pm \| IP Logged

I'm so enjoying all your responses! Please keep them coming!

Angel wrote:

Others may disagree with me but I have found that up until about 4th grade or so, my kids are perfectly happy to hop around in history based on interest. It's cultivating the interest that's most important then, IMO. Then, in the upper elementary years, they're ready to organize their knowledge a bit more.

So I wouldn't worry about trying anything in 2nd grade and then changing your mind later on. 2nd grade is still very young. You won't ruin him by spending some time on American history then switching to ancient and later on deciding to do a classical rotation.

Thanks for this. It's not that I'm afraid of ruining him, it's that I feel like I need to pull in my reins and get a sense of direction.

A few more questions. What kind of approach does MODG take? I didn't want to open every overview and was hoping someone would be familiar.

A lot of your answers refer to incorporating geography and culture instead of "straight history". That gives me something to chew on.

I find I like to see the "whole picture" including culture and geography when stuydying a period. How many of you really "separate" these subjects?

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Posted: June 01 2010 at 3:25pm \| IP Logged

oh definately not.. the culture.. the ways and mores of a society make so much difference to what was done and said and why.

Laws only give you a very limited view of things people did or did not do. Society could exert great pressure on people to conform without resorting to laws for instance.

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Posted: June 01 2010 at 3:51pm \| IP Logged

JennGM wrote:

A few more questions. What kind of approach does MODG take? I didn't want to open every overview and was hoping someone would be familiar.

I always look at MODG first when I'm planning my year for her thoughts. Sometimes I don't use any of her suggestions, but she's my starting point. However, I've never read any theory behind her history plans either. This is just my observation from her book choices at Emmanuel.

MODG seems to start American History in 2nd grade with reading biographies of the famous people: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Paul Reverse, etc.

In 3rd grade, she uses How Our Nation Began as a Spine with more biographical books.

4th: Seems to go back to Exploration -- spines: Our Pioneers and Patriots and Cath. Faith Comes to Americas with biographies of Christopher Columbus etc.

5th: The Revoluion is covered through book choices

6th: Old World and America and begins Ancient Egypt

7th: Ancient Greece and Rome

8th: The Story of the Church, Knights and Medieval

High School she has many various options for American History and for Ancients and Medieval.

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Posted: June 01 2010 at 3:58pm \| IP Logged

JennGM wrote:

I'm so enjoying all your responses! Please keep them coming!

Angel wrote:

First off, I think that 2nd and 3rd grade is probably a good time to experiement and figure out what works for you since, I don't know about you, but I don't remember any history I learned in those grades, really.

Another thing I've been pondering about history is the way it repeats itself and also the fact that some things are more important that others. I'm reminded of this article I've linked to in the past. I didn't reread the article before linking it here, so forgive me if its off topic, but just the idea that studying the Greeks and Romans is more important than the Aztecs stuck with me. The Aztecs are "interesting" but not all that significant, so an overview would likely be sufficient. I tend to feel the same way about Ancient Egypt. As fascinating as I find it, imho, it doesn't really seem worth spending an entire year studying, and frankly, I recall more from a couple of choice PBS specials than I do from studying it in school anyway.

Just my ramblings that aren't all that helpful in terms of organizing it. Just recently, I've pondered the idea that history repeats itself and human nature is the same and we have not changed, so, have a mere overview of some eras but an intimate knowledge of others is probably better in the end than trying to cover everything. It seems that the point of history is to understand people, anyway.

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Posted: June 01 2010 at 4:06pm \| IP Logged

and you can also take family reasons into account.. a little no account war may be nothing to study but if your family is from that area it could be a much bigger deal and worth extra time.

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JennGM
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Posted: June 01 2010 at 4:13pm \| IP Logged

CrunchyMom wrote:

Another thing I've been pondering about history is the way it repeats itself and also the fact that some things are more important that others. I'm reminded of this article I've linked to in the past. I didn't reread the article before linking it here, so forgive me if its off topic, but just the idea that studying the Greeks and Romans is more important than the Aztecs stuck with me. The Aztecs are "interesting" but not all that significant, so an overview would likely be sufficient. I tend to feel the same way about Ancient Egypt. As fascinating as I find it, imho, it doesn't really seem worth spending an entire year studying, and frankly, I recall more from a couple of choice PBS specials than I do from studying it in school anyway.

Just my ramblings that aren't all that helpful in terms of organizing it. Just recently, I've pondered the idea that history repeats itself and human nature is the same and we have not changed, so, have a mere overview of some eras but an intimate knowledge of others is probably better in the end than trying to cover everything. It seems that the point of history is to understand people, anyway.

No, it is helpful, and it echoes a bit of Christopher Dawson. It's important to study the roots of our Christian civilization, how it was established, and how it continued. While studying other aspects can be interesting, it might not necessarily be a building block.

Our study of history in today's schools has gone this way, where we have to make sure everything and everyone is discussed and covered, but it actually waters down highlighting the key elements of history.

Rambling from me right back at you!

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Posted: June 01 2010 at 5:17pm \| IP Logged

Jen-

We did the Mary Daly timeline this past school year, then we went right into reading Volume 1 of Story of the World a few weeks ago. This has worked really well for us, since the kids are delighted to "meet again" some of the time line characters in SOTW.

I am planning to finish reading SOTW to them over lunch this summer (we're more than half way through). Then I will go back through it with the audio version.... we'll do one chapter a week and some more of the crafts that go along with it. My dc are inhaling SOTW. They can't get enough of it.

I just wanted to mention really how well it fits in after the Time Line.

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Posted: June 01 2010 at 6:40pm \| IP Logged

JennGM wrote:

CrunchyMom wrote:

I am really of two minds on this issue.
I find a lot of truth in the idea that we should focus on our western heritage because of it being the foundation of our civilization.
But...
I really despise the fact that I left school able to name practically all of the Greek gods, a good many British monarchs, and numerous renaissance artists, but I didn't know a Ming from Hmong! What that means is that I ended up with practically no knowledge whatsoever of anything African, or South American (except those fascinating bloodthirsty Aztecs of course), practically no working knowledge of the history of Islam, and virtually nothing of the entire continent of Asia except a briefest sprinkling of Chinese history.
And I find that disturbing because although these cultures may not have a tremendous influence on US, here, now, they DO have a tremendous influence on the here and now of many millions (billions, actually) of people in the world. Should I not know more about my neighbor's world view in order to better understand the events of this day? I think there is a real danger in too much ethnocentricity and this is why the schools have swung so far (as you say) to making sure they cover everybody and everything at the expense of leaving out the points which we may consider most important. Have they swung too far? Maybe. But then again it isn't the only area where schools fail, so this surprises me not at all.

So, with that battle raging in my mind (no pun intended), I am trying very hard to put together an education for my children which emphasizes the importance of the roots of western civilization, yet still respects and includes the history of the many other cultures which make this big world go around.

Balance. It's the toughest act in this whole crazy educational circus, I think.

How will I manage it? It still remains to be seen, but my plans are forming and I will share them as soon as I can.

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Posted: June 01 2010 at 11:20pm \| IP Logged

One very important element I feel is passion, either/or yours or your child/ren. In other words if it is down to study Ancient Rome and your child suddenly develops a passion in the American Civil War due to an excursion, then I firmly believe in following the passion. You can always come back to Rome later.

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