History for the growing child (aka your middle schooler)

All things rotate around the market, aka- the buyers, aka, the support system by which products are produced and maintained.  So it should come as no surprise that good middle school history programs are hard, or at least harder, to find.
Here's a list of the middle school, early high school history programs we've used, and what I thought about them.  No matter how much I like a  program, if it doens't gel with my "market analysts", aka the students, aka my kids, then it's not a good a program, and we give it up and move on.
One of my biggest requirements for a history program early on is that both kids be able to take it. With all the other stuff we do, and want to do, having 2 separate history programs was not an option, so I gravitated towards prgorams that spans several grades and ages. These below fulfilled those requirements :)

Beautiful feet, "History through Literature" middle school editions- I do love beautiful feet. They are pretty much unit studies using historical fiction, and come with teachers guides that are *sometimes* helpful.  They are good to use as a scope and sequence guide, but I don't care for the "now ask this question, assign this writing task...". I can figure that stuff out myself, but the scope is great to have so it's a mixed bag on whether you need the teacher's guide. (Others are welcome to chime in on that opinion :) We incorporated BF into our Story of the world 3, when my dd was doing that history. It really added to the history for her. I've seen the classical literature BF curriculum guide and liked the book choices.

Greenleaf guide to history  "History for the thoughtful child" - Roman, Greek, middle ages, famous men, etc
There's the text and an activity guide, which I highly recommend if you're going to be using this curriculum.
They start the 7th grade with "Famous men from the 16th and 17th century", but I actually think if you've never had it, you could  start with the Middle ages.  I liked it. If you are a huge history buff, you might take offense that it's not super in-depth, but it takes a different edge on teaching history- it teaches history through biographies so there's always room to explore further and easily add to interested subjects as your child develops them. The other criticism of this series- it's very Euro-centric in it's history.  It's not breaking any molds in who it decides is noteworthy. The History of the Middle ages would be more aptly titled, "History of the Middle Ages in Europe" (with one journey to China with Marco Polo).  My son really liked this series, and it also incorporates well into other history curriculums because it's biography lead, not another general history text.  Despite me mentioning the two criticism of the series, we thought it was worth doing and enjoyed it very much. I think this would be a great history for ppl like myself, who sometimes have trouble getting into history. You see history in a very personal way, and I think my children responded to that and enjoyed this series while we used it. (We went as high as the middle ages, respectfully 3rd and 6th grade for my kids.) 


Glenco history- World History- This is actually a 9th grade VA text book, but I find it to be an excellent overview of all the history we had up to that point and gave it to my dd in 7th grade.  It does a slightly better job then elementary history guides we had of presenting the "WHY?" and making historical connections. I thought the questions in the back of the chapters were thoughtful and encouraged analysis and critical thinking in my student. And it was her first highschool credit to be earned.

My favorite history that I've presented to my children is the Critical Thinking Co.- "Reconstruction to Progressiveness", 6-12th grade.  They have the entire history of the US, but this is the one we used so far. I find their history series to be fabulous when it comes to helping a student learn to evaluate history and historical claims. It does a better job than any other text or curriculum of presenting the idea that history is a "story", and we must understand why some facts are chosen to be revealed and considered history, while others facts are not presented/ignored.  It also helps the student evaluate any language bias in the presentation.  Again, CT knocks it out of the park when it comes to creating critical thinkers.
     A neutral comment is there is a lot of writing/answering questions so take that into consideration for your student. The con of this program it is sold on disc, which means you need to print the entire text out yourself. I dislike doing that. I wish there was a paper copy for me to buy. (If there is now, it wasn't there when I bought mine.)  We actually missed doing history because I was out of ink one or two weeks last year, and my son doesn't read well from the computer, so that's a half-strike in my book.  The other strike is that I gave up on the teacher guide and just followed along with the student text. I dislike admitting my own stupidity, but I didn't find it easily laid out, and I just didn't understand the teacher guide. But just following along, lesson for lesson, with my son on his student book was enough for us. 

Well trained Mind has a new "high school" series of text that follows along with their popular Story of the World guides, but takes it up a notch on vocabulary and in-depth discussion of historical events.  These books are purely history texts. There's not pictures or pauses here, so take that into consideration. I've looked at these, but we've not used them.  The reason they aren't marketed for middle school is in part because S.W. Bauer wants ppl to spiral through her SOTW books, which takes you from 1st to 8th grade.  But if she's ever listened to any criticism of her buyers, the homeshcoolers, she would have heard we think the books, which are written for 1st and 2nd grades, are too simple and shallow for advanced middle schoolers.  Yes, we can augment them, which is her recommendation, but she doens't really give many book recommendations for upper grades in the activities guides, and if I have to do all the work of finding extra appropriate resources myself, I'm more likely to just not use the program.  My dd spiraled through the 1 &2nd books before she moved on and never spiraled through the 3rd or 4th books again, which I guess is a shame because the 3rd and ,especially, the 4th books deal modern history, which has a lot of readily available resources. Oh well. 

We came super close to getting the "History Odyssey" series- it is written from a "secular" point of view in the early history book (book 1), so be aware of that, but once you get to the year 1000, it's like any other history book, except it suppose to do a great job of being in-depth.  But the program has a pretty intense writing guide, and my son is not the writer.   I would have gotten it for my dd, but the only histories she needs now are government and civics, so I don't think she'll volunteer for it :)

Good luck finding a history that you and your child like.

Homeschooling towards college - Yes, it really can be done well!

So our co-op, Williamsburg Classical Academy, held a Homeschooling towards college seminar this month.    We were lucky enough to have a speaker, Mrs. Dori Staehle, educational consultant and former homeschooler , come and enlighten us all the way from her home in North Carolina.  Mrs. Dori is not only a former educator who has the experience of getting all her children into their top choice colleges, but she was also a former admissions officer and homeschool liaison for a NC university, which puts her in an amazing position to tutor the rest of us! She spoke for the two morning sessions-

9:45- 10:45   RU Ready 4 College?  Teens, do you know what's needed for college admission, how to choose a college and a major, application tips, and do's and don'ts for the college visit, and how to stay grounded once you go away to school? Come hear some tips from an "Admissions Insider" and former homeschooling parent of 2 recent college grads.

  In "Are you Ready?" talk, which was mostly about transcripts, I learned that there are no plus or minus in grades for your child's transcript. Interesting! Another fascinating tidbit is that an AP class, when no test is taken, should be labeled as Honors, not AP.  Yes, our public school counter parts get away with this all the time, but it calls into question whether the material was truly AP quality.  BUT oddly, enough, if you take the test and get even a "2", you can still carry the designation of AP.  My concern, & I kept her trapped in a  series of questions about this topic, was "What if they get an "A" for the AP class, but only a "2" or "3" on the exam? Wouldn't that be a credibility issue?"  She said it didn't matter. LOTS of p.s-ers carry that same story with them. It's a one day test, Mrs. Dori explained, & anything can happen, but taking that test, even if you don't do great on it, which should always be the aim, is ok.
    For all those who don't know, competitive sports is an Honors class. Cool!
    In science, a lab is worth a half credit, which shows you completed a lab for that science- even though public schools rarely break this apart, it's important for homeschoolers to show the lab in their work- and the text portion is a worth a full credit.  Mrs. Dori said Apologia Biology was worth Honors credit. As a Master in educational tutoring, she had seen enough texts, and done enough tutoring in all subjects, to understand that their text covers exactly what the what the public schools' honors biology covers.
    On the math portion of your child's transcript, start with Algebra I. It makes sure that the college admission's officer understands you've taken the entire gambit of math courses.  I was only going to give my child her 4 math credits and just take the top four classes for her math, which should be Calculus by the time my daughter graduates in two years, but Mrs. Dori said other admissions officers were sometimes confused by that and asked if they had ever had Algebra 1. Mrs. Dori told an anecdote about one occurrence. (I'm paraphrasing) "You think these very bright admissions officers would realize a student getting dual enrollment from a community college for pre-calculus would have taken Algebra 1 somewhere,  but they questioned it. So always start there."
        Classes taken for dual enrollment can be written off your taxes:) Yeah. That will be my first ever educational discount.  (So wish homeschoolers could get some of that $250 a dollar write off public school teacher do.)

10:55-12:00- Navigating the College Maze:  A former Admissions Counselor and homeschooling parent will explain the college process, what courses your student should take when, SAT vs. ACT, how to score more scholarship money, what should (and shouldn't) be on your teen's high school transcript, and what's the real scoop on financial aid.
    The next hour was just as enlightening for me.  In "Navigating the college waters", Mrs. Dori spoke about the terminology used in the financial office. A "grant" or "scholarship" is free money (that you never pay back), and an "Award" is a fancy word for a LOAN.  Do not be fooled.  I honestly had forgotten all about that since I left college.  (Financial) "Aid" is need based, while "Scholarships" are academically based.  Contrary to what others have told me, Mrs Dori said don't include your child's Iowa or CAT scores anywhere.  Colleges don't ever look at them- even for additional consideration to decide a final weight if one is needed, they will not be used a factor for or against you.
  You can include as many classes and courses as your child took. Do not be afraid that they have too many credits, which is good for us because my daughter, whose only taking 4 classes this year to try to slow her down a bit, already has 29.5 credits- making 33,.5 at the end of this year.  Since most highschoolers graduate with 29 credits with an advanced degree, I was starting to worry if that would be look "weird".  Nope. Mrs. Dori told us. It's fine to highlight how great your student is & how much they can accomplish. Many homeschoolers "are like diamonds in the rough. Hiding how great they are."  This is not the time to be shy about how awesome your student is!
     I knew this from my many other transcripts talk from Mrs. Ingrid Cannon, creator of "Transcript Boot camp" (which was very empowering to me to watch and learn from), but create your child's transcript by the subject, not by the grade. This gives you far more flexibility.  Because of this concept, my daughter can take a light year, and it won't read as "slacking" or bring up any questions of why this year was lower for her than previous or future years. It just is, and there are no negative repercussions for letting her take a year to explore her passion of reading more fully. (which is being transcribed as "Contemporary English", btw.)
       The big thing to know is start early. Look at the goal and figure out the plan to get to point B- early, like in middle school. I personally started learning more about this process at the end of my oldest child's 5th grade year.   There is nothing worse than seeing that look on a parent's face when they realize/think they've really missed something in planning or executing their child's highschool years.
        By planning early, Mayah has had this year to take it a bit slower. My rational is actually something purely pragmatic- hormones. When looking at students , the lowest grade point averages can be found between 12-14. They almost always raise after 14.  To traditional educators I'm sure this appears to be the students "learning their lesson", "buckling down", "getting serious about their future" or whatever other expression they wish to use. To me, I see hormones, which are not a friend of memory retrieval.  Hey, that's puberty for you!  Plan early so you can plan around it for a year :)

Mrs. Dori left before lunch, and the floor opened up to two other great speakers:
Afternoon session-

Room 1-	Room 2-
12:15 - 1:15 "Designing a college program for middle and high school"- Gwen Sturdy	12:15 -1:15 "What does ready look like? Explaining The college common AP" -  Catryna Jackson
1:25 - 2:25 "Extra curricular: honing skills and pursuing passions"- Gwen Sturdy	1:25 - 2:25 "Tests that matter- CLEP, AP, SAT 2 subject tests" Catryna Jackson

"What does ready look like? Explaining The college common AP" -  Catryna Jackson
I can only comment on the two sessions I attended- Mrs. Catryna's common college application lecture and Mrs. Gwen's extra curricular talk.  Mrs. Catryna got right down to business- log-in on August 1st.  The essays, which your child will have to produce for the common college application, get released that day. Better to have all summer, than 1 month, to get them done.  Mrs. Catryna's 2nd tip was- read them over. Proof read them. You don't want to change them, or rewrite them for the student, but you will want to make sure that nothing is amiss. They do not understand how some things will read to other adults, and since this is the only chance many colleges will get to see your student, it must be the best vision of them.   The other reason for logging-in right away is so YOU have time to write all YOUR essays. You will need a homeschool philosophy and a guidance counselor letter. You need to make yourself your child's guidance counselor. Do not think it will look somehow better to place a friend or church youth leader there. The common college ap tells them you are homeschool right upfront- no getting around that. So make your life easy and place yourself as the guidance counselor of your homeschool.  Also, it's good to know now, that you will need the text book name for each class your child took. Mrs. Catryna's tip was do not think you will be able to easily remember what English your child took 3 years later. Just write it all down now!  Since I learned this last year, I went back to create my list , and she's right, it's hard to remember every single text book they took for each class. I remembered most, but I had to really think and look through emails for the name of one book that we no longer owned.  If you did not use one text book, ie. This year's my daughter will have Contemporary English, "various" will be the word in the "textbook" tab.  While doing that for some, or even most is ok, Some subjects NEED a text. Putting "various" down for Algebra 2, will look very unusual to say the least. You can also list the primary texts.  Mrs. Catryna's bonus tip, other than giving us an intervention of reality into the college common application, was that she attached recommendation letters from her daughter's professors and tutors to various places; At the end of the guidance counselor's letter. As the side bar to her daughter's resume which she created and added the optional section of documents. When ever she updated her daughter's information, she added letters of recommendation to them. Since her daughter received a full scholarship to her top college choice in Boston, and numerous scholarships and merit aid from other universities she will not be attending, I take her advice like a new gold miner's advice from wealthy, retired prospector  next to my claim.  I can only reap the benefits from what she has to tell me. Thank-you Catryna for this bits of gold advice and treasures of information. 

"Extra curricular: honing skills and pursuing passions"- Gwen Sturdy 

       I gained a new perspective of Mrs. Gwen Sturdy as she talked about letting her kids follow their passions and seeing clearly as how she grasps the idea of homeschooling as educational journey and not as a commodity, like so many box schools or "school at home" educations.   (As a side note, I love how Gwen is able to create charts, power points and handouts for all events. This one on the topic of Extra Curriculars was no exception to her paper printing, corner stapled organization. I envy her ability to make everything seem doable in the outlined, 3 tiered margined columns of her handouts :)  I am having trouble trying to pick out particular points to relate, since everything was really a bullet point of interest to know in Gwen's hour long presentation.  I'll go with my top three favorite points in no particular order-
1.Creating extracurricular activities is about building a whole person who is passionate about life and the community they in; It's not about checking off a box on a college application.  If you do it right, it will be valuable in that well as well, but more importantly, you have helped your child blossom.

2. Knowing which E.C. activities to purse can be tricky. Gwen gave us a short, helpful check list-
    -Does it support the student's interests?
       -Be willing to support your child's EC's with both time  and money if they fulfill a real need and interest for your child.  Obviously, the sky is not the limit, but be willing to try to work with your child to meet their needs and the family's.
          -Know that NOTHING is too crazy to be an extracurricular.  Gwen's son was the top Kite flying young adult in the country at one time and went to India to represent the United States that year's International Kite flying tournament.  He now has a small business making and selling his invented kites in 6 countries across the world.  All, she said, from his first bamboo and cellophane kite put together with tape in 5th grade. Um, wow!

3. Be willing to adjust the academic schedule to make room for extracurricular activities. This is one of interest to me because while I don't do "school at home", I do not by any means unschool so it is a good reminder to me to keep that balance going and remember that some opportunities have windows that smaller than when their next math assignment is due. 

2:30-3:30 - "Had I known then what I know now... " Multiple parent panel; open for discussion and questions.- Gwen Sturdy, Catryna Jackson, and Mary Blunt

We ended the afternoon with a little Q&A session. The presenters all had a tid bit for us to start the talk off. Catryna said, "Start early". Gwen remarked that it's important to look at the whole person when homeschooling, and that it's possible to reach for great Ivy league schools. Mary spoke about her kids' paths. She said, "Listen to your kids!"   While she prepared each of her children with an preparatory college education, neither one seems headed there. Her daughter is a dancer with the Sesame Street traveling theater and her son is now talking about being a chef- and those are great choices as well!

Knowledge is power, and what these presenters gave was powerful stuff!  Things that can make or break your child's chance to pursue a dream, a reminder that we're not in the "business of raising students. We're in the business of raising people. There is much more to life a than academics and ECs are the door into a non-academic side life" (How to be a High School Super \Star- by Cal Newport) and that has real-life applications. 
    

Updating

So I have changed the name of this Blog- again!  But I think it will stick this time.
  This is really what I've been doing all along. While I do "Classically homeschool wild things", they are much more tame these days, and the name reflects their beginning more than their present.  It is a "Journey in homeschooling", but if I always have the goal in mind, it if rides on the front of our cart like a golden compass, it will be much easier to get where you want to go.  So the name of the blog will be "Homeschooling Towards College", which, not strangely, is the name of the my co-op's upcoming seminar/lecture series.

How to integrate (cirrulcum x, y, or Z) into your life.

 From: Random fellow homeschooler asking how to integrate her curriculum into her routine;  Wanted to know if I had any suggestions.  Since I had never used her particular curriculum, I had only this to say:

Gosh. I've never used that curriculum before so I can't give specific feedback on what "worked" for me.  I can say some general things about homeschooling that might be helpful-
 1. The best program for your family is the one that works.  I actually LOVE rod and staff for English and think there is no better complete English program out there. However, my son hated it, and it made work range from tears to impossible drudgery to threats, so we gave it up went with a different program that, for whatever reason, he enjoyed better and now he's doing well on English mechanics.  So the best program is only the best program if your kids get the most out of it.  Not to say that the kids get to pick every little thing they do (not in my house anyway.), but a certain amount of co-operation and enthusiasm is necessary for learning to really take hold.

2. Seriously, there's always next year.  One year, many years away, there won't be, and I realize that as well as anyone with a 10th grader can, but don't assume you need to teach them every single thing they will ever need to know in one year- or in one single subject- in one unit study.  It burn everyone out, including the kids. When I hear from moms who are really, really trying and saying to us that they don't know what they're not doing well- it's typically that they feel they need to get 100% of the curriculum done and covered in a short amount of time.  Another mom asked me this early on in our hsing journey- "How many books did you ever see the last page of in public school?"  I can assuredly say none of them.  We made half way through our 8th grade civics book, but most texts were about 70-80% covered.   We homeschool for a superior educational opportunity, so we while we don't need to use the low bar that public school set for our kids, it is helpful to remember that we are (mostly) well educated adults and we did not need to cover each text/subject 100% each year in order to get there. 

3. Once you've bought the curriculum it's yours to use as you like, in any way you like.  Don't let the curriculum, even a great one, tell you how to educate your kids.  You are the one using the curriculum and you get to decide, when and how much of it you use.  I got a call a while ago form a mom who had bought a super expensive on-line course, and it wasn't working for her student at ALL.  Instead of giving it up and moving to different one, because understandably they didn't want to waste their money, their child is back to doing pre-cal this year with the curriculum that he could have been using last year.  So in the end, curriculum is like all things, you spend time or money, and if you beat a dead horse long enough, you'll end up spending both. 
     Again, I'm not familiar with (x curriculum), but if it as all encompassing as Sonlight or Oak Meadow, you may just need to scale it back- a lot.  I honestly feel they give students more than they could ever do in a  year.  Certainly more than any private or public student would do in one year, and I have to think they are trying to offer a buffet for you to choose from and tailor to your child's interests and needs.  My child has 14 subjects they take each year, but most are not everyday subjects.   Spelling and math are the only 4 day a week subjects we have. Lots of subjects are once a week events- art, computer skills, logic, writing, carpentry, history, robotics, so scale back to teach subjects once a week and just get as much covered as you can in a reasonable amount of time. 

4. Give yourself time to find your groove. - or Your kids are far better at home learning with you then are at school.   Nothing worth doing is easy the first time, and homeschooling, and all that that encompasses, is totally worth doing!  I homeschooled for 5 years before I actually felt like I knew what I was doing; 5 years before, I stopped reading the Rainbow resource catalog on a weekly basis looking for workbooks and curriculum that would help my children "reach their potential".  The proof is in the pudding as they say, and I gained confidence as my kids got older and I could finally visibly see I hadn't destroyed their educational futures by not giving them that extra Analogy work page, or because we hadn't watched the entire hour of the animal planet documentary.  Seeing that my kids were happy, and that they did know some stuff, made it ok.
     I help run the co-op in Williamsburg, and none of the kids have the same path, even ones in the same family. But they're all terrific kids and knowing that that variety exists out there, has given me confidence in what I'm doing.
    So I have no idea how to integrate (your curriculum) into your routine, but I say if the curriculum is what's keeping you from being full participants of your community or your family's happy week, then don't integrate, scale back. Having taken both paths in different years, I discovered it was covering less that gave my kids more.

 5. Ask your question on the larger Homeschooling-in-hrs board, or look to see if your particular curriculum has it's own yahoo group and ask there.  Sorry I couldn't offer any concrete suggestions, but good luck!
Regards,
Brandy