For those of you who use/used the History of US books

[hsmom]

Did you use the teacher guides? Are they necessary? Or can these books be used without the teacher guides and still be good?

[MIch elle]

nt

[StephanieZ]

I've never seen the teacher's guides. The books are very self-explanatory text books. If they were the spine of a history program, I could imagine the guides being helpful for tests/questions/essay topics/etc but when I'm using them just as a reference, I don't need/want teacher's guides. In a few years, we'll be using them with SL Core 100 as a spine and I think SL provides a guide of some sort, which will be interesting to see.

[swimnactmom]

I think the guides are important if this series is your spine. They really challenge your child's critical reading and thinking skills. My ds (5th grade) would miss a lot if we weren't using the guides. I would recommend them although they are expensive, around $20 each. Of course it gets pricey if you use all 10 plus the initial investment for the 10 textbooks plus the sourcebook.
One thing that I did not do that I regret is buy the assessment book. I make up my own tests for each book and that is a task I am not happy about. We are on Book 6 now and I don't want to pay $50 for the assessment book at this point.

[nestof3]

I bought the books, the guides and the tests. I used the guides quite a bit and always gave the tests. I was using the books as a spine for a drawn out three-year US history study with TONS of supplemental reading and documentaries.