Monday, January 10, 2011

Easy Classical: Early Modern History Schedule ~ A Review

Easy Classical is owned by the Williams family, a homeschooling family of six, and provides homeschool resources for families that follow that classical method of homeschooling.

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I received the digital version of the Early Modern History Schedule.  This resource provides a 36-week schedule for teaching early modern history {explorers to 1820} using the classical method.  This history schedule includes plans for reading the history spine books, writing, geography, read-alouds, history projects, and even some step-by-step drawing lessons.  This curriculum schedule is designed to be used with learners who are in the “grammar stage” of learning, typically kindergarten through fourth grade.

At the beginning of this 106-page ebook, Mrs. Williams provides an “instruction” page that is intended to help the homeschool parent prepare to teach history using the Easy Classical Schedule.  Mrs. Williams first asks that you read the “Grammar Stage” section of The Well-Trained Mind: A Guide to Classical Education at Home by Susan Wise Bauer.  She recommends using the suggestions in the “How to Do It” sections to help you set up notebooks for your child{ren}.

She then takes you through the schedules, explains the different features of the schedules, and gives suggestions for how to use them.  She also provides a description of the history spines and read-alouds that are used in the schedule and a main materials shopping list.  

In addition to the 36-weeks of schedules, Mrs. Williams provides a variety of helps including comprehension questions {and answers} for each week, and a shopping list for each week {provided on the previous week’s schedule so you can prepare ahead of time}.

My Thoughts

This history schedule is jam-packed with activities to complete.  Every week Mrs. Williams has scheduled reading from the history spine {usually on Mondays}, five days of writing assignments, four days of geography assignments, supplemental read-alouds, and even a history project. 

However, she did this with the intent that you will not complete every assignment every week, but rather that you would pick and choose the activities that best fit your child{ren}.  In the “instruction sheet” section of this ebook Mrs. Williams even states “[p]lease keep in mind that you will not be able to do EVERY assignment EVERY week.”

Therefore, if you are a “box-checker” who feels that you must complete each and every assignment listed on your schedule, you will probably be overwhelmed by this schedule. 

However, if you are looking for a well thought out history schedule that will help you teach history to your elementary-aged child within a classical framework, a schedule that gives you lots of options and includes a variety of activities ~ from writing to history projects ~ you will definitely want to take a look at Easy Classical. 

Links to sample pages {introduction, schedule, lessons} from the Early Modern History Schedule are provided on this page.  

More Information about Easy Classical

Please note that this product contains only a schedule…if you want to use Easy Classical’s schedule to teach Early Modern History, you will need to purchase {or have access to} a number of items in addition to the schedule.  Some of these items are Easy Classical products {writing, copybook, and geography}.

In addition to obtaining a copy of Susan Wise Bauer’s The Well-Trained Mind {portions to be read in preparation for teaching}, you will also need to obtain the required resources for this curriculum.  A full list of both the required resources and suggested supplemental resources is available here

The digital version of Easy Classical’s Early Modern History Schedule is available for purchase on the Easy Classical website for $29.95

Easy Classical offers a variety of schedules that aid the classical homeschooler, from complete curriculum schedules to individual history or science schedules.  They also offer writing with history guides, geography with history guides, and history copybooks.

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Click the above banner to about my fellow crewmates’ experiences with Easy Classical.

I received a complimentary digital copy of the Early Modern Times History Schedule in order to provide an honest review of my experience with this product.  I did not receive any further compensation for my review.

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