History Odyssey

[tmkclscroggins]

Has anyone used History Odyssey - the first 2 levels - grammar and logic stages?

What did you think? Was it fun and EASY TO USE?????

Thanks,
Melissa

[Mrs Mungo]

If you do a search you will find some discussion on it. I ordered it a couple of weeks ago based on recommendations here so I know there was a recent discussion.

[Sue in St Pete]

Here is my review:

I chose HO because it's the only secular history program I know of for logic age. Ds would be in 6th grade this year. We have completed 48/66 lessons. I have mixed feelings about it so far, but my thumb is starting to point up instead of down lately.

Pros:
• History is all planned out
• Outlining is learned and practiced
• Map work and timeline work is helpful
• Can be done independently
• A large amount of history is being covered

Cons:
• KHE is dull (reading snippets of information and picture captions)
• Retention may be low
• No review/discussion questions to assess comprehension
• Little supplemental reading
• Required literature is never discussed, only read
• Too much freedom for an unmotivated student to do a mediocre job
• History Pockets involve too much time for knowledge gained
• Expensive if you buy package
• This is picky, but the study guide in the 3 ring binder format is completely falling apart because of all the flipping back and forth that has to be done. We have to keep those little, sticky o-things right in the binder because the pages are constantly being ripped out.

20/20 Hindsight:
• Buy only the study guide (maps included) and timeline
• Do not buy the supplemental books – get them from the library, substitute from the library, or buy used
• Do not buy the History Pockets unless the child likes cut & paste & color
• Add Life in the Ancient World by Bart Winer

[Nicole M]

Very thorough review, and I would agree completely. We just finished levels 3 & 1 ancients, and it was a tough go. The biggest weakness for me, especially for older students, is not having any review / discussion questions and not having an "answer key." Also the format, with successive lessons did not work for us. I had to work very hard to figure out due dates, etc. My oldest would simply stop moving ahead if he got to a tough assignment, and it would take several days for me to figure out what was going on with him and that put him way behind.

Thing is, I reallyreallyreally wanted to love HO. There isn't much else out there like it. But I realized I could come up with something similar and better formatted for our needs with not that much work. In the end it was not worth it for us.

[Sue in St Pete]

I reallyreallyreally wanted to love HO. There isn't much else out there like it. But I realized I could come up with something similar and better formatted for our needs with not that much work. In the end it was not worth it for us.

I, too, wanted to love HO. I don't have the time, energy, knowledge, or talent to put something together myself. I'll probably stick with it because of that. Maybe I could just make up a reading list for ds to read through, but then I still have the problem of making sure that he is understanding and retaining the material.

[freethinkermom]

We did not like HO level1. It was too repetitive and boring with all the coloring.

HO level 2 (Early Modern) is a big hit with ds11. I have not seen the other periods of history in L2, but for Early Modern I have to disagree that the additional books are not discussed. There are no questions to answer, but the essays are often based on the reading in the books. To me that requires a higher level of digestion than simply answering predetermined comprehension questions. There is also no use of History Pockets in the level 2 we have (there was in the level 1 we did). My son does it all himself. I just check over his work when he is done. He also does ALL of the writing. I know some people have said they cut some of it out, but the writing is where the comprehension is shown. We must also be of a more analytical mindset because we prefer history books like KHE and Usborne to the story format books. Ds does enjoy The Story Of Mankind, but he loves KHE.

I agree with just buying the guide and a timeline. The other books can bet purchased elsewhere less expensively or found at the library.

[Stirsmommy]

We have used HO level 2 for Ancients and Middle ages. Ancients was a bit weak in that I didn't realize I would still need to put in some effort to tweak it to our needs. That and I didn't realized dd despised coloring someone elses work and would hate the pockets. For the middle ages I didn't get the coloring book. She prefers to draw her own pictures. I have also added a couple of books. I don't buy the package. I get what I can from RR (that is also where I get HO) and then the rest from amazon since my library isn't so hot.

[Kat in GA]

Okay...having bought the guide to HO 2...and seeing it a bit for myself...and hearing your comments...do you have suggestions for another curriculum? One that is more planned out (like the activity guide for SOTW)? With review questions and reading lists? HELP!!

[nmoira]

DD is currently in HO Level 1 Medieval. We enjoy it, and intend to continue; however, I'm very comfortable adapting the program to meet her needs. I find it flexible (for me this is a feature), and never require her to do busy work. If she isn't interested in coloring when we do read-alouds, she draws, does needlework, or otherwise occupies herself. We don't do much with the History Pockets, and we do a lot of supplemental reading. Neither of us are crafty, but we did find many of the projects in Level 1 Ancients to be engaging. The two activity texts, Ancient Egyptians and Their Neighbors and Ancient Israelites and Their Neighbors are worthy of purchase even if you don't do HO.

[training5]

I keep wishing SWB would have time between writing for Norton and writing the second book of her new writing fundamentals sereis to create a SOTW for Logic age. Gee, she just has sooo much free time...

[Nicole M]

I've been thinking abou this for days now, since this thread first appeared. For me, if levels 2 & 3 of HO just had a parent's guide, a road map for entering into the conversation, it would be perfect. As is, it's really just a set of assignments and there is no answer key, no flag that tells you "this is the finish line!"

I had this problem a little bit with Oak Meadow, which we used when I was first homeschooling. They do have teacher's guides, but I didn't know really how to use it. Then with my youngest son, I used Calvert's CHOW with the workbook, and then realized what I had been missing. Now, having used several Calvert enrichment courses, I can make my own discussion questions and answer guides, but my feeling is that if you're going to purchase curriculum materials, that stuff needs to be part of the package, kwim?

This is all to say that I think I'm going to email Pandia and see if anything like this in the works. Anyone know already? Or am I the only one who wants this?!

[training5]

I would love to see that as well.

[Stacia]

Here was one of the earlier discussions...
http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4302