Elementary and Junior High Social Studies

This is a basic listing of our plan for Elementary Social Studies.  I will explain a little below.

Kindergarten - Liberty's Kids TV series (40 episodes) and Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood (if available).
Grade 1 - Read Aloud from Biographies
Grade 2 - Read Aloud from Biographies
Grade 3 - Read Aloud from Biographies
Grade 4 - Read Aloud / Independent Reading of Biographies
Grade 5 - Heroes of History biography series (Independent Reading)
Grade 6 - Heroes of History biography series (Independent Reading)
Grade 7 - Our 50 States
Grade 8 - American Government (Abeka) / Economics (BJUP)

If you have not seen Liberty's Kids, may I highly recommend it.  There are 40 episodes covering the American Revolution through the signing of the Declaration of Independence.  My kids really enjoy the program, and they have learned a lot about America becoming a nation by watching each of the episodes.

I also find that Mr. Rogers is great for helping children to learn about the people who live in our communities.  There are all sorts of great and interesting topics discussed on the program.  (Some of the movies he shows are like a children's version of "How It's Made".)

I was VERY blessed by my husband at the Teach Them Diligently Conference in Spartanburg, SC.  He bought the rest of the Christian Hero Series and the Heroes of History Series from YWAM.  During the early elementary years, I will read aloud to my kids a chapter a day from these wonderful biographies.  When the student is an independent reader, they will finish reading all of the book sin these two series. 

On a side note, our library carries the animated hero dvds from Nest Family.  Another library nearby carries the Bible dvds.  Many of our trips to the library result in bringing these dvds home.  I have been thrilled to see the details that my younger children have picked up from watching these outstanding biographical animated movies.


As our children approach high school, I want to encourage them to research topics on their own.  In 7th grade, they will do their own personal study of each of the 50 states.  For each state they will fill out worksheets on the state bird, flag, etc...  They will also include essays about the state and people in history from the state they are studying.  Horse Girl will be in 7th grade this coming year (2012-13), and she will be the first child to embark on this journey.  All of the notebook pages will be compiled into one binder.

When I planned the high school Social Studies classes, I found that the other classes were more difficult than the American Government and Economics courses that we will be using.  As a result, I decided to cover those two courses in the 8th grade.