Middle school, high school history textbooks?

kittynh

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I'm doing the home schooling for history for Kitten2. While we are doing a lot of trips, I'd like a simple textbook to use. A lot of the places on line cater to the fundies, I can't believe there are even science books that somehow teach the Bible version of events. Anyway, no way am I buying a history text from them!

Anyone have a used one? I'm looking for American history and world history.

I just want a little supplement.

Any suggestions on where to look for one (because I got awfully confused looking online).
 
Old college textbooks might be a good idea - My high school uses Glencoe textbooks for U.S. History (The textbook is called "The American Journey), and I have no clue who makes the World History textbook we used this year.
 
Not textbooks, but...

I have Asimov's Chronology of the World and Asimov's Guide to the Bible : The Old and New Testaments (2Vols. in One). I have not had a chance to read much of the world one, but the bible one has a lot of interesting history in it. Wouldn't help much with US history, but if you are interested in one or both for world history, I'd be happy to loan them to you. If you are not familliar with them, look them up on Amazon.com. I also have The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody : Great Figures of History Hilariously Humbled by Will Cuppy that I could throw in as well.

These may not be what you were looking for when you started this thread, but I thought I'd offer them anyway. I'll look through my grandmother's books when I get home. She used to buy the Readers Digest and National Geographic books about various parts of the country and the world. If there are any good ones left, I'd be happy to loan them to you, too. If you are helping someone to learn, there is no such thing as too many reference books. (As long as they are fact-based)
 
oh I'm an old will Cuppy fan. My kids are both familiar with his works.

I'll keep checking around!
 
Not my field

kittynh said:
I'm doing the home schooling for history for Kitten2. While we are doing a lot of trips, I'd like a simple textbook to use. A lot of the places on line cater to the fundies, I can't believe there are even science books that somehow teach the Bible version of events. Anyway, no way am I buying a history text from them!

Anyone have a used one? I'm looking for American history and world history.

I just want a little supplement.

Any suggestions on where to look for one (because I got awfully confused looking online).
Click to expand...

but beware of using pretty much any of the standard history texts for Middle or High School - they are ridiculously PC and, thus, unreal (i.e. Glencoe, Houghton-Mifflin, McGraw-Hill, Holt, Prentice-Hall, etc.). Sorry to only have a negative.
 
I've heard good things about the Hakim books.

I think I'll order the history and science history books. A little money, but worth it.
 
Larry Gonick has a well-regarded series, The Cartoon Guide to... books. I'm not personally very familiar with them, but most people I know who have read them think they're pretty good.

Here is a link to Larry Gonick's web-site, where there are further links to such books as Cartoon History of the United States, Cartoon Guide to Chemistry, Cartoon Guide to Physics, Cartoon Guide to Genetics, Cartoon Guide to the Environment and Cartoon Guide to Statistics.

One advantage to these is they are probably available cheaper and more easily than most textbooks. Amazon.com lists the statistics volume for $12 new and $3.50 used; I suspect other volumes in the series can be found for comparable prices.

Edited to add: thought I'd glance at the reviews before posting this, and found some of the comments noteworthy. (These are Gonick's selections and I don't have time to look these up in full to see if he has quoted fairly, but I think it would take very creative editing to turn bad reviews into these excerpts.)

"Gonick's take on history is whip-smart, skeptical about familiar but questionable stories and absolutely in command of dozens of simultaneous historical threads. He's also very funny."
—Publishers Weekly
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"A delight. Charming, irreverent, with a true global perspective. A better way to learn human history than... school textbooks."
—Carl Sagan
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"Brilliantly rendered and unexpectedly timely ... Will reading an erudite, if flat-out hilarious, account of Middle East history help us make sense of our current clash of cultures? Let's put it this way: ignorance hasn't worked."
—Garry Trudeau, creator of Doonesbury
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"Superb artistry and stand-up wit! The Cartoon History of the Universe is a gift to those of us who love to laugh and who love to learn. Insidiously disguised as cartoon books, Gonick's well researched and hilariously illustrated graphic texts should be in every library. They are capable of making the densest and most resistant cerebellum absorb and retain REAL INFORMATION! Whoever called comic art "literary junkfood" can eat his words. Gonick's books are food for thought, rich with humor—and they leave you waiting for the next course."
—Lynn Johnston, creator of For Better or For Worse
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oh I read his guide to communism! Very good, and helped me pass a history test!
 
"People's history of the United States" by Howard Zinn. ( I think that's the title..)
 
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