Homeschooling for 3

The American Heritage Education Foundation was created to help educate American citizens about their heritage. This is accomplished not by dry facts but also explains the philosophy of the Founding Fathers as well as character development for citizens.  The American Heritage Education Foundation does an excellent job of creating resources for schools and individuals to help remind us of where our country started and what the intentions and aspirations were by this diverse group of men.

The book, Lies My Teacher Taught Me, by James Loewen was what I consider my first real introduction to American History. Now don’t get me wrong, they taught social studies and history in my schools, but they never taught it correctly. By that I mean, we spent a disproportionate amount of time learning about the kings and queens of Europe rather than what really lead up to the formation of the United States. Mr. Loewen’s book opened up my eyes (and interest) into history; I consider it an appetizer.  The American Heritage Education Foundation, however, is the main course and desert.

The educational course they have laid out consists of 18 units of study ranging from the introduction which lays the foundation for the information to come all the way to personal character development. Since my children are in the elementary grades we dealt more with basic citizenship ideals as well as some biographical information on some of the founding fathers (my oldest daughter has a thirst for all things about George Washington). American Heritage has curriculum that covers elementary, intermediate and high school levels.  At first I was a little intimidated by the breadth of material that should be covered. I was, however, very appreciative about learning all of the information that I never knew before.

Each lesson plan that they have is actually quite manageable to get through on a daily basis. Although there is a lot of information, much of it is instructional for the teachers and can easily be broken down into smaller pieces if you find that necessary.  But to be honest, I’m enjoying learning all the things that I should have learned long ago. For example, I although I can recite the preamble to the  Constitution (thank you Schoolhouse Rock) I never actually read the constitution for myself.  And I may be wrong, but I don’t ever recall having to read the whole thing in school either.  This lack of basic knowledge about my own country can’t be good, and sadly I’m sure that I’m more the rule than the exception.

These wonderful materials are available free of charge, although donations are accepted to help them continue their mission to educate American citizens to their heritage and encourage a return to the value system that made the experiment in self-government such a success. If you would like to have the material preprinted and put into binders, it costs $19.50 per level or a complete set for about $350. So if you really want to understand why the United States has been held in high esteem in the past, the answers are all contained in one CD.

Khalid Family rating: 5 out of 5 stars

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