I know that I want Map Trek for geography and I think I'm getting story of the world. Do I need to worry about getting US History/geography in?
Personally, I would not worry about history at all for 1st grade unless it just seems to be an interest of the child's. The Story of the World is a good read if you feel it will capture your 1st graders attention. When I read it with my kids I had them color a page on the subject that I was reading on & they truly surprised me at the way they would hear what I was reading regardless of their coloring. Also they would draw about more things that I was reading about on their color sheet. However they were closer to 5th grade. Of course, if your child has interests in maps or ancient Egypt or whatever, then jump on those interests but in a fun way to keep them alive. Otherwise, I simply wouldnt bother with history for some time yet. I would focus on the most important & basic, bible(if you're going the christian route), reading, writing, & math. The rest of anything that your 1st grader could learn would all be gravy...all out of fun, nothing structured as a curriculum for any other subject. I probably wouldnt start structured history until 5th grade or so. Good luck & God bless
It depends on your state requirements. In NYS you are required to do history/social studies each year and there should be some part that is US History. For 1st grade we just did studies of Columbus, Thanksgiving and watched Liberty's Kids to cover our US history requirement.
We've basically done literature based interest led units for history/geography and haven't done much of the US to date. Next year for 3rd grade with Kayd we're all going to be doing the Road Trip USA.
I don't like "courses" for first grade. One thing I've done is what I call "color booking" -- read-alouds with pages from the internet or coloring books, and we kind of mix it up between science and social studies. Topics like holidays, family & friends, famous Americans, stuff like that, interspersed with animals, plants, weather, 5 senses, etc.
We don't start official history until about grade 3 or so. The younger ones hang out while we talk about it, but I don't quiz them on it. I think just picking up some children's history books at the library is helpful. My kids love the You Wouldn't Want to Be series.
