I homeschooled my son for 2 years through a public charter school but this year will be going on our own.

I'm trying to keep things very simple and classic over here and not very "formal" yet, as my oldest is 7.5 and I also have an almost 5yo, 4yo, 3yo and a baby.

For history I was just going to focus on U.S. history and go through in order of events/time but then someone mentioned starting ALL the way in the beginning - to creation and Bible times and going through our Bible for history. I don't know that I'll want to do both. I'm saving world history until the children are older.
But that sort of messes up my "approach" to doing everything in chronological order because I also plan to read books they are interested in and are at age level (sort of - we have a variation of ages!). For example: right now my kids would LOVE the "Little House" series but we haven't come to that point in history yet (pioneers). My son is also interested in learning about the pilgrims, which is right about where we are at, since we covered the explorers last year.


I was going to just have the children do nature journaling but I found some books by Jeanie Fulbright on "Exploring Creation" and thought they would be really neat to supplement as we journal - a sort of spring board or direction guideline to go by. Another reason I was considering this is because my husband and I feel strongly that our children need to hear the truth as put fourth in the Bible. So I am wondering if anyone has gone through any of those books with their children yet and how it went. FYI: My 7 year old is hard to keep attention and is go, go, go.

I also ordered a "Betsy-Tacy" book for my daughter for her 5th birthday. Has anyone read these to their little girl(s)?


Sorry there is so much in one post! My 3yo little boy has been in and out of the hospital, has special needs, 7yo is hyperactive and a handful (but so is my 3 year old daughter!)... I think you get the picture - it's a bit crazy so keeping things simple, making them work, etc... is so important to me right now.

Welcome, Racheline! I'm glad you found us!

Honestly, I'd suggest going with your first inclination of American history. Little ones can relate to it and your 7 year old isn't ready for sit down work. There is more than one way to pour info into his head! :0)

Take a look at Stories of Great Americans linked here:
http://www.homeschoolchristian.com/curr ... assics.php

You could read these aloud to all the kids during quiet time or story time. Then have older two dc draw pictures in a sketch book of something from the story. Write a sentence or two that they tell you to sum up the story on a different piece of paper. If they are writing have them copy it onto the bottom of the page. (Draw lines for them if necessary.) You'll then have their very own history books with little of your time taken up. Hope this helps!

You have time to do a timeline and do things in chronological order later. Don't worry!

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Above all else, don't worry! You may change directions here and there but it's ok. My suggestion would be to keep a timeline forEVER. Whenever anything comes up, whether school related, in church, in life, put it on your timeline. Put their birthdays and other family members bdays on it. Put big news events on it. If you move you could put the dates of the different towns on it. Then if you read Little House put "Little House" on it (the years its about). When you read about Noah find the "best guess" time frame and put that way back there. Don't forget to put world history events on it, too!

As they get older you will fill in more gaps but there will always be these reference points - oh, that happened BEFORE this? Or gasp! Noah was born 56 years before ADAM died?!!! (I think that's right?)

If you go chronologically from the beginning, you will have gaps. If you start with American history, you will have gaps. You just can't cover everything the first time through. It's the layering of learning that helps it stick. Do hands on activities - use playdough or make stick people or make a play. But ALWAYS put it on the timeline.

As for which to do, well, we generally teach kids from their neighborhood out. That doesn't mean you can't teach them about constellations or the earth's place in the universe but you concentrate on the neighborhood. How the fire department works, what they do. How early do bakers get to work? How to make eggs.

You said: "For history I was just going to focus on U.S. history and go through in order of events/time but then someone mentioned starting ALL the way in the beginning -"
You will have so many people giving you "helpful" advice. Just do what you and your dh think is best for your family. Smile and say, "Thanks for your input" to the others and then go home and do what YOU want.

Thank you for your replies! That definitely helps me out

Welcome! : )

For teaching from a Christian perspective, if you just read a children's story Bible through during your Religion/Bible study time, the kids will get a LOT of Bible history that way. For us, the Bible IS our history text to a large degree. When I teach ancient history (Greece/Egypt/Babylon/Rome, etc) I will by definition HAVE to cover the religious practices of those cultures - something I don't want to do just yet. So, our awareness of those cultures comes (at this point) with how they interacted with the Bible.

I see American History as simply a separate subject.

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