My son, who will be a freshman, really likes the idea of watching videos as part of his lessons (what kid doesn't, I guess.) I am looking for suggestions of either movies or documentaries you and/or your children have enjoyed for each unit we are covering in world history. I am feeling a bit overwhelmed with the thousands of choices out there. The movies can either be valued for their historical accuracy or compelling story. They can be from a Christian standpoint or secular as we plan on discussing and evaluating some of the differences. Here is a list of how our units are broken down. We are following the chapters/units in a textbook but are using mostly living books, library resources, etc. The dates of units overlap some, it's not a perfectly chronological text. If your not sure where a particular film/documentary would fit in, but you love it please just throw it out there. Unit 1 "Rise of Civilizations" (prehistory-500 BC) Unit 2 "Flowering of Civilzations" (2500 BC-AD 500) Unit 3 "Regional Civilizations" (AD 400-1500) Unit 4 "Emergence of the Modern World" (AD 1400-1800) Unit 5 "Age of Revolution" (1500-1830) Unit 6 "Industry and Nationalism" (1750-1914) Unit 7 "World in Conflict" (1914-1945) Unit 8 "The Contemporary World" (1945-Present) Thank you everyone for your help! Kendra
Try this site to get some ideas too: http://www.teachwithmovies.org/indexes-main.htm#subjects You might also want the Drive Thru series. They have a series on ancient cultures and some on US history too. I know sd loved those as supplements.
Kendra, get hold of "How Then Shall We Live?" These are Christian documentaries done by Francis Schaeffer. They are EXCELLENT. I saw them in college, and will have my sophmore daughter watch them this year as part of her World History. (Oh, they're based on a book by the same title Schaeffer wrote!)
When I was in highschool we had an english project on WWII. The group I was with decided to use a movie for our report. ( Man was the rest of the class mad at us) I believe the name was Swing Kids. We broke it down and used the various points in it to start discussion
Thank you for the suggestions. I will check them out. We do watch a lot of the history channel and I have spent quite a bit of time on their website, I'm just trying to narrow down the list. There are a million choices for each time period and I would love to use resources that other people have really enjoyed.
A fun type of thing we did in world history in high school was we watched History of the World part one and part two (with mel brooks) it was fun because we actually understood what was inconsistant with the film.
That reminded me. I found a website a while back that listed the top 5 least historically accurate films of all time (or something along those lines) I thought at the time it might be fun to watch them after studying a unit and see if we could come up with all the inaccuracies they listed or maybe some they didn't. Might actually take more thought than doing it the other way.
I do think that adding some incredibly innacurate films could be benificial and get some discussions going. (how about monte python's holy grail??? We fastforwarded through the spanking castle scene.) But in the long run, I don't know that they got anything historical out of it. (we did laugh a bunch...I really love that movie.) Braveheart is good, as is the Patriot...(not only mel gibson movies...) but there are definitely inconsistancies. I read that the "lord's right" to sleep with a bride is a "urban legend" without the urban part. also some tv shows...baa baa black sheep (ww2) and even hogan's heros. brother cadfeal mysteries. (pbs/bbc) although I have only read the books so I cannot speak to the accuracy of the shows. Have fun with it, let us know what you come up with.
I enjoyed the Brother Cadfael series on PBS. I've read the books, and find the movies just as good. I also had Rachael watch...Oh, dear, I forget!!! "Kingdom of Heaven"...? The movie with Orlando Bloom, about the Crusades. I was amazed that it wasn't totally fiction, as I thought the first time around! There were scenes that I recognized from a book we read about Saladin. Also, if you want a good fiction book about the Arabian Nights, there's one called "Shadow Spinner" by Susan Fletcher.
I've always enjoyed the movie 'Gandhi' (starring Ben Kingsley). It's very thought-provoking and, of course, based on real events. The more recent 'Amazing Grace' (starring Ioan Gruffudd) is also a great depiction of historical events.
