Pathway to Liberty's History Curriculum was designed to teach single or multiple children from grades K-12. The curriculum contains four years of coursework each with 26 weeks of work:
Universal History
The Middle Ages
U.S. History
World History
Each of the courses contains 4 different levels. You choose the level according to your child's grade. Level 1 is recommended for students in grades K-3. Level 2 is for students in grades 4-6. Level 3 is for grades 7-9 and Level 4 for grades 10-12. Levels can be adjusted according to the individual child's ability. In addition to history the curriculum covers Bible, geography, writing assignments and word study. The suggested schedule includes 4 days of work per week with each day lasting anywhere from 20-60 minutes. For each course you will need one Teacher's Guide and the corresponding Student Guides for the levels your children need. Additional books are required to complete the course and will vary depending on the course that you choose. You may already own the required books or be able to find them at your local library.
I chose World History to use with my 10, 12, and 13 year olds. World History begins with the turn of the 20th Century and ends with the presidencies of George W. Bush, Clinton, and Obama. I chose to use Level 1 with my 10 year old, Level 2 with my 12 year old, and Level 3 with my 13 year old. We received a Teacher's Guide and Student Guides for Levels 1,2, and 3. We also received the Chain of Liberty Book and Study Guide. Additional materials that we needed for the first 6 weeks included: a Bible, access to the Noah Webster 1828 Dictionary, Henry Ford, The Age of Extremes, and War, Peace, and All That Jazz. You also need access to YouTube to watch videos. There are also suggested books for expanding history that are not required.
The World History Teacher Guide is a 367 page spiral bound paperback book. One of the greatest benefits of the Pathway to Liberty History Curriculum is that you only need one guide for all 4 levels. Each week starts with a weekly overview and teaching objectives. If there is anything special that parents may need to know about that week's lesson it is listed in a Note to Parents on the first page of that week's lesson. For example in one of the videos there was a profanity and the note tells you exactly where it will occur so you can skip it if you choose. Then there is a chart showing that week's scripture, principle, and leading idea and all of the week's assignments for all 4 levels. Then you have the questions and answers for all of Level 1, then Level 2, Level 3 and Level 4 for the week. Some answers to questions require students to think deeply and provide their own thoughts on a topic so in the answer sections it will say "Answers will vary."
Inside the Teacher Guide
Each of the Student Guides are also paperback and spiral bound. They also contain the Weekly Overview and Teaching Objectives for each week's lessons along with the assignments for each level. Then they have workbook pages for the student to fill in the answers to questions, color, fill in maps, or charts.
Inside the Student Guides. Levels 2 and 3 were pretty similar.
The Chain of Liberty is a 172 page paperback book written by Jayme MacCoullough. This book talks about the principles the United States was founded on and shows a timeline of events (links) through history: Creation Link, Dawn of Nations Link, Moses and the Law Link, Church Link, Reformation Link, First Colonies Link, First Constitutional Republic Link, Expansion and Erosion Link and Restoration Link. The Chain of Liberty highlights the agenda of people and nations throughout history. The Chain of Liberty Study Guide is a 98 page paperback book that has questions and answers for each of the 13 chapters in the book.
We skipped over the two Foundational lessons and dove in starting with week 3. We love to read aloud books and study topics as a family. Each day Monday-Thursday I would start with reading the assigned reading for Level 1 and then help Lily answer her questions and complete her assignments and then read aloud the assignments for levels 2 and 3 or watch the documentary on YouTube and then go through the assignments with Christian and Anthony. Although you have the huge benefit of using one Teacher Guide for all 4 levels, the readings are very different between Levels 1 and 2 and 3 so it did take us quite awhile to get everyone's assignments completed each day. Lily's main book for the first several weeks was Henry Ford which she absolutely loved and the boys enjoyed listening to it as well. Levels 2 and 3 used A History of the US Age of Extremes and War, Peace, and All That Jazz by Joy Hakim. This was my first experience with this series of books and although it is written in a very conversational style and provides interesting information we had to have many conversations on author bias and the differences between fact and opinion. It is noted in the Parents Notes that the worldview of the author of these books may not be in line with the worldview of the reader and that this is an opportunity to teach worldview and allow students to draw conclusions.
The boys loved the documentaries they got to watch on YouTube. They were very easy to find by going to Pathway to Liberty's channel and putting the title in the search bar. I thought they made a great addition to the readings. Their favorite was Inventions that Shook the World. It made you think about things we have never thought to be an important invention like the Parking Meter. I appreciated the notes in the guide warning of things that parents may need to know in the videos and also the two different options of videos for World War 1.
Student Guide Page they completed after viewing Inventions that Shook the World
Path to Liberty is very flexible. Scheduling only 4 days a week allows you to not feel as though you have fallen behind if you miss a day. Each week's lessons has several options for writing assignments for each level and are appropriate for the ages of the children completing the different levels. Level 1 only writes 1-3 sentences and Level 4 is assigned 5-7 paragraphs. You also have the option of how many vocabulary words if any you want to work on with your student. If the lesson is too lengthy for a younger child you can split it up into two days, or choose not to work on everything. We chose not to do any of the writing or vocabulary work and instead focused only on the reading, videos, and workbook pages. I did not have to do any advance preparation for each day's lesson other then making sure we had the books we needed and a computer to watch the videos. The children enjoyed listening to the readings and watching the videos and Lily especially loved completing the pages in the Student Guide.
Members of The Crew reviewed all four years of Pathway to Liberty's History Curriculum. To see what my Crew Mates had to say, stop by the Crew Blog!
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