Spineless

Caution-A long, long post which consists mostly of me "thinking out loud" about history books/programs. I have been tearing my hair out about my choices for a while now. Hoping it will help to write it out. You have been forewarned.

Ahhhh. We are finally done with our school year and piano lessons. Just one more week of soccer and the summer officially yields to our whims. Of course this means that I will have endless hours of free-time to plan for next year's course of study. My current obsession is in finding the perfect spine book to our history studies. We are back to the beginning again this fall with ancient civilizations (my personal favorite). Last time through the cycle we used The Story of the World by Susan Wise Bauer and enjoyed it immensely. It is a perfect narrative for the early grammar age set, and the accompanying activity guide had great suggestions for additional reading on each topic. I have toyed with the idea of using it again, but I feel Ben is beyond it for sure, and Will, who will be 10 in the fall, also is ready to move on to something more meaty. Question is, what will fit the bill?


What I want:

1. I still like the narrative/storytelling style much better than a straight textbook.

2. Secular works best for us, though I can adapt somewhat.

3. We need something that is appealing and age appropriate for both boys at ages 10 and 12. I don't want Will to be a total tag-along, eyes glazing over.

What have I looked at so far? Ha! Just. About. Everything. here's the low done on what is currently on my shelves or has been previewed from my library. I'll briefly give my opinion, and whether we'll be using it.



1. Story of the World Volume 1-Own it. Great style but we're beyond it. Some criticize this text as being too secular coming from a Christian author. Others criticize it for being too Christian. I think it is pretty even-handed. YMMV. I won't be using it this time around because we're simply beyond it.

2. Child's History of the World by Virgil Hillyer. Own it. Secular-ish. I want to like Hillyer but I never quite get there. I can't explain it. Sometimes he seems charming and other times creepy. Whatever. This has been on my shelf for years but have never been comfortable with it, even though it is an oft recommended narrative. Maybe it's just me, but we'll pass on this one, too.

3. The Story of Mankind by Van Loon. Own it. This doesn't sit right with me. I think this was a Newbery award winner in 1922. It's a little dull in my opinion. Dated (though it has been updated), opinionated, and tinged with bigotry common for the era. Nopes. We'll pass.



4. A Little History of the World by E. H. Gombrich. Own it. Originally written in 1935 but updated by the author before his death, this is one of my top picks. Very engaging narrative. It may be too brief for my purposes though.






5. The Book of the Ancient World, Book of the Ancient Romans, Book of the Ancient Greeks-Dorothy Mills. Library Previews. I really like these older books. Very thourough and well written. Very engaging. But to cover these 3 meaty books in one year (considering all the historical fiction, non-fiction, DVDs etc cetera I'd like to add in) would be a stretch. Sigh. Perhaps I am simply too particular?


6. Oxford First Ancient History-Roy Burrell and Peter Connolly. Own it. Pretty good. Very much like Story of the World, but at a slightly higher level. Secular. It's in the running. The one negative is the art work. At our house, if a book is going to have illustrations, they need to be no less than stunning. The pictures in this book are just, well, blah. Sorry to be such a snob. Again, perhaps I am too particular.





7. Oxford World in Ancient Times series-Own 2 of the titles. Secular. LOVE these books! I will use these in some capacity but I will have to figure out how to pick and choose from all the info because it will take four books to cover the cultures we will be studying-The Ancient Near Eastern World, The Ancient Egyptian World, The Ancient Greek World and The Ancient Roman World. Whew. I would highly recommend having these books as part of a reference library. The writers (different for each book, experts on the topics) really draw kids in with witty writing full of adult information, not dumbed down, but livened up. If that makes sense. LOVE these books.




8. The Human Odyssey-K12. Own it. Secular. Beautiful book. Photographs are fantastic. A textbook written in an engaging style. The layout is very nicely done as well. While packed full of good information, there is plenty of white space on the page so kids are not overwhelmed while reading. Again, though not really a narrative/story style, it is engaging. I'm leaning heavily towards a combo of this and the Oxford series, even though I know that it will be far too much to cover realistically. Hmmm. Maybe we won't do any math or anything next year so we can fit it all in. Good plan.

9. Usborne Encyclopedia of the Ancient World- Own it. Secular. Gee, think I have too many history books? I have toyed with the idea of keeping it simple and using this along with the E. H. Gombrich book (above). That would probably be just about right, but keeping it simple would be too simple.

10. Mystery of History-Young Earth Christian. Previewed at the website. Tried to convince myself I could use this along with the Winter Promise program "Quest for the Ancients". A scheduled "box" program just sounds so easy. But I know I would end up not using a lot of it and tweaking too much. Not worth the money for the work I'd be doing anyway.

11. Sonlight-Also looked at this "boxed" literature based history program. Easy to secularize (so I hear) and great books. Problem is I wouldn't want to do all of core 6 which covers world history from "The Pharaohs Through Martin Luther". So I would end up rescheduling the schedule which, again, defeats the purpose. ( I won't link it because they'll find me and come leave a comment on how great they are and I should give them a try.)

Other things that just won't work for one reason or another- Guerber Histories at Nothing New Press, Simply Charlotte Mason history guides, Oak Meadow (secular, lovely, but not a good fit for my boys), Living Books Curriculum, My Father's World, History Odyssey (secular, but yawn), Ambleside, Tanglewood (secular, nice book choices but incomplete), Tapestry of Grace and Biblioplan. I think that about covers it. Yep. Too particular. If I missed anything, let me know. Stay tuned to find out what I finally choose!

Next post-Which Homer? Oy vey!