I noticed that quite a few books had been taken out of the new Modern Times revision for the younger children. I currently have the old version but am considering purchasing the revised one. I was wondering what were the biggest changes for the older children?
Grades 7–9: We took out one book in World History and one in American History; also replaced one in World History
Grades 10–12: We added the last sections from America, The Last Best Hope, Volume 1 (The first sections were added to Early Modern.), then spread out the readings for America, The Last Best Hope more and made Volume 3 optional. We took out several books for American history to make room for the addition of that Volume 1. The World History book list stayed pretty much the same.
Both have the new Bible study, Strong in the Word, assigned along with the new Family Bible studies in the lesson plans.
Would you say that the updates make the Grade 10-12 plans more doable? Or were there other reasons for the changes? I ask because one of my children at this level is a slow reader. I do have most of the books for the old version in both Grade 7-9 and 10-12 but anything to keep history an enjoyable experience.
Sue, America, The Last Best Hope is more of a spine/walk through American history in three volumes by William Bennett. We’re focusing on the first two volumes, because they cover the most ground. (Mr. Bennett hadn’t planned on writing the third volume since the events were so recent [1990–], but many people were asking for it.)
teachme2learn, the amount of reading has been reduced some by using America, The Last Best Hope as the main books rather than trying to cover all those events with separate books. I do see an advantage of using the books in the first edition, though, if you think you may want to eliminate some to keep the list from being overwhelming. It might be easier to eliminate some books than to try to eliminate some portion(s) of the spine readings. Does that make sense?