History Odyssey - Middle Ages (Level 2)

Imagine a classically based history course where your child reads great history books and period-related literature, keeps a running timeline of the period studied, writes outlines and summaries of important people and events, completes history-related map work, and does all of this without extensive planning on mom's part. Although it may sound too good to be true, luckily for you it's not! The authors of the History Odyssey series have done an awesome job of combining an excellent variety of resources and activities and presenting it all in a very straight-forward, professional way that takes the stress of lesson planning off of you and puts the accountability and expectations squarely on your history student.

History Odyssey is basically a series of study guides, with one guide covering one era of history (Ancients, Middle Ages, Early Modern, or Modern) in one year. The Level 2 guides are intended for the logic stage students (5^th-8^th). With material extending and available for high school students on the Pandia website (www.pandiapress.com). The Level 1 series has been adapted into the History Quest series. The guides are loose-leaf, 3-hole punched, and designed to be placed in a binder. You'll probably want a thick one; students will be adding a lot of material! It is suggested to start in the Ancients guide, as this will lay the foundation and the format of the program. Skills like time management, critical thinking, and writing become more advanced with each time period.

These Level 2 (the logic stage) guides introduce the timeline, outlining as a writing skill, research, and independent writing assignments. All great student-independent and student-driven work! Students are expected to read all assignments on their own, and critical thinking and analysis are emphasized through the assignments. Parental involvement is minimal, as parents should only be checking the quality of each day's work and making sure that it has all been done. Students weekly work will consist of research, timeline work, map work, history, geography, and writing. All these are strongly represented throughout. Although the writing practice is extensive, you will probably still want to incorporate a separate course in English and writing.

Now that you're familiar with the basics of the course, let's look at the lessons. Lessons are presented to the student in a checklist-type format. All assignments, including reading, timeline, writing, and others are listed for each lesson with a box to check when the task is complete. Lessons typically include a mix of readings from resource books, map work, timeline work, and writing assignments/copywork to be added to the student's master binder. This is why you will want a 3” binder. Exceptions may be lessons which ask the student to begin reading a required book. In this case, a recommended time frame is given in which the book should be read, and follow-up writing assignments may be listed. Occasionally, websites may be listed to check out more information, but these are not necessary for the course if you are not able to visit them. Following the lessons, you'll find worksheets, outline maps used in map activities, and several appendices. Although the guide is not reproducible, the author does give permission to copy the maps and worksheets for your family's use only.

There are several important aspects of this course. First, there is little parent preparation. A "Letter to Parents" at the beginning of the guide explains the course, while the "How to Use This Guide" lists required resources and other necessary supplies, describes the organization of the student's binder, and briefly discusses several aspects of the program. Parents will be primarily making sure the necessary books and resources are on hand, while ensuring that each lesson's work has been done and is complete. This leads to my next point, which is that at the end of this course, the student will not have "completed a workbook," but will have compiled their own meaty notebook with all their work from the course. Instructions are given at the very beginning of the course on how to organize the student's notebook, and from that point on, the student will be putting all their work into their binder. The binder will be not only a tremendous keepsake, but a collection of all the work done in the course. Finally, the timeline is a very important tool of History Odyssey. This can be made by you, or you may choose to purchase Pandia Press's very attractive Classical History Timeline (039403), which is described below. Events and people studied are added to the timeline throughout the course, and when students are finished with the guide, the timeline can be folded up and included in the student's binder.

One bonus to the course is the use of well-known resources and literature that you may already own! Level 2 lists the Kingfisher History Encyclopedia, The Story of Mankind, Usborne Internet-Linked Viking World, The Door in the Wall, Tales from Shakespeare, Beowulf: A New Telling, The Adventures of Robin Hood, Castle (by David Macaulay), The Canterbury Tales, and many more classic literature selections. Check out the lists of resources beneath each History Odyssey Guide below – I'm sure you'll see many familiar titles! Additional recommended titles (but not required) are listed in the appendix of each guide, organized by region studied. You should be able to locate most of these at your library.

The study guides were created based on three principles – "that history is fun when it is presented as a story, that history is best studied through the reading of great books, and that history is best taught through a world view with an opportunity to learn about different cultures." In accomplishing that, it also appears that kids will come away with a very cohesive grasp of history, the sense of accomplishment from creating their own book of information about the time-period, and well-honed research, writing, and organizational skills too! Although I've seen "the notebook approach" used in unit studies, I love how in this case, it makes the student an active researcher and analyst as they compile their notebook and create their own history record. I also love the way the guides speak directly to the students. Being able to manage their own assignments and keep track of their work is an invaluable skill – and terrific college preparation at any age! ~ Jess