Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I used these pockets to support the Ancient year my family enjoyed as an annual theme in their earlier home education. The theme took in every kind of learning, and these added something special, but I mainly relied on Story of the World, Volume 1: Ancient Times Audiobook CD: From the Earliest Nomads to the Late Roman Empire, Revised Edition (7 CDs). Fortunately they fit beautifully together. The Story of the World title gives a lot more information than the pockets, including stories from each culture, and if you get the Audio CD version, your children can play the tracks to their hearts' content. The matching Story of the World activity book was also a great help to create some active/hands-on/role play learning. These three titles together work really well but don't supply any of the science, so to flesh it out I used Ancient Science: 40 Time-Traveling, World-Exploring, History-Making Activities for Kids, which is also arranged civilization by civilization, so the experiments are super easy to fit in at the right point. The set of science experiments are couched in historical background, are well explained from both the scientific point of view and from the point of view of what each civilization discovered, and most importantly they really work! So the pockets by themselves are not going to teach the history, but my children LOVED the pocket activities which had them make things that they can handle, that will remind them of what we covered in other ways. I'd also like to recommend Ancient World (World History Series) for your independent readers. It is also arranged by different major civilizations, but adds in some other peoples, e.g. The Celts, and includes spreads on key figures, like Alexander the Great. My 8yo and I both fell in love with this book. My daughter asked me to buy it for her as her very own copy, and she can remember tonnes of the details because the book is so inspiring. Using these five titles together has created the best learning experience we've ever had in our home educating. Oh - I also read some ancient stories (folklore and fairy tales would fit here) as evening read-alouds before bedtime. And the next year was Medieval Year, using the same approach. That was our second best year.