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Biblioplan and Truthquest?
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Hello families! We are fairly new to SCM and would appreciate any feedback on the above History curricula, and how SCM History would fall into that category (if at all). I am looking at starting our 4th and 7th grade children with SCM Matthew through Acts & Ancient Rome (History/Geography/Bible) and stumbled upon the other 2 curricula, since we did Ancient History with MFW and MOH last year. Any suggestions or experience would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Blessings, Jackie
I looked into Biblioplan before I settled on SCM this year (I was interested in switching after 3 yrs. of Story of the World). Biblioplan seemed to have too many parts – too many books that I “had” to buy in order to do it with my 9,7,5,3 yo daughters. The main “book” for Biblioplan was a little too text-book-y for me, although it was beautiful, with many pictures and little sidebars of info. It was also WAY pricey – $90. And I hated to just have that and not have access to the coloring pages and all the other things.
Then I looked at the coloring pages and I didn’t care for them – hand-drawn, balloon-y type characters, etc. I just didn’t care for them. Then I got to thinking about what I really wanted to accomplish. I really wanted my children to have a basic understanding of the flow of history and get to know some of the great people in history. Did I need coloring pages for that? I decided not. I also decided I didn’t need hands-on activities. They’d be nice, but I thought they’d add more stress to my days.
So, there! I’d decided I didn’t need any of the things Biblioplan provided.
For the previous 3 years, we used STOW spine, and the activity book – coloring pages. I had my children color while I read the history. I almost think that hindered in some ways, as if they weren’t paying attention! I liked that it kept them quiet while I read and that they had a picture to remember what I read. But I just wasn’t loving the STOW spine anymore. It seemed like it was getting hard to read aloud and hard to keep in my head where we were in the great scheme of things.
So, I switched to SCM Module 6 (which would be about the same as SOTW 4) and changed our routine so that History reading is right before naptime. It’s working — no coloring pages, because we’re on the couch and lounging around. I’m not opposed to coloring pages, and sometimes I wish I had something to put in the oldest girl’s portfolio. But I’m not worrying about that right now. I plan on having her do some notebooking pages about some of the people we “meet” and some written narrations or “book reports” and put that stuff in the portfolio.
I did end up and buy some Dover coloring books about the subjects (Civil War). But we haven’t used them yet!
Hope that helps!
We actually use a combo of SCM and Truthquest. It’s not necessary to use both, but I like both aspects and the two guides combined still cost less than many other curriculum guides out there:) I love the biblical commentary of TQ…who God is, how man responded to him in history, and the consequences of that. But I had a hard time using it as a stand alone because the book list is SO huge I just have trouble narrowing and getting done w/a guide in a year.
I love the SCM handbook layout! It’s a day-by-day plan that’s very mom-friendly. Weekly plans stressed me because if we had a sick day/fieldtrip day I felt behind. But w/the SCM guide you just do the next day, and make-up days and exam days are scheduled in for you, too. It doesn’t really have a commentary, more of reminders to narrate the past lesson and current lesson, maybe a tibit of what’s coming next, occasionaly activities (but not much…which I prefer!) I love how the Bible is covered in 6 yrs. alongside history.
What I do is go through my SCM guide and pencil in the margin the corresponding TQ commentary page. I also pencil in the page #’s of TQ Think Write qu. and movie suggestions. So, I’m daily going through my SCM guide as my main plan, and just grabbing my TQ guide on the days I have it penciled in. Does that make sense? Anyway, just what works for us…hope something was helpful:) Blessings, Gina
Wow, what wonderful reponses, thanks everyone!
I have also struggled with the weekly plans, Gina. As much as my love for the TM that comes with MFW, it has now become a burden to me, and I end up feeling like we’ve missed so much if we didn’t get through it all in 1 day. I have really liked the CM philosophy, but have been afraid to try it. Well, it looks like we are going to give it go and begin with SCM History and Spelling Wisdom (which we used before). Gina, would you happen to have some sort of of chart or list that you have created for TQ and SCM History? Is it pretty simple to tag them together on my own?
We actually did The Mystery of History 1 last year, and began using MOH 2 just recently. Would you all suggest that I start the SCM History at Matthew through Acts, or at the very beginning? We love ancient history and wouldn’t mind going back, but want to make sure that we are not hurting our learning by doing so. Our 9th grade daughter is doing ancient history with MFW, so it would be fine if we were in that time period as well. I really want to incorporate her in our studies as well, but she does like MFW and I don’t want to deter her from enjoying her learning. Any suggestions would be wonderful, thanks!
I totally understand. I stressed over Sonlights weekly schedule….and that was for K! Plus it was hard to do things more like CM with a packed out schedule. Which is why I love SCM! Plenty to do, but not burdensome.
I’m sorry I don’t have a chart of how I combine SCM with TQ. But it’s very simple….takes me less than an hour or so. Have you seen a TQ guide? Basically it’s commentary/topics with books listed below. Many SCM books are used, so I love letting SCM do the work of narrowing for me:) Some TQ commentaries are just a line or two telling you a topic….very short. I skip those. I focus on the longer commentaries (usually page or so). So, I just pick up my TQ guide and flip to the first commentary. I look in my SCM guide to see where this commentary best correlates and just jot theTQ page in the margin of my SCM guide. I also jot the pages of TQ Think Write qu and movie suggestions into my SCM margin. Does that make sense?
As far as where to start, I’m not sure what’s best for your family. Has your 7th grader had exposure to other periods than ancients? If he/she has, I might be inclined to start with Module One and that would give a perfect 6 yrs to complete all 6 SCM modules for your 7th grader. Also, the TQ American History guides for olders are said to be pretty deep and best for upper high school. But if your 7th grader has only studied ancients I might be inclined to move on. Pray!
My kids were 4th and 7th last year and we did Egypt with SCM alongside TQ Egypt. I have TQs old Egypt guide. The new Beginnings guide has Bible and Egypt combined, but the Egypt commentary is the same. TQ actually says very little about Egypt (dark topics) so
so you wouldn’t miss much if you just did SCM for that year.
You will notice that TQ spends 3 yrs on American and SCM spends 2 years. You can do it any way you want, but my plan is to follow SCM’s schedule and just add in TQ commentary from all 3 of their volumes. That’s the current plan anyway;)
I hope this was helpful and not overwhelming! Please feel free to ask if you have more qu. Maybe others will chime in, too. Blessings, Gina
Thanks Gina! This is great information, and it does make sense. All of our children were in in public school up until 2 years ago when we began homeschooling. They learned a mish-mash of History in school, if that makes sense. We started using MFW ECC, which was a year of missionary geography with very little History. It was great, then we moved onto Ancient History last year with CtG and Mystery of History. We began with Rome to the Reformation about 4 weeks ago, but have been looking at CM this week to see how we can change. I know that we all love Ancient History, so wherever we begin with CM is fine with us. My 9th grade daughter is using MFW Ancient History and Literature currently, so I’ve been reading some of the high school posts on this forum as well. She is struggling with this curriculum, so I guess I’m just nervous as where to begin, whether we continue with the Matthew History/Bible/Geography CM book, or start again at book 1. Any suggestions?
I know this decision can seem stressful. I’ve stewed way too many hours over history cycles:) I can’t say what’s best for your family. I personally always figure what’s best for my oldest, then younger tags along(my two are 5th and 8th). If your oldest is happy with MFW I would just continue that path. If not, the SCM modules can be completed in 4 yrs instead of 6. There are posts on this. I think generally people read all the history books in Mod 1-3(Ancients) in one year, but likely do do something else for Bible….or it would be a lot of reading . Then ancients are done in one year, MA/Ren/Ref the next, then 2 yrs of American.
You could also do that with the younger two if you prefer everyone staying on same topic and want a 4 yr cycle for everyone. Or the younger two could take 6 yrs and do guides as written. An advantage of this is they get to read through the Bible alongside history and you can use the SCM guide as written….less work for you.
Or your younger two could start with Matthew guide. If really doesn’t matter since they have more time. A qu I would ask myself is do I plan to homeschool for the long haul. If likely so, I don’t think it matters much where you start the younger two. If they might be going back to school, I’d probably want to move on from ancients.
Does that help? Hopefully others will add input, too:) Blessings, Gina
Thanks Gina, I am now trying to decide if we will simply begin with either Module 2 or 3. If we begin in 2, then we will then go through both 2 and 3 this year so that my 9th grade daughter will be able to complete the cycle by her senior year. I may simply add some reading/activities from MOH 2 for her, since I know that high school credits need to be properly accounted for. We are sticking with this, so I know that we should do the entire cycle at least once. Thanks again, you all have given me such wonderful suggestions and guidance!
Hi Gina,You had posted some suggestions on my previous post a couple of weeks ago, so thank you first of all. Your encouragement really helped me to see what we needed to look at, and what might work for us!
Well, after much consideration, we’ve decided on SCM History module 3 (Matthew-Acts), and also ordered TruthQuest Ancient Rome. Do you think those 2 would go together? I figured that would probably be the closest due to both being on Ancient Rome, so to speak. I am going to use your suggestion of writing in the margins of my SCM guide as to what commentary I will be using from TQ. As much as I was nervous at the fact that everything isn’t perfectly planned out for me, it did give me some relief knowing that I don’t have to be tied down to a specific list of things to do, only to be let down and stressed if something came up and we couldn’t get to it. Like I’ve mentioned previously, we will be using this with our 4th ds, 7th dd, and 9th dd. If you have any other suggestions, or even think another TQ module would work better with our SCM module 3, please let me know. Thanks again for listening, God bless!
Blessings, Jackie in TN
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