We are on week 14, and have the same difficulty each and every week. For the History Accountability and Thinking Questions (dialectic), is there a place where references are given? For instance, in the teacher's area, is there a place that even gives a book reference to where the answers might be found? Or where to look?

Not sure if I am explaining it well or not. I feel like we are missing a lot of information - and I end up still spoon feeding it to my children, rather than them being able to FIND answers to their questions.

Heather
mom of 4
2 dialectic and 2 upper grammar

quote:

I end up still spoon feeding it to my children, rather than them being able to FIND answers to their questions.

Heather you didn't mention how old your DI children are. I had one DI that could do this well by 8th grade. My other son didn't do it will until 9th grade.

When they were in 5ht and 6th grade I read the history aloud and then we discussed....we didn't do any SAP's. The following year we were in a co-op and I would sit with my then 7th grader while working on the questions and we would do them together. The following year he would do them on his own pretty much.

Remember that kids mature with their thinking skills differently...my younger son could do the concrete work but struggled with the thinking questions for the DI level until 9th grade.

It is a process...go slowly...they will get it.

Blessings,
Barb

Thanks for answering, Barb.

Part of it is because I am not reading everything with them, I am not sure where they WOULD find the answers. So when it comes discussion time, they have maybe some of their answers written, but then insist that the information for the other questions wasn't covered. I then end up spending a good portion of time finding the places where they may be able to get answers, or information to come up with answers. It would just be so much less time consuming (and it feels like time wasting when they are sitting there looking at me like, well... anytime now, Mom) to have a little note by the questions in the teacher section, that has a book title, or pages or ANYTHING. I just feel like we are wasting more time in our discussion times, and it's not productive.

My older two boys are 12 and 13. They are understanding HOW to find answers, and that they may have to look in various sources and come up with things on their own... but with some of the questions we are having a hard time finding the direct references.

Thinking out loud... maybe I should have them read the questions at the beginning of the week, before they read. Then *maybe* when they come across pertinent information in their reading they could call on that right then?

and... in all honesty... history was my LEAST favorite subject an I am not confident in what I know. So it's not as if I am able to recall history facts - or even the bigger ideas. Give me math or science any day. This history and what the big ideas are - the recurring themes? ugh I am not versed well enough to KNOW it.

What I've found at this level is that the outline in the "answers" section is not necessarily found straight out in the A & T questions. Those prepare them for the outline but then the discussion should build up from that base. It took me some time (maybe more than a year) to be able to let go of going through and "checking" those questions and just let them be a back ground spring board to discussion.

However, in terms of the OP's question. No, I don't think there is place where TOG tells you that you find the answer to question 1 on page 32 of Book A.

On your copy of the Loom, Heather, we explain the philosophy of our approach, which really does differ from the typical textbook one. Our goal is to create thinkers. As Pat says, many moms (especially those of us who have sat with our children from pre-reading years on) have difficulty trusting that, if they're reading, they're getting FACT BASED content. This is what the AQ's are based on. In a nutshell, as Pat well said, the purpose for the discussion is for YOU to take them BEYOND the facts/accounts that they've read. For the dialectics, your goal is to help them make connections. For the rhetorics, its to add the ability to analyze. These skills take time to develop, but it sure does help to know what the goals of these discussion outlines are.

We also find, by the way, that many kids come from a text book background where answers to very simple content questions are bolded for them and repeated word for word. Our questions--even for content--are our attempt to point them to the main idea. We are very careful to make sure that the resources answer every question we ask. Teacher's notes, too, are finely combed to make sure that, between the Background Information and the Discussion Outlines (TAKEN TOGETHER) you'll have the answers you need to the AQ's and TQ's.

Hope this helps! It's probably a new form of learning, and it may take time, but the benefits are truly out of this world, as many here can attest!

Your post is something I could've written when we were on year 1 two years ago. I found a big disconnect between the books the children are assigned to read and the AQs and TQs for the dialectic level. I myself had a hard time finding the answers to the questions. And I read everything the kids read plus the teacher's notes! I could not even figure out from where the answers came.

Year 1 was our most frustrating year because of that. Maybe because it was the first one that was redesigned. But to encourage you, Years 2 and 3 are much, much better.

I wound up giving many of the answers to my two young D students. It was not worth having them cry every week and hating history. Whatever answers they could find was acceptable. Now that they are older and the Years 2 and 3 books and questions really correlate with each other, they have to answer all the questions on their own.

I have mentioned this to TOG and I hope that the next time they come round to a newer edition of Year 1, they'll take a closer look at this.

And I am stating this not as a Christian complaining about another Christian. I am only stating this as a possible area of improvement for an otherwise well-rounded history/lit curriculum.

God Bless,
Anna

Note taken, Anna. We always do look at our work after each round in order to find ways to improve. I will say, though, that this is something we worked pretty hard at in going through even Year 1, but we can, of course, do better each time.

Your comments are certainly taken in the spirit you intended. We are most grateful!

I just posted this very question this morning! Then found this thread, and felt relieved that it wasn't my lack of preparation. We did part of Year1 several years ago with the Classic, and I do not remember having this difficulty of finding the answers....they were clearly laid out.
I would love for TOG to consider making it more clear for the Teacher. That was one of the main reasons I switched to TOG was that it was Teacher friendly and had the answers readily availble to me(as it says on the website, it is for K-Mom. Now that you have Pop Quizzes, it should stat K-Dad)! If I have to do their homework to find the answers, it leads to a huge time commitment on my part, which is why I stopped using our other curriculum (and we are a large family). With Classic, I found that if I had some weeks that I could not thoroughly read through the teacher notes, I could still cover my children's work and have great discussions since I had the questions with answers listed in front of me.
Since I traded in my Classic, I do not have access to these notes anymore and wondered if there is a way online to access the Teacher Notes from Classic?

Many Thanks,
Kelley