HELP! Combine MOH and TOG?

[lovetobehome]

There must be a schedule already made up somewhere combining MOH and TOG, PLEASE???? I really, really hope so!! If anyone can offer me help here, I will be VERY grateful!!! I am looking at the end of MOH 1 (from the final semester) and TOG Y1 units 3 and 4. Then on to MOH2 and TOG2....

[Donna A.]

I don't know of any, although Paula's website has several schedules with SOTW and MOH together, and TOG does schedule SOTW within. Perhaps you could just pull the SOTW/MOH schedules off that site, and then plug the MOH readings into the TOG schedule where it lines up with SOTW.

TOG is very complete and you don't need MOH, though. You do know that, right? And TOG has many other possible spines scheduled. Is there a reason you want to do both?

FYI, each volume of MOH also gets a lot meatier. In fact, beginning with volume 3, she gives instructions on how to beef it up for high school. Thus, if you're thinking you want to add TOG because MOH 1 wasn't meaty enough, I don't think you need to worry.

[lovetobehome]

Thanks so much...I have tried Paula's, using SOTW, it just got me really confused, but I will keep working at it!

So...which would you do? TOG or MOH?

I really LIKE MOH, have been using it, but decided to buy TOG and see if I like it, in the hopes of getting used to it and learning how to use it as the kids get older. Now they are only 9, 6 and 18months. TOG arrived today, and I can't see how I can realistically do both together. I am sure it is possible, but probably not the wisest idea.
Mainly, I want my kids to see God's hand in history and in our lives....I feel like TOG is so solid as they get older, but is MOH equally so? HELP! Advise me!

[Donna A.]

Thanks so much...I have tried Paula's, using SOTW, it just got me really confused, but I will keep working at it!

So...which would you do? TOG or MOH?

I really LIKE MOH, have been using it, but decided to buy TOG and see if I like it, in the hopes of getting used to it and learning how to use it as the kids get older. Now they are only 9, 6 and 18months. TOG arrived today, and I can't see how I can realistically do both together. I am sure it is possible, but probably not the wisest idea.
Mainly, I want my kids to see God's hand in history and in our lives....I feel like TOG is so solid as they get older, but is MOH equally so? HELP! Advise me!

Well, this just MY opinion... I'm sure others' here will differ, as I know many use and love TOG and make it work just fine. But TOG is very comprehensive. If you were confused by the SOTW charts on Paula's website, I don't think TOG would be helpful at all. But that's just what *I* think. Early last fall I had spent some time with the TOG manual of a friend and thought I could get a pretty good handle on it after the so-called "two-week fog" (or however many weeks they say it is, LOL!), so I went ahead and bought it. I mainly had my oldest dd in mind for TOG (7th grade this year), and so I had her look through it as well, and we both liked it. But after I ordered it, it sat on the shelf for a few weeks while we packed the house for a move that didn't happen, spent two weeks at my mom's across the country, and then had company for a week. By the time I got back to TOG, I was really unsure of it. I looked it over and over again, and just couldn't get same thing assurance I'd had earlier. There's a LOT to it. And then about that same time is when I got the e-mail that they were going to stop printing hard copies and go all digital, so that pretty much made my decision for me. So I sold it.

Now I've got MOH 3 for my oldest to begin in February. (We school year round, so the date we start new material isn't that big of a deal.) Honestly, MOH is MUCH simpler to handle. If you're still in the second half of Volume 1, you could pull up this chart to utilize from whatever lesson you're on now: http://www.redshift.com/~bonajo/sotwmoh.htm (http://www.redshift.com/%7Ebonajo/sotwmoh.htm)

So let's say you're on Lesson 77 in MOH 1. Scroll down on that chart to where you see Lesson 77 in the 2nd column: Hippocrates and the Statue of Zeus. You would just go through your MOH and do Lessons 77, 78, 79, 80, and then read chapters 23 and 24 from SOTW 1. Then Lesson 81 from MOH, then 24 from SOTW, and so on. You could do this two ways: 1) Just use SOTW as a read-aloud to plug in the secular viewpoint of history at the appropriate points and do the activities in MOH; or 2) You could get the AG to go along with SOTW so that as those lessons come up , you have more book recommendations and activities to choose from in the SOTW AG. Or both, if you have the time and interest.

Have you obtained any of the extra resources that MOH recommends for rounding it out? If I remember right, there were some recs from Answers in Genesis in MOH 1 that our library doesn't have, so we would've had to purchase them, but those resources are a great investment for the whole family.

TOG is a fine program, but it really is a LOT of work. I suggest you either return what you've just ordered and revisit it at a later time, or hold onto it, but keep moving with MOH (and SOTW if desired) and take your time with TOG to study the TOG teacher's notes in order to better prepare yourself to use it in a few years. There's great value in studying ahead of our children so that we're prepared to teach them the meatier subjects. :)

[Donna A.]

P.S. My pastor's wife has been using TOG all along (she's now in year 3) but is in a quandry about what to do since they've gone digital. She LOVES TOG but really can't stand the thought of having to work directly from the computer and doesn't want to spend the time or money going to have it all printed and bound herself when it cost so much to purchase on digital format. She has MOH 1 and loves that also; the only reason she didn't go with MOH to begin with is because at the time, the author was still a long way from having any add'l volumes completed. However, she's now thinking about switching to MOH. ;)

[4evercanucks]

P.S. My pastor's wife has been using TOG all along (she's now in year 3) but is in a quandry about what to do since they've gone digital. She LOVES TOG but really can't stand the thought of having to work directly from the computer and doesn't want to spend the time or money going to have it all printed and bound herself when it cost so much to purchase on digital format. She has MOH 1 and loves that also; the only reason she didn't go with MOH to begin with is because at the time, the author was still a long way from having any add'l volumes completed. However, she's now thinking about switching to MOH. ;)

Since we have only now purchased TOG and won't be starting until 2010 I will not comment on the quality of TOG. I will leave that to those that has used and are using it. I did however want to say that when TOG went digital they brought the price down so that you actually have some playing money to finance your printing. You don't really need to print the entire Year Plan but for those that want it printed and don’t wish to have it printed themselves TOG has an arrangement with the Printing Company of one of their customers and can arrange to have it printed before it is shipped out to the customer, for a cost of course, that is only slightly higher than the old printed versions. Lets not forget that a digital version gives much more flexibility and unlimited options than just a printed copy (one example being if some pages get damaged or destroyed you can just print new ones). All this information is available in their site and their forums. Also, lets not forget that since TOG is designed for you to cycle through history for the different levels or grades if you will (up to about 3 times if you start with TOG from the beginning), even if you use it only with one child and divide the cost by how many times you can reuse it, the cost does not work out to any more than say SL or other similar curriculum providers.

Just felt the need to clarify certain things!

[siloam]

There must be a schedule already made up somewhere combining MOH and TOG, PLEASE???? I really, really hope so!! If anyone can offer me help here, I will be VERY grateful!!! I am looking at the end of MOH 1 (from the final semester) and TOG Y1 units 3 and 4. Then on to MOH2 and TOG2....

Ok let me try to explain why TOG works for me.

It isn't about the books-the history texts that TOG chooses, because I do have others like MOH that I prefer. In year 1 I will probably use MOH, Guerber and a picture text (the easy choice there would be Usborne, because it is scheduled, but I already own Kingfisher, so I might just schedule it in ;) ).

While I adore MOH, I did want more of a lit approach. If I wasn't using TOG have no clue what I would do for readers. I tried TruthQuest, which I also like, but I didn't want to have to come up with my own mapping (timeline figures would be pretty easy). I also like WP, but they don't include the Guerber books, and my oldest would need more reading, so I would be back to supplementing with TQ and re-doing the schedule. TOG just has more of everything I want. It has a topics lists, the people lists, timeline, mapping, literature/reader then I ADORE how everything is tied together-art history, music history, Biblical history with secular history, church history, missionaries, scientists and later philosophy and government as well. It is that coordination, studying people in their times, that I am really paying for when I bought TOG.

With the ages of you children, if you are very happy with using MOH alone, then it might work out better just to use MOH alone. Try as I might I would be messing with things, adding, rearranging in no time, if I tried to just to MOH alone. It isn't a problem with MOH because I adore it as well. It just doesn't have all the pieces I want and for me it is easier to use TOG with MOH as a spine than it is to start with MOH and do a bunch of modifying on my own.

Maybe that will give you more incite as to whether you should use MOH alone or try to make TOG work.

Heather

P.S. I got the first quarter scheduled last night. Should get farther tonight because I had to first put the last three units in binders and page protectors. :)