Truthquest-who uses this into Jr. and Sr. high?

[Karie]

I'm curious who has used this into the upper grades and if it has been complete for you. What did you add to it if anything? I've looked extensively at TOG, and while it looks awesome, I'm afraid it may be more than I want. I would like my history to be just that-only history.

[Alphabetika]

and we're using the Ancient Egypt/Greece and Ancient Rome guides with a 3rd grader and an 8th grader, whom I consider to be like a highschooler, late dialectic/early rhetoric stage, to use WTM language. :) My 3rd grader has never studied history "formally" and my 8th grader has not been a history lover in the past (we've used Sonlight, BF Classical Music, and created-our-own). Now they are both hooked. I plan to use all of the guides with my older dd by the time she graduates, if I can ever spring her out of Ancient Greece. She is immersed. What I have done is had her read the commentary herself, and just given her a bevy of books and allowed her to choose her own reading, basically. She is reading a few different spines, sections in books about art and architecture history (Annotated Mona Lisa and Annotated Arch - highly recommend these!), a book of source documents from scientists throughout history (so, for instance, she has read some of Archimedes' actual writing), a book about historical fashion, Edith Hamilton's Mythology (sections), history of medicine....you get the idea. She has also read The Iliad and is now reading The Odyssey (both Robert Fagles translations - love 'em!), and we discuss them, for which she will get high school literature credit because of the level and amount of reading. She takes notes as she reads, on whatever facets of the reading fascinate her most.

We have not done as much with the ThinkWrite topics as I would like to, but I haven't been too concerned with that because worldview discussion comes very naturally when you study ancient Greece; it's very easy to compare and contrast the mythological gods and the Greek cultural worldview with a Biblical worldview.

Perosnally, I think the guides are excellent and could absolutely be a complete history study, if that's what you're looking for. You wouldn't have to do all the "fringe things" that I've added in, like art/ architecture/ fashion; I just choose to add that because I have a kid who loves the weird little details of anything much more than the big picture. In fact, I think it's the little details that make the big picture palatable for her, if that makes any sense. I never dreamed that she would become so hooked on ancient Greek history. Before we started, she claimed not to be interested in ancient history at all - now she's begging me not to move on to Rome because she still wants to read so much about Greece.

I recognize that this isn't necessarily unique to TQ, but TQ makes ME think of history in a whole new way and gives me ideas for new approaches. I think if you have a dc who's a high school level reader and thinker, TQ can be a high school level course for you. You could easily have your dc read one good spine and a book or section of a book about each topic that you assign or that is of interest to the dc. I am thrilled to have found it and plan to continue with both dd's, then send my younger one back through the guides on a higher level.

Hope this helps - like I said, it's our first year but we are greatly blessed! You might also want to look at the TQ website, because there's a section in which parents of high school students talk about how they make TQ work for high school.

Yours,
Erika in Southern CA
aka Alphabetika