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History Resources

Fun with History: Free 30-Day Challenge to Explore the Past

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The fun with history free 30-day challenge to explore the past is a journey into the past that is as exciting as it is enriching.

Let me help you to teach history for a month.

Today, I have a free printable to help you teach history.

It has fun facts, activity ideas and a clickable link to an educational video.

Fun with History: Free 30-Day Challenge to Explore the Past

Your child can do this independently or you can make each topic into a longer study.

Although I’m crazy passionate about covering history with our unit study approach, some kids struggle with any approach.

So this challenge mixes and matches various topics instead of staying too long on one topic.

Besides, one of these topics can be a hook for a longer unit study if you find one or two which interests your child.

My 30-cay challenge encourages kids to actively participate in the learning process.

LIVING HISTORY BOOKS FOR KIDS

Next, look at a few fun books you can incorporate into this challenge.

With a bit of reading and videos you’re sure to hook your kids on some of the topics.

Next look at more ideas to go with the history challenge.

MORE FUN HISTORY ACTIVITIES

Pair these activities with the daily history challenge for a fun day spent learning tidbits about history.

Fun with History: Free 30-Day Challenge to Explore the Past

Finally, look at how to get this free printable.

HOW TO GET THE FREE 30 DAY PRINTABLE HISTORY CHALLENGE

Now, how to grab the freebie. It’s a subscriber freebie.

That means when you sign up to follow me, you get my emails in your inbox and you get this freebie.

1) CLICK HERE ON THIS LINK TO SIGN UP ON MY EMAIL LIST & TO GET THIS FREEBIE.

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How to Create a Creditworthy American History Course (& resources)

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

I’m showing you how to create a creditworthy American history course with resources. Also, look at my page How to Homeschool High School.

Whether you want to create a standalone creditworthy American history course for your teen or you want to enhance the interest level of your current American history curriculum, you’ll love these tips.

Here’s a seasoned veteran tip.

Use lower grade level resources to put important topics in a nutshell.

How to Create a Creditworthy American History Course (& resources)

To get a quick glimpse of major events, use what you have at the house or that you can get at a library to get a quick glimpse of major events.

Lower level resources can give you an easy starting point when teaching a new topic.

5 TIPS FOR CREATING A CREDITWORTHY HISTORY COURSE

Then, look at these 5 seasoned veteran tips that will make creating your own American History high school course easy.

1. KNOW YOUR STATE LAW.

Be familiar with your state homeschool laws so you can meet the requirements as you build an American history course.

A lot of states don’t have specific requirements, some do. Just be sure you know so that you can cover it.

2. TRACK YOUR TEEN’S TIME.

The rule of thumb is that one course credit is equal to 120 hours. Obviously one-half a credit is 60 hours.

What is not so obvious is deciding how to meet the hours requirement.

It also does not mean that all of the hours need to come from textbooks.

Also, look at my post Homeschool High School–How to Log Hours for High School to give yourself time to learn more about how to truly count hours.

3. FOLLOW YOUR TEEN’S INTEREST. THINK OUT OF THE PUBLIC-SCHOOL BOX STANDARDS.

Don’t hem in your teen’s creative expression on how to meet the hour requirement.

If you have the control in your state to determine how to fill the credit requirement, then think beyond what public school dictates as traditional learning.

Look at this list of ideas to add to your course and ways to meet the time requirement.

Mix and match these activities to meet the needs of an American history credit.

  • Read a textbook
  • Read living books
  • Essays
  • Hands-on projects
  • Prepare a speech
  • Review primary resources
  • Learn history through art
  • Learn history through geography
  • Learn about fashion of the period
  • Apprenticeships
  • Watch movies
  • Cook a period recipe
How to Create a Creditworthy American History Course (& resources). You'll love these EZ steps for creating your own curriculum @Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

The fun part begins when you and your teen decide if he will cover only history for the whole 120 hours or if you’ll mix and match with other subjects.

4. DETERMINE IF THE COURSE WILL BE HALF-CREDIT, FULL YEAR CREDIT OR SOMEWHERE IN BETWEEN.

The beauty of homeschooling is that you can adjust a course to a teen’s likes and passions.

For example, if a teen is a writer, then he can focus on writing while learning history.

So history could be a .60 credit and creative writing about history a .60 credit.

Alternately, if you want to add a literature element, then history may be a full 1 credit and literature could be a one-half credit.

If your teen is a budding artist and doesn’t like history so much, then he can cover history while doing art. You and your teen determine how to divide up the hourly credit.

5. IF YOU BEGIN IN MIDDLE SCHOOL YOU CAN STILL COUNT IT AS HIGH SCHOOL AS LONG AS YOU USE HIGH SCHOOL LEVEL RESOURCES.

By starting in middle school, your teen can go slower or take his time and dig deeper if there is a passion for history.

As long as the resource you’re using is high school level, then you can count the credit on the transcript.

American Homeschool History Outline

Although my teens had some say in the topics, they didn’t have the final say.

I wanted to be sure my teens were exposed to a wide variety of topics.

But it’s not necessary to cover all the events, people, or topics at the same depth.

I find that looking at the table of contents of any American History textbook can serve as a beginning point for an outline.

You can easily use it as a reference or make your own course outline.

AMERICAN HISTORY EVENTS AND PERIODS TO COVER

Look at one I created to get you started.

  • Columbus
  • The First People of America
  • The American Colonies
  • The American Revolution
  • Creating the Constitution
  • The Age of Jefferson
  • The Age of Jackson
  • Religion and Reform
  • Manifest Destiny
  • The Civil War
  • Reconstruction
  • Industrial Growth
  • The Gilded Age
  • World War I
  • The 1920s
  • The Great Depression
  • Truman and the Cold War
  • The Eisenhower Years
  • The 1960s and Vietnam
  • Present

5 American History Enhancements

As you can see you quickly can draft a diy American History course that your teen will be passionate about.

After doing American History several times with each of my grads, I mixed and match different resources.

Key to keeping it easy is to have a variety of resources at your fingertips.

Look at these 5 American history resources that you can use to enhance or flesh out your course. It’s not that hard, I promise.

I’ve listed living books, a hands-on history resource and even a book to us a spine in a story form which is how we prefer to learn.

5 History Resources for Teens

Laid out resources can help you put together an easy creditworthy American history course for teens.

In addition, hands-on games bring a different element to the day and keep teens from taking all so seriously.

Add in hands-on games and fun if your kid loves hands-on.

Hands-on history is not just for the young.

If your teen learns best by hands-on then assign one or two projects as a grade.

I used Home School in the Woods projects to help me come up with ideas for my teens.

Include your younger kids too and the day can be fun while your teen gets his credit hours.

I love this format because if you have to teach American History a few times over, there is always room for a unique slant or perspective.

How to Create a Creditworthy American History Course (& resources). You'll love these EZ steps for creating your own curriculum @Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

Avoid the boredom and blahs by using different resources.

What else do you like to include for your teen?

MORE CREDITWORTHY AMERICAN HISTORY COURSE ACTIVITIES

Hands-on Homeschool History Free Ancient Civilization Cards for O Ring

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I have another set ready for the easy and interactive hands on homeschool history on an O ring series that I want to do. Also, look at my Ancient Civilizations page.

Adding the cards today, which are for Ancient Civilizations, I now have 4 sets of cards.

These cards have very general information and I made them so we can hit broad strokes when studying these topics and as a way to memorize some of our unit studies.

Hands-on Homeschool History Free Ancient Civilization Cards for O Ring

The four I have done so far are

And today, like I mentioned are the Ancient Civilizations.

Because I may study some of our history topics several times with each child, I have been wanting to make up these cards to allow my sons a way to study independently.

Too, through the years I have had one son interested in delving deeper into one topic that another son may not be so interested in.

A remedy to that problem is to make these O rings which they can grab, and do interactively.

This way if they are not as interested in a topic, at least they know some broad strokes about that topic.

Ancient Civilization Resources for Kids

Next, look at some of these fun resources for learning about Ancient Civilizations.

13 Ancient Civilization Hands-on Resources and Books

Add some of these fun resources to your unit study or study for the day of Ancient Civilizations.

Also, if you want to flesh out your study on these topics, then look at my pages, which match up with these history cards.

I plan to do another set soon, so hope you enjoy these.

How to Get the Free Ancient Civilization History Cards

Now, how to grab the free history o ring cards. It’s a subscriber freebie.

That means when you sign up to follow me, you get my emails in your inbox and you get this freebie.

1) Sign up on my email list.
2) Grab the freebie now.
3) Last, look for all my emails in your inbox. Glad to have you following me!

Don’t forget to follow BOTH of my Pinterest accounts for more AWESOME pins.

Visit Tina Robertson’s profile on Pinterest.


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Free History Cards. Put on an O ring and learn facts about Ancient Civilizations, Westward Ho, the Titanic and the French and Indian War. Grab them @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

History Makers Notebooking Pages – Famous Persons from Ancient to Modern – Set 2

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I created the history makers notebooking pages because I don’t use one book or curriculum anymore when teaching homeschool history. Too, look at my page Homeschool Geography for hands-on and simple ideas and tips.

Earlier I shared set 1 of history makers notebooking pages because I do use a variety of reference books when creating unit studies. 

Keeping history lively, eventful and hands-on is my priority right now instead of always focusing on chronological order.

History Makers Notebooking Pages – Famous Persons from Ancient to Modern – Set 2

Teaching about a variety of time periods also allows us to focus on famous people or history makers. 

Because I always like my pages easy and not complicated to figure out, especially for older kids who have a lot of subjects to do anyway, I created this second set the same way as the first set.

History Makers Set 2

Next, look at some of these geography resources.

10 U.S. Geography Resources

If you're looking to teach U.S. geography in a hands-on way, you'll love adding one or two of these resources to your day or study.

Write a few important facts about the time period the person lived in and also write about what events made this person famous. 

These pages can be used for middle school or high school ages.

History Makers Notebooking Pages

Too, I added a box for drawing just in case you had a younger learner or sometimes the time period that the famous history maker lived in lends itself to an invention to illustrate or something to label.

Also, both sets cover a variety of time periods from ancient to modern.

One thing you will notice is that on each page, I have chronological boxes, so that your child can either lightly shade in the box or check the box this famous person lived in. 

It helps when you are covering history in chronological order to be able to see where this person lived in the stream of time.

This way you can coordinate and plan your unit studies too with what I have on my website already.

So that area on the notebooking pages basically helps you in two ways. 

One, it helps you keep your history in chronological order when you do need to cover it that way and two, you can coordinate with the free units on my site.

I hope that all made sense.

Too, hopefully, these will help you to add to your history collection because it covers the more significant history makers in each time period instead of covering every history maker. 

As I say often, sometimes we just need the highlights of history and not every single famous person.

List of 11 History Makers

  • Muhammad Al Pasha
  • Askia Muhammad
  • Nelson Mandela
  • Seretse Khama
  • Hammurabi
  • Mohandas Gandi
  • Confucius
  • Kim Jong II
  • Tokugawa Ieyasu
  • Aung San Suu Kyi
  • Charles Perkins

Too, grab Set I History Makers here 12 Free & Unique Geography Resource History Makers Pages.

Geography Curriculum and Resources

How to Get the 11 Free History Makers Notebooking Pages

Now, how to grab the subscriber freebie.

That means when you sign up to follow me, you get my emails in your inbox and you get this freebie.

1) Sign up on my email list.

2) Grab the freebie.

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History Makers Notebooking Set 2 Collage

Ancient Greece Unit Study Play Stomachion Like Archimedes {Explore Geometry}

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This post may contain affiliate links. For more information, please see my full disclosure policy.

We are picking up on our Ancient Greece unit study. Studying Archimedes stomachion, we added a bit of geometry. Also, you’ll love my two Ancient Greece Lapbooks. Go here to Fun Ancient Greece Homeschool Unit Study and Lapbook and Free Awesome Ancient Greece Lapbook and Fun Hands-on Activities to grab both free lapbooks.

Ancient Greece Unit Study Play Stomachion Like Archimedes {Explore Geometry}

So, we have the book, TOOLS OF THE ANCIENT GREEKS: A Kid’s Guide to the History & Science of Life in Ancient Greece (Build It Yourself), which is fantastic for hands-on ideas.

So Tiny picked out another activity from this book, which is playing Stomachion.

The book brought out that some called the game loculus Archimedius (Archimedes’ box).

First, look at some of these other books about Ancient Greece we loved.

Books about Greece for Ancient Greece

8 Living History Books about Ancient Greece

You'll love this roundup of living history books about Ancient Greece.

Hands On Math

It just requires a few things and instead of printing off the puzzle pieces, Tiny decide to do it himself.

Stomachion 1 @ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

So this is what we started off with, but like normal, we change it a bit as we went along.

  • 12 inch square poster board
  • ruler
  • pencil
  • sharpie
  • scissors
  • markers or map pencils.

We started off using the Prismacolor Colored Pencils, but decided we would go with our professional art markers because Tiny could color the puzzle pieces faster and they were brighter too.

Either set would be okay for this project.

Ancient Greece Unit Study Play Stomachion Like Archimedes {Explore Geometry}

So he began by making 1 inch grids on his poster board page.

Ancient Greece Unit Study Play Stomachion Like Archimedes {Explore Geometry}

Then he copied the pieces following the coordinates on the picture out of the book TOOLS OF THE ANCIENT GREEKS: A Kid’s Guide to the History & Science of Life in Ancient Greece (Build It Yourself) and suppose to have ended up with 14 pieces.

Ancient Greece Unit Study Hands On Activity

He caught his mistake (he only has 13 shown) after I took the picture, but too he is doing more of his own self-checking instead of me supervising so closely.

Ancient Greece Unit Study Play Stomachion Like Archimedes {Explore Geometry}

So here he corrected his mistake by coloring the piece black.

Here is the 14 piece puzzle after he colored each piece.

Then he cut out each piece.

Ancient Greece Unit Study Play Stomachion Like Archimedes {Explore Geometry}
Archimedes Stomachion an Elephant @ Tina’ s Dynamic Homeschool Plus

He started playing with the shapes and made an elephant.

Isn’t this just the coolest?

Of course, his pieces are off a bit in size proportion, but then again this was a lesson too in measuring accurately and taking your time, but I wanted it fun for him too.

Ancient Greece Unit Study Play Stomachion Like Archimedes {Explore Geometry}
Archimedes Stomachion a Hummingbird @ Tina’s Dynamic Homeschool Plus

Then next, he made this. Is it a hummingbird or is it a diving duck?

Uhmm, well Tiny said hummingbird, so I’ll go with that.

Point is, Tiny is having lots of fun playing with these puzzle pieces and exploring geometry like Archimedes did.

He has made a few more pictures, but this baby is not as easy as it looks to build.

Unlike the squares and triangles he did in grade school, they shapes are more challenging.

He is loving exploring about Ancient Greece this this fun math activity! Have you tried this before?

More Hands-on Ancient Greece Activities for Kids

Ancient Greece Unit Study. Try Archimedes game stomachion to explore geometry@ Tina's Dynamic Homeschool Plus

Don’t Forget Follow My Ancient Greece Pinterest Board

Follow Tinas Dynamic Homeschool ‘s board Ancient Greece on Pinterest.