These are the books that Z will read in the evening for fun for 1 hour and once he completes this list, he will choose his own to finish out the year.
These are the challenging morning books that Z will be reading for 45 minutes:
We're not required to do testing in Ohio but I like to see where my kids stand when it comes to these tests. I read that the 1970's CAT (California Achievement Test) is the best to use before they dumbed-down the testing, so we use that one. As you can see, Z is very advanced and the vocabulary was a bit antiquated, so he missed some - obviously that's the downside with using a test from 1970.
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We purchase the tests through Academic Excellence and if you use my link, you can get $5 off of your first purchase of at least $10 minimum. If you use my link to get this discount, they also give me a $3 coupon to use for the next test I buy.
I did a post on our new history and how well it went for 4th grade. We are covering all years of history from ancient to modern using The Human Odyssey (THO), Story of the World (SOTW) and The Good and the Beautiful (TGAB). I already owned THO and SOTW, so I had all those and even PDF versions of the SOTW activity guides so I could print any pages my son was interested in doing.
I bought TGAB, all 4 years, because they were discontinuing it and I also wanted the games. I was also interested in trying out their historical fiction books and let me tell you - those are our absolute favorites! It is so disappointing that they discontinued printing the reprints of these great books but we went ahead and bought all the ones we wanted that were available and we are enjoying reading them as a family and I'm saving them for my future grandkids.
Here are links to some of the tools I used to combine these histories together:
Here are the plans for Z's 5th grade year:
Bible - Bible Study Guide for All Ages
We found the absolute best solution for Z and he now loves history! I had went through so many programs the past few years and most we just stopped early on because it was like pulling teeth. Then, I prayed and came up with something that worked so well for us for 4th grade that we are going to continue on with it through 7th grade (or whenever we finish it).
I combined The Human Odyssey with Story of the World and The Good and the Beautiful history. I have had The Human Odyssey for many years because I had planned to use it with my daughter but my hospitalizations and health got in the way and she ended up doing history on her own with Notgrass (which she loved). So, I already had the books, all 3 volumes and I tried starting it with Z and he, not only loved it, but he retained a large amount.
What we do is read 3-4 pages from The Human Odyssey and then another day he listens to SOTW audio while he follows along with the book. Then we do the maps and some activities but mostly, we use the book lists from SOTW as extra reading. I then incorporate TGAB and the book lists, along with videos on YT pertaining to whatever we are studying. It worked beautifully I must say! We finished up Ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, Hebrews, China and India and will start in the fall with Ancient Greece and then Rome.
I will post a more detailed post soon hopefully with downloads that show how to combine all 3 of these curriculums if anyone is interested. It does take work and there is some repetitition but Z enjoyed hearing some things again in the other lessons.
