Half a Hundred Acre Wood

Christian homeschooling integrating Classical and Charlotte Mason principles

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At one time we used Classical Conversations as a spine around which we built our school year. If you want to supplement the memory work but are lacking funds to go hog-wild with buying boatloads of books, here’s a list of supplemental resources that you might want to check out.  Most of them are in the form of pdf documents for those who have an e-reader or can read off of a computer.

American History Readings

American History Stories Vol 1-4 by Mara Louise Pratt-Chadwick provides a narrative account of various people and events throughout American History.  Audio recordings only exist for Volumes 1 & 2 of this series.  We plan to use these to supplement our study of Columbus, Pilgrims/Colonial Life and the American Revolution.  The history contained in each volume is as follows:

Volume 1:  Norsemen to the end of the French & Indian War  pdf    audio
Volume 2:  American Revolution & Patriotic Songs  pdf    audio
Volume 3:  The First President through the Fugitive Slave Law  pdf
Volume 4:  Abraham Lincoln through The War Between the States  pdf

A Short History of the United States by Edward Channing is a fairly complete American history book from 1000 to 1900 .  Download a free e-book or the audio recordings from Librivox.  (NOTE:  Though the audio recordings are listed as “Chapters” on Librivox, there are actually several chapters on each recording, so you will have recordings for the entire book if you download the 26 “Chapters” from Librivox. The recordings range from 7 minutes to 38 minutes in length.)  As a family, if we listen to one “chapter” recording per week, we will have listened to a complete history of the United States up to 1900, filling in the gaps left in our Cycle 3 memory work.  As a side note, Channing’s A History of the United States, is regarded as one of the most complete and accurate accounts of American history and received the 1926 Pulitzer Prize for History.

The above listed books were the history books we used during our first trip through American history, chosen primarily because they were appropriate for the elementary school level.  In selecting these, we considered readability, vocabulary, and whether or not audio recordings were available (because we listen to or read-along with our history lessons), but many others are also available. Below are additional titles that are available for free:

(There are many more free e-books that can be used for supplementing American History.  If you need to beef up the reading part of your curriculum, be sure to search for additional readings at Gateway to the Classics.  If you need them in pdf or e-reader format, you can conduct a search on google e-books for those you find on Gateway to the Classics.)

Note:  We now use Story of the World (SOTW) by Susan Wise-Bauer, which can be purchased through Amazon.  SOTW is a world history book, so the American History is dispersed throughout Volumes 3 and 4.  Because it is a world history book, it does not contain some of the history that we will be studying in Cycle 3.  Correlation to SOTW is available in our Reading Correlations Packet.

For an illustrated book encompassing several stories from American History, purchase a used copy of William J. Bennett’s The Children’s Treasury of Virtues (I found mine on ebay for less than $10). The Treasury of Virtues contains The Children’s Book of Virtues, The Children’s Book of Heroes, and The Children’s Book of America.  This book can also be used in conjunction with Bible lessons to reinforce character development (Book of Virtues).  [UPDATE:  The price of the Treasury of Virtues has gone up significantly! As of September 2014, the Book of America is a good alternative for a fraction of the cost!!]  Check out our suggested readings from these books here.

U.S. Presidents: Coloring Pages of U.S. Presidents

Science

Geography

Drawing

This is just a small sample of what you can find for free on-line!  For a listing of free resources for all subjects, visit our Cycle 3 Resources page, our Cycle 2 Resources Page, or our Cycle 1 Resources Page.

You may be interested in the following:


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