Can you love America?

     

Can you love America although she has so many dragons in her past?  Well, I think it depends on how well you know her. As a child grows and matured into an adult, they can usually find love and forgiveness in their hearts for their parents past mistakes, if they’ve taken the time to know them. To see them as humans. Humans who did the best they knew how to, despite their imperfections, despite the situations and families they were born into and despite the flawed truths they were taught when they were children. I think the same is true of America. The more you know her stories, her people, her history, the more you can love her without loving her dragons. 

But how do you teach history in a way that does this?  Charlotte Mason speaks of giving children biographies of people from the time period they are studying.  Giving them rich literature that draws the child in. Timelines that help them understand the chronological order of events which helps it to all flow together as one story. 

She says, “Let him, on the contrary, linger pleasantly over the history of a single man, a short period, until he thinks the thoughts of that man, is at home in the ways of that period -CM

Charlotte Mason encourages children to learn of their own country first, so next year for 2nd grade we will be learning US History!  Fortunately our base curriculum “My Father’s World” does the hard work of incorporating so many of Miss Mason’s teaching principals such as timelines, narration, biographies, projects, literature & chapter books in Adventures in US History.  The first picture is a few of the books we will use, but there are book lists galore for each unit we will study!  😍 The second picture are a few that I pulled aside from my older kid’s younger years that I may use. 

    

Because I’ve homeschooled two older children and had the privilege of seeing them form their own opinions of historical figures and create their own worldviews, I will share in more depth on my next post, why I believe history to be one of the most important subjects taught to students.  

Until then, let’s enjoy these beautiful books.