Welcome to the second installment in a series of primers for the new homeschooling family. My name is Josef Stallings, and my wife Anne and I have been homeschooling our 8 children for over 13 years. For more information on our background, please see the first primer in this series here.

 

This second primer deals with the teaching of history in the homeschool setting.

History is a funny thing. It has often been said that history is written by the victors. My wife and I would like for our family to be victorious, and to be winners. With this in mind, our history curriculum is heavy on interpretation and taught such that our children are encouraged to be critical thinkers.

 

I have read history books on occasion, and I have found that they are mostly dry and boring, full of useless details, and without merit when it comes to understanding the people that are being studied. For this reason, I prefer to use movies when I study history, and when I engage in discourse about the past. My wife doesn’t exactly agree with this approach, but I have a certificate from the U.S. Navy that proves that I am an efficiency expert, and proficient with Microsoft Excel, so I’ll just let it rest at that.

 

 

We generally divide our history curriculum into the following eras:

 

1. Pre-history
2. Ancient history 
3. Post-classical history
4. Modern history
5. Contemporary history
6. Things that will be history

TEACHING PRE-HISTORY

 

• Daffy Duck and the Dinosaur
• Ice Age (all movies in the series)
• Land of the Lost

 

For the best pre-history, check out movies based on Genesis chapter 1 and John 1:1-5 in the Bible.

 

Teaching about pre-history is difficult in a history class, simply because it is pre-history. It somehow seems to not belong in the curriculum at all. However, I left it in because I was a huge Land of the Lost fan when I was a kid, and we have the whole series taped from television onto VHS tapes here at the Diego Garcia Atoll base.

This is another area where I have some difficulty. I am always saying to my kids, “Forgive and forget, it’s ancient history. Move on with your life!” How can I keep giving that advice while also having them learn ancient history?

 

Anyway, I resolved this by finding some great movies that teach about how things really were in the ancient times. 

 

• The Ten Commandments (with Charleston Heston, of course)
• The Rev. Ted Turner Bible Collection movies (Ben Kingsley and Richard Harris are in these)
• Ben Hur
• Gladiator
• Clash of the Titans
• Hercules
• Jonah, a VeggieTales Movie
• Cleopatra
• Jason and the Argonauts
• The Odyssey
• Spartacus
• I, Claudius
• Barabbas

 

I’m still not exactly certain what this means, but my wife assures me that it makes sense. As near as I can tell, movies from this period include things that have lots of jazz, blues and rock and roll music in them. However, that would make them modern history films, unless Bing Crosby were singing. I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest the following movies for teaching post-classical history:

 

• The Jazz Singer
• Lady Sings the Blues
• Miles Ahead
• The Glenn Miller Story
• The Blues Brothers
• Jammin’ the Blues
• Leadbelly
• A Hard Day’s Night
• The Last Waltz
• Tommy
• Blackboard Jungle

MODERN HISTORY

I really don’t get this one, either. If it’s modern, then it can’t be history! So, I’m just going to go out on a limb again with the following list:

 

• Star Wars movies
• Star Trek movies
• Into the Wild
• Taped Super Bowl games 
• Taped Word Series games

CONTEMPORARY HISTORY

Modern History is history up to the present day, from some arbitrary point taken to represent the end of the Middle Ages. In some contexts it may be contrasted with “ancient” rather than “medieval” history, and start, e.g., from the fall of the Western Roman Empire.

Contemporary history is a subset of modern history which describes the historical period from approximately 1945 to the present. The term “contemporary history” has been in use at least since the early 19th century

Not getting this. If the term “contemporary history” was in use since at least the early 19th century, then it would actually have been “future history,” as the 1945 starting point for this so-called “contemporary history” had not yet occurred. Modern history appears to deal with an arbitrary period that cannot be defined, so that it not useful, either.

 

I’m just going to skip this one. I don’t think my kids would understand this if I can’t make heads or tails of it.

This one I have figured out quite well. Things that will be history are covered extensively on the shows “60 Minutes” and “Frontline.” Enough said.

It’s not difficult to teach history, since there are more movies being created every day. Go ahead; sit your kid down in front of the tube, and let them learn! Everything is available on DVD these days, and you can get some great deals through Internet streaming of films. Just stay away from the Oliver Stone stuff. I’ve heard that he takes some liberties in his script writing.

 

As always, I am looking forward to hearing your thoughts about this article, and our approach to homeschooling. Please leave any comments or suggestions that you have found useful in your own homeschooling experience. Again, a special thanx to LTC Bob Smith for typing this for me!

 

Our next article will cover teaching math in a homeschool setting.

 

Until next time,

 

Josef 

 

(Note from Anne: Josef, you did it again! Please don’t publish until I can review the article. This is horrible. What exactly do you do all day out at Diego Garcia? I love you!)