My children dabbled in a little Ancient Egypt learning last summer, so when the opportunity came to review HISTORY Through the Ages Project Passport World History Study: Ancient Egypt by Home School in the Woods, they were very excited to learn more this interesting period of history.
Two years ago we reviewed The Middle Ages (you can see our review here). My children were only 7 & 5 at the time so were still a little young, but they retained the information and it gave them an interest in history that they still have. Now that they are that little bit older, I knew they would get a lot more from this unity study; and I was right!
The periods available in the HISTORY Through the Ages Project Passport World History Study:
- Ancient Greece
- Ancient Egypt
- The Middle Ages
- Renaissance & Reformation
- Ancient Rome (available in 2018)
We received a zip file to download and use. The file was HUGE and contained an enormous amount of information. Tristan (now 9) told me that one of the things he likes about this product is that there is so much detail – he’s loving the detail!
Once unzipped, you’ll find the guide, photos of the projects, audio clips to listen to, and enough things to print that will keep you busy for days. Seriously. It took me three days to get everything printed and organised for the first 10 stops. But don’t let the prep and printing costs put you off as they are TOTALLY worth it!
Each ‘stop’ (there are 25 in this unit study) is a lesson on one area of the culture or history. It generally takes us a couple of days to a week or so to complete a stop, depending on how much is involved. Each stop has 2-3 pages of text to read, and detailed directions on how to complete each of the elements that are required for the stop.
There are several projects that are ongoing throughout the unit study:
- writing newspaper articles and drawing advertisements
- labelling a map
- colouring and gluing pieces onto a timeline
- design the fronts of postcards that have been sent from famous characters
Each stop will also have at least one project, and often more to do. You don’t have to do all of the projects – some may depend on the supplies you have, some may depend on what your children are interested in. We’ve done most so far, but there are a couple that we’ll come back to; like making a reed boat, we’ll do this in the late summer when we can gather some reeds.
We didn’t use this hands-on Ancient Egypt study with a particular pattern. We have a couple of other projects going on that have had us into Belfast, and some days haven’t gone as planned. We had planned to use it three days a week. There have been a couple of weeks when we didn’t achieve this goal, but there have also been weeks that the children worked on it daily. For some lessons they only spent 30-45 minutes on it (during train rides and waiting for meetings – it travels great!) and other times they spent the majority of the day working away on the projects. This flexibility really did work well for us.
The suggestion is to do all of the lapbook projects along the way and then save them until the end to put them into a lapbook. However, we constructed the lapbook and the children place their activities in as they go to keep them tidy, they can see their progress, and the pieces can be easily referred back to for reference when needed.
What are some of the other projects that you will find?
- A menu with recipes
- a pop-up pyramid
- building a step pyramid from card stock
- paper dress-up dolls
- making a sarcophagus
- making mud bricks
- dress like a pharaoh
- and many more!
We all love this product. It has a lot of detail, and it’s also very flexible. You can do small projects like the timeline or newspaper articles if you’re short on time, or for days when you have more time, the children can work on the bigger projects. If they’re interested in one area, or something comes up in the news, etc., you can skip ahead and move around and it still works for the most part. I have two children working on it together. Some projects they can each do separately, while others they work as a team using their own strengths.
We can all see that so much effort has been put into each study, and must truly be a labour of love. Although the age range for this is grades 3-8; my children have been able to do some of the work in grade 1; though the older the children the deeper their understanding will be. I think that if an older child is willing to do the projects, they’ll also enjoy this and learn a lot.
To read more reviews about Homeschool in the Woods by the Homeschool Review Crew, click on the graphic below and follow the instructions. You will find 100 honest reviews by the Crew on four of their HISTORY Through the Ages Project Passport World History Studies. If you’d like to know more or would like to follow Homeschool In The Woods, you can connect with them through their website, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Google+.
