Can you share with me a bit about the history portion of this curriculum?
I'll tell what I was thinking and you can tell me if it would suit my needs, if you don't mind : )

I was thinking to use just the history portion for ages 6.5 and 8.5, maybe bigger hearts since we are presently going through the history books from Beyond on our own now a bit at a time. (right now we're reading Stories of the pilgrims).

I have all my other subjects covered so I'm just looking at purely their history. I'm thinking using HOD might be more manageable for me (coming from a SL background) but still give me the literature flavor but not more than I am able to handle right now.
Does this sound like it might work for us?

Thanks so much!
~Melissa~

Hi Melissa!
We are using Bigger this year, and also used SL previously for several years. The reading-aloud load seems *much* lighter this year than when we were using Sonlight. Basically what the guide would give you (using it just for history) is a schedule for reading the history books (two books by Eggleston and Journeys in Time) and various hands-on history projects, art projects, and geography and notebooking activities. You also make and keep a timeline.

The Storytime books are good but don't necessarily correspond to the history readings. If you wanted that, you could use the schedule for Extension books in the appendix which do go along with history. These are meant to be read independently by older students, but there is no reason they couldn't be read aloud to younger students. You can check the website for some of the titles to see if they would appeal to your dc. My dd is reading them to herself and has enjoyed them so far.

So yes, I definitely think it could work for you *if* you like the history books used. They are older books and I know some have had issues with that because of the writing style. We are enjoying them now, but they did take some getting used to. I believe you can find them online so you might google them and see what you think.

Also, I would recommend adding in the poetry if you do decide to go with Bigger--we have really enjoyed it this year!

hth. :)

There are about 3-4 pages a day to read aloud and there are some great activities that are easy to do to accompany the reading. I am assuming you would like to do the time line and notebook pages. They add a lot without being overwhelming. There were a couple I changed for simplicity that you might want to as well with an infant also. Instead of the boys drawing the outline maps of the world and the Jamestown area, I traced it for them and let them label and color it. Also, instead of drawing and coloring rice and indigo from South Carolina, I ran off a picture from the internet. So far that is all I changed in the first 8 weeks. Oh, if you do get it, let me know and I will explain how we did the timeline to give us bigger boxes to draw in. (This was a discussion on the HOD board.) I know you are not interested in the science, but my boys have really liked the colonial science book. You could just read that one if you wanted to. I was surprised my boys liked this book because it seemed a little "heavy" and "technical", but they do so I mention it. If I ever did a different science with Bigger, I think I would still get that book. Different people split it up a little differently, are you including storytime in your interests? That is another aspect of it that I think you might like if you had time. We have really liked it. There is a little box for a very short activity or oral summary of the reading each day. We have sometimes skipped this when short on time however. If you did mean this part also, the average might be around 6 pages for this part. I did Sonlight K, 3 and 4, and I enjoy and accomplish HOD in a much more timely fashion. I also think their retention is better. Maybe it would be a good fit for you as well. I hope this helps. The Other Melissa

Totally doable. I'd do the history reading box and the extra activity box (vocab, history project, art expression, geography, and timeline, each done weekly & corresponds with the history reading).

May I suggest you think about the science portion (Science in Colonial America, Pioneer Sampler, James Audubon, etc.)? It corresponds beautifully with the history reading. Even if you do your own science and just read the science selections, I think it would add so much to the rest of the history. Just a thought.

Oh, I totally agree with pottersclay about adding in the science. Even if you just do the reading/narrating and not the notebooking, they do add a lot to the history! I will admit, we were kind of 'hit or miss' with getting the science done when they One Small Square books were scheduled but I am really trying to keep up with the rest of it. And we are really looking forward to the Pioneer Sampler! I bought that last year to use with SL and never got around to it.

(Not that we don't like the One Small Square books--but we are doing a science coop this year using the God's Design for Science books, and when it gets to be too much, those are what we drop).

I'm going to be the odd man out here - I don't think I'd use Bigger for a 1st grader. I think the program is pretty good but the Eggleston books - well, you either like them and understand them, or you don't. We tried Bigger this year with a 4th grader and I found even myself going "What?" (I got lost when on one page they talked about Columbus' first trip and before that trip was even over they were talking about the fourth trip. Huh?) I think you can easily do just the History portions from HOD and even the science without doing the rest (although the copywork is very good) as I did this with Beyond for one my kids two years ago but I'm not sure at the girl's ages I'd do Bigger just yet. The Beyond program was really great for American History and my ds remembers it so well. Bigger's focus changes on to the people of the times so you basically cover the same time frame but you cover biographically the key players of the time. I ended up selling Bigger and getting WP's AS 1 and that is a much better fit although I find right now we're skipping parts because we had already covered it.
Okay, so I'm just one in the "cons" column.
Heidi

I think it would work well if your kids are used to listening to read alouds. My now 7 year old then 6 year old and even my 4 year old (at the time) listened in. I am not sure the 4 year old had total comprehension but I am sure the 6 year old did becasue we spoke about it and I had to hold her back from answering questions and participating. She was doing LHFHG at the time. I have her doing Beyond this year and am thankful for the gap becasue she did listen in so much we needed something in between. I have her in Beyond for the sake of keeping her together with my youngest. Bigger is a program with lots of flexibility and for your purpose I think it would work well. Enjoy!

I think you could do it, but the Egleston books are a tough sell for an 8 yr. old. I don't know that a younger child would really be inspired by them.
My 8 yr. old couldn't narrate from Egleston at all hardly b/c she zoned out after a few minutes of my reading out loud.
My best advise would be to look online for a copy of the Egleston books. They are on free readers all over the net. Dowload the sample from HOD, the necessary pages from the Egleston book, and go over the week yourself and see if you think it will work.