cmhelp

We used the majority of the books they have on there along with some I liked better…we found it meaty and very interesting. However we made our own plan as I found theirs too rigid and burdensome. We took books from the salad bar and made our own schedules to suit our lifestyle and needs. Was there anything specific you wanted to know? I actually used HEO and not CMHelp, but CM help uses the books from HEO so it is the same thing. Linda

Amanda I think the books are excellent for a meaty high school course, they are not easy reads and require thinking and diligence, but they are in the main well worth the time and effort. We loved the Churchill books and the girls learned so much from them, they can be a bit dry for some, but Churchill was a wonderful writer. If you give me specific books I can better answer the question. I wanted the girls to read for college in case they decided to go, so I opted for meatier reading….there is nothing wrong with the SCM history at all, except that the girls had read most of the books listed, by the time they got to high school, so I needed something more. The girls also love history, so reading more challenging books was not a hardship for them. The HEO schedule I did not care for so we made our own to suit our little family – I think you would enjoy doing the same…pick your books to cover the time period and then set it up as you would normally, I use the SCM plan your CM education forms to do that and it works great. I should also say, I studied a lot of history and it was my major in college, albeit European, so the books were not too difficult for me, if you struggle yourself with history or don’t enjoy it, you may not enjoy Churchill, however there is benefit in trying them…I like the books by William Bennett that SCM lists and we have read some of those, but we read mostly Martin Gilbert and Paul Johnson for the main books. It certainly would help if you had time to read some of these books before your child did, then you could see whether they would be suitable or not. Linda

I think SCM is fine for all years depending on what you want….however when it came to history, we had covered a lot of the books that SCM recommends in earlier years – and so they were of no use to me for the later high school years. We like AO/HEO because they are CM and have excellent books…some of them very meaty and interesting and more adult reading…my girls love history as I do, and we wanted something that was challenging…we still used narration both written and oral; essays and things like that. I did not do a pure CM education with the girls, we did a mix, but all our reading was CM style, with the appropriate narrations depending on age. SCM is excellent in all years especially up to high school level I think, and depending on your needs and desires it would work for high school too…I just know that the history was not perhaps challenging enough for college, some of the books are but I did not think there were enough of them. I wanted the girls to be ready for the challenging reading they would have in college, and I know in my high school years in the UK, we read some pretty hefty books in readiness for our college reading – that is where I first read the Churchill books. So it is up to the idividual, to see what is good for their own family. Amanda is enjoying SCM, so there is no real need to change, and the books that AO/HEO recommend that may have risque content you can easily avoid. I for one don’t believe in avoiding all risque things with older teens, they need to have some idea of what is out there – having said that though there is nothing we have read that has shocked any of us. I just know that college is challenging, the reading is hard, and I wanted the girls to have some experience of that so that it won’t be a shock when they start classes. As long as you have put your faith into your school in the younger years, the high school student should be well able to handle and discuss more challenging things in readiness for college and adult life. If SCM is working great, no need to change, but if like us you have already read a lot of the books earlier on, then you need something different and HEO has some valuable books to offer.