Fitting in non western culture books

You could plan a subject called “Non-Western Studies” and select one book from the HUFI or Sonlight list to read each term. I would imagine you could do this from about 4th grade on if you have strong readers; earlier if you are reading the books aloud.

Heather

Could you follow the curriculum guide for geography and include more books for the non-Western sections? For example, if you are mapping Asia could you include more books about Asia?

Not having the list of books in front of me, I can’t be more specific, but here are some thoughts:

Have a fun summer focus without the stress of all subjects. You wouldn’t get into huge detail if you covered all the civilizations in one summer, but you could do some interest-provoking stuff like:  

Schedule a country/civilization for a certain amount of time (like two weeks or something):

Read the books, find a YouTube video about something that correlates, check out a crafty type book and let your littles create something.

At the end of the two weeks, have a special ethnic dinner/party with the crafts as decorations and everyone has a minute in the spotlight to share what they learned, and mark things on a time line or Book of Centuries as they present their thoughts and ideas.

That way you can have all the kiddos involved and perhaps do something fun that normally you wouldn’t get done in the regular school day.

Or make passports and visit the places – again by placing time frames on the civilizations:

I printed a passport cover and put it in a 3-ring binder. In that binder are dividers of each continent with maps.

As we study each country we are placing a stamp and date on the map to show that they were “there”.  

As we read, we create notebooking pages for each one (written and drawn narrations, photos, etc) to place behind their maps.

They like this and it is a fun record for geography.