For our second installment in the series on "What We Do" in our homeschool, today, we are going to be discussing history. This is everyone's favorite or second favorite subject, which might surprise you if you come from a public school background, since it's usually considered the most boring subject for most students. So read on to discover why it's so beloved in our household. If you haven't seen our other post in the series or would like to catch up check out the link below.
How I Teach History
When Britt was little I started out only doing history and science by following his interest. Additionally much of history in early grades is traditionally social studies, where a student learns more about interacting with the world around him. They use to focus on skills such as reading maps, learning about community helpers, the basics of how local government works, and other little, every day tasks that make one a good citizen.
Homeschool students are in a particularly unique position to learn these things through actual interactions, so we didn't use curriculum at this point. Rather we took the kids along with us and talked about big concepts using examples and words they could grasp to introduce them to the wider world, than our home. We took the kids into the voting booth with us and while we voted took a minute to explain how we evaluated our choices and told them about the process of deciding who we should vote for without ever telling them who we were actually voting for. We took them into the DMV office and let them observe us changing our drivers license and car registration over to a new state. We took them to fire stations and police stations on field trips so that they wouldn't fear these community members but learn about their jobs. They watched the maps on the cars and became familiar with cardinal directions and reading map keys. Schooling in this way is scattered, but overall sinks in better than book learning because they are interacting with the material in a practical way.
However, there came a point where I wanted to introduce history on a deeper level, do more than our varied conversations, but to place those people and events that we would discuss into context in a way that would unlock greater understanding. That's when I began searching for a history curriculum. There were so many popular options out there, many of which looked great, so how could I choose just one? I started much as I did with math, by asking myself what was most important to me in the presentation of history?
The first priority I had was to find history curriculum that told history in chronological order. I felt that it was important to start at the beginning and work up to the modern period. As a historian myself I know just how much of history is dependent on what happened before, and so rather than jumping in the middle of something I wanted to build history from the ground up. So I was able to eliminate several options, because many elementary school curriculums choose to start with basic local history, or general American history because it is closest to a student. Too often this leads to a dumbing down of our own history and misses the deep and beautiful blossoming of modernity. I wanted to make sure when we reached the history that most affects us that they would be in a position to really grasp the underlying issues and be amazed at the birth of our country.
My second priority was to find history curriculum that was as unbiased and objective as possible. One of the courses we had to take to get a history degree was historiography, which is basically the history of history writing. The foundation of that course was the fact that everyone comes to history with preconceived ideas and beliefs and that as a history writer you must do your best to check those at the door and not look at history through the lenses of today's beliefs and values, but to record faithfully and then analyze what happened. This is difficult to do. I found that a lot of homeschool curriculum fell into one of two ditches. Either they proposed that God ordained America's rise and thus everything she does is part of a divine plan, or they were so secular that they failed to address the very real beliefs of the time. This let me get rid of a number of curriculum options.
My third priority was to find integrated curriculum. Too often in school we studied things like Ancient Egypt, Rome, and the Far East as independent units. The truth was that these countries while existing for hundreds or even thousands of years didn't exist in a bubble. I was in college before we looked at how these various civilizations interacted and affected one another. Placing history into context includes helping it fit into the world around it, and so I was looking for history that would help the kids to see the way our interactions with others affect us and the world around us.
My fourth priority was to find history that came alive for the kids. A great deal of why they love the subject is probably because I love the subject and that passion comes across when I am discussing it with them, but I wanted curriculum that encouraged that, and for very young kids the best way to engage them and bring history to life is to address every day life. Much of history curriculums only follow the big picture events and people, but I wanted them to see what the period's clothing looked like, the games they played during their leisure time, and learn about culture as well as big events.
My fifth and final goal was to find an excellent timeline. I felt that especially for early ages, seeing where people and events existed side by side helped to reinforce all of those goals that I had for their education.
As you might imagine I didn't readily find one curriculum that checked all my boxes so I've combine resources over the years to accomplish my goals for the kids. Some of our stand-bys have included Homeschool in the Woods Passport Series and Homeschool in the Woods Time Travelers, Story of the World, Genevieve Foster's books, and our local library.
Why Homeschool in the Woods
Our primary resource from around 2nd grade for Britt up until the present has been Homeschool in the Woods, they are a relatively small, family owned company, that I found by happy accident in Pennsylvania at my first homeschool convention. I immediately fell in love with their timeline notebooks and figures. I felt like they were the best done I had seen, and having the timeline in book form, meant I didn't have to have it up on the walls of the house, like most other timelines I was seeing at the time. Further, their resources approached history as a unit study addressing both big ticket events and the culture of a people. They are designed to be as short or long as an individual family wants, and they always include a host of books and additional resources for a variety of ages from around 3rd grade to 8th grade. Finally each lesson has several hands on projects that the kids color, cut, assemble, and write on to further cement learning, a big plus at the time for my kinesthetic learners.
Now that we are entering the upper grades with our two oldest how we use this curriculum has changed some what. Now, the kids complete the newspaper articles on a variety of events, someone each day has one to write, requiring them to interact with the material and really summarize what they've learned. They don't do as many of the hands on projects leaving more of those to their younger two siblings. Everyone still colors and adds our timeline figures to our book, as we have steadily begun moving through American history. But Britt and Ruth have also added additional source reading to round out what they are learning through the unit studies.
Why Story of the World and Genevieve Foster's Books
I find these two resources useful for the same reason, they make connections between civilizations in history. Rather than studying Eqypt from 5,000 BC up through the Roman Empire and then back tracking to do the same with the Celts and Germanic peoples of Europe, and then back tracking again to do the same with India, and on and on; rather it makes more sense to talk about everything that is happening at a specific time. Story of the World, while rather basic and simplistic, does a good job of moving between cultures to set the stage for world history at a given time.
Genevieve Foster is even better as kids get older. Diving into greater depth she takes popular moments in world history like Julius Cesaer or Abraham Lincoln and follows world events from their birth through their death always stressing varies interactions their effects on the world at large. Additionally, both of these text have the ability to make the characters seem personable and alive while faithfully recording history.
Along with these books, I find good quality library books and web resources to be indispensable for getting a complete view of history. I'm not a huge follower of Charlotte Mason but I do agree with her position on using real books to teach a subject. Historians are passionate about their subjects and that shows when you read their books, I would rather find slightly challenging material and have to break down and explain sections than I would just let them get all of their learning second hand, already digested, through textbooks. I want them to question and learn, not just memorize facts. Web resources like good books, convey deeper information while also providing videos of archeologist work and discussing their findings. It also gives music and popular images that help to round out what they are learning.
Reinforce Learning
One thing I've learned though, is no matter how great the curriculum is, and I find Homeschool in the Woods and Genevieve Foster's books to be some of the best there are, there is a need for what we do for history to reinforce learning in a fun way. We have found the absolute best way to do this is to take field trips to museums and historic sites. Even better is when you can find a living history exhibit, so that the kids can talk to and work with an actual person in the context of historical culture and events.
Museums surround students with the artifacts of the time and place that you are studying. It's one thing to see a picture of a cannon and another to stand by one. It starts to give you perspective concerning the scope of history through the use of objects. It also helps students to see just how similar in ways and how vastly different in others ways those who came before us were. This leads to connections on another level to the history that is being studied.
Historic sites do all of this while also conveying the size and scope of a place and an event. Walking the grounds of a historic fort or the remains of a now nonexistent town allows kids to visualize history in a way they couldn't before. In the case of a historic battle field it leaves the visitor with a scene of gravity for the events that happened and a sense of mortality when considering all of the deaths that occurred. This is true no matter your children's age. I was able to visit a Scottish battlefield in college and while I had studied the battle intensely before hand, to see the actual ground and the size of the battle field the placement of the fort made things I had only read about more understandable.
Finally, happening upon living history exhibits at places like this further expand a child's mind. We have been to Civil War reenactments, Florida history villages and observed craftsmen working, we observed the methods for making prehistoric canoes in a museum, and even watched and spoken with archeologist while they work. Each of these events have made impressions on my children, and even years later are remembered. They recall not only what they saw, but conversations they heard, and how they relate to history that we've studied. These types of learning opportunities are key to helping your children better understand the history you are studying at home.
In Conclusion
History has proven to enthrall all our kids no matter their age. We allow an hour for history. While I read our history from our Homeschool in the Woods lesson for the day, or an except from another great book, they color their timeline figures and complete their projects for the day. We then spend the rest of the hour discussing what we've read, looking up the music of the time, asking questions and evaluating how this fits in with other things that we know. This multi-age level learning that happens between not only me and my students but between each of the children themselves is something I've discussed before, but it truly sets the beginning of our day apart and gets everyone into a learning mindset.
I hope today's post exploring what we do for history has helped you to think about history options in a different light, and made you realize that history can be anything but detached and boring. Whether you are looking for a new curriculum option, deciding on how to round out your student's studies, or considering fun ways to reinforce subjects, I hope you find some ideas here. Remember to check out next week's post in the series What We Do: Science
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