Recommendation for American History Resources please.

[Kristen Jorgensen]

This is a tall order I know but if you could help me in any way at least to get started I would really appreciate it.

I am looking for an American History source of compilation of books both actual history books as well as literature that goes along with it. This is for myself. I'm one of those..."barely got anything out of school" people so I finally want to play catch up. Esp. with everything going on now. I want to develop my understanding of the founding of our country up to the present.

Any suggestions? Even if I could start with some great history books and then I can fill in my own literature.

[Pat]

A friend suggested that there are several books and series by this author, Joy Hakim, which she felt are really good for all ages.
http://joyhakim.com/history.html



Pat

[Kristen Jorgensen]

I found some wonderful children's books for anyone else who is interested. I found them at the library but they are fairly new books and ones I plan to buy to have around as the kids grow up. I'll have to post later who the author is of the first but they are good, basic descriptions of the beginnings of our nation and self explanatory by the titles.

The Bill of Rights (wonderful illustrations and very concise, basic information on the 10 amendments and how they were formed).

The Constitution by Lynne Cheney. This one is probably more for the 9/10+ yrs but the illustrations are very child friendly for youngers to start thumbing through. We are taking it one page at a time right now with my 7 and 5 yr old.

[Kristen Jorgensen]

Pat, those books look great! That's definitely in line with what I want. Anything that can give personal stories from varying points of view and make things personal is excellent.

[Kristen Jorgensen]

I can't find my other post but I found some excellent children's books: The Bill Of Rights and I need to check on the author's name but it was published in 2007 and We The People by Lynne Cheney. They are good basic beginnings to how the Constitution and obviously the Bill of Rights was written.

[Karen Davis]

The Story of US by Hakim is fabulous. I am reading through it for the second time with my 6th grader. I actually like it even better than the first time I read through it. I have learned SO MUCH history homeschooling my children. How DO they make this stuff so boring in school?!!!

[Kristen Jorgensen]

One thing I am doing right now, granted I'm not homeschooling older children, is I am reading Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe and have checked out a pretty generic history book from the library (A Concise Guide To American History to consult with it. I've decided that I would like to find as many period books written as I can. It is very interesting to read from the point of view of someone who actually lived in that period of time. I have already learned so much and have disspelled some of my misconceptions. I also have another book, a guide book to Uncle Tom's Cabin so I have some literary critiques of it and a bio on the author so that gives me some other good author resources.