Congratulations on starting this journey!

Every weekly lesson of this package will open up once you have completed the previous part. You can go as fast, or as slow, as you like. Read through all the documentation, and you are set to go!

Your access allows you to use all of our materials for one student for 13 months. We trust our members to keep this amanah and not share this access with others.

Materials

The History Connections Book 4 – Modern History program includes the following: 

• History Connections Book 4 – Modern History
• History Connections Book 4 – Modern History Maps & Worksheets (Needs to be printed)
• World Wall Map (Needs to be printed & Assembled)
• Wall Icons (Needs to be printed)
• One Ummah Crescent Template (Needs to be printed)
• Usborne Internet Linked History Encyclopedia, abbreviated as UILE throughout this book
• History Intersections, edition 2

Elements

All lessons have scripted discussion questions and detailed instructions. The worksheets and maps needed can be found in the accompanying Maps & Worksheets book. We have provided a space for notes at the start of every lesson. We found that jotting down what the student struggled with, or any particular interest he/she showed in a topic, helps with tracking progress and finding enrichment if needed. In every lesson there are several elements:

Inquiry: throughout this curriculum, students learn how to ask questions and extract information from images and maps. They will generate questions before doing any reading. This is called Inquiry Based Learning. Learning how to ask the right question is half of the success of research. In book 1 through 3, parents have been modeling this skill with increasing participation of the student. In book 4, students will organize their independent inquiry questions a bit more in detail. They will categorize their questions into What, Who, When, Where, Why and How, using Inquiry Sheets to organize their thoughts. During the reading process, more questions may come up and should be added to their sheets. Initially, students are merely required to come up with one of each type of question, and find the answer to this question in the paragraphs read. As they progress, they may transition from the inquiry sheets to a notebook should they desire to do so. 

Reading: Learning how to read a historical text is a skill that will benefit a student throughout his/her life. The goal is not to read as many paragraphs as possible, but to read each paragraph with attention, looking to extract information. Since reading levels widely vary between students, we give suggestions where needed for those with lower and higher reading levels. However much a student manages to read, please praise and encourage the student for their efforts, with a focus on the effort to understand the information embedded in the text. Reading a text phonetically, without understanding is not the goal of this program. Initially, extracting information from a written text may require a substantial effort from the student, depending on the familiarity and reading level of the student. Therefore, going slow is not a problem, as the goal is to master the skill of extracting information. 

Activities: Every week the child will complete an activity that relates to the topic of the week. This will help students to internalize the information covered. Activities are varied and alternated, in order to keep students engaged. We recommend allowing the student to complete all activities as independently as possible. Every activity will teach different skills and abilities, such as strategic thinking, hand-eye coordination, and deduction. In order to help you prepare for the activities, we have included a list of materials needed for the activity for that week (see below). 

Tracing a Map: The program asks the child to trace the Location Maps (provided). The action of physically tracing a map enforces the integration of information into the memory. Please make sure you have tracing paper available. The mapping activity allows students to get familiar with geography and teaches them to pay attention to certain geographical landmarks, such as rivers and seas, mountain ranges and oceans. In addition, students will learn political boundaries and how they were created. Consider the mapping instructions like a game: take each instruction separately and see if you can find out where to draw. Maps have been provided for reference. Borders drawn do not have to be precise: a general idea of where borders were and how they were formed is sufficient. 

World Wall Map & Wall Icons: Every week, the child will cut out and stick small icons on the World Wall Map to remember the events that have been discussed. It also gives a sense of where most of the events are happening on a global scale. The World Wall Map can be assembled from the pages in the Maps & Worksheets book. When using the World Wall Map, always show what part the child will be tracing on the Location Map. You can do this by making a ‘photographer’s bracket’ with your hands: simply hold your hands together so they form a rectangle. Then show the child on the World Wall Map, where the Location Map is located. 

One Ummah: In order to make it clear that events on one continent may affect Muslims on another continent, we use the One Ummah Poster. Truthfully, in the global society we live in, everything is connected to everything else, but we chose to highlight certain events that affected Muslims around the world directly. It is essential for students to be able to visualize information, so they will stick 1 or 2 images on selected topics that affect Muslims on a large poster.  

Reflection: We have added reflection questions to help understand one of the important lessons from the topic of that particular week. You can simply discuss the question and a possible answer verbally. 

Main Points: We have provided parents with a text box of main points of the topic. This will help evaluate if the student has extracted the proper information from the paragraphs. If the student understands the main points, or even a few of these (depending on how much the student is able to read), it will be sufficient. The main points also help serve how detailed any understanding should be. We do not focus on dates of events, as much as the understanding of the events. Even if a student does not know a particular name of a President, or a battle ground, or a specific date of an event, but broadly understands the events that happened, he/she has fulfilled the requirements of the program. From grade 5 to 8, students will dive more into depth into the topics covered in book 1 through 4. 

Extra Resources: At the end of every lesson, there are extra resources listed. We recommend that if your child expresses a particular interest in a topic, you allow extra time for the extra resources. Extra resources are optional and not part of this curriculum. If you are working with a hard copy of the curriculum, we have added a QR code in the Extra resources that allows you to access them easily through our webpage. These webpages with resources are only available to families who are using our curriculum. 

Visual Elements

Every lesson also has visual elements to help guide you through the lesson. There are several approaches to using this book. The easiest is to simply follow all of the instructions. The lessons are set up to be repeating the information. However, should you feel your child is simply not responding to a certain element, there are ways to differentiate the teaching method.

Highlighted text contain instructions to the parent. Normal text is supposed to be read out to the student.

Bold text are the questions asked, and these should be read aloud to the student.

Text in Italics should be read to the student as well, as it explains the images. This is often a repeat of what was mentioned in the stories.

Fun Facts & Did You Know... boxes are meant to be shared with the student, but are not an integral part of the lesson.

Dashed Text Circles are alternative suggestions for parents.

Different Types of Learners

The lessons are written in a such a way that they cater to different types of learners. Ideally you will take the lesson as is, and your child will learn several different skills. However, some children are not auditory learners and they struggle with listening to a story. On the other hand, some children are not visual learners and they need to hear a story to get a sense of structure. In our program we cater to both.

If you do the entire lesson, your child will practice both skills, which we recommend. Despite this, we do recognize that for some kids this may prove difficult and may lead to less engagement. As a parent, you know your child best, so if you feel a certain element does not work well for your child, here is what we recommend:

You can read the stories and look at the images in the resource texts to reinforce what was mentioned in the story. Often, having the child look at the image while reading the story will greatly help. After this, you can continue with the questions in bold, and skip the lines in Italics. On the other hand, if you child is not engaged when hearing the short stories, but enjoys the images instead, you could skip the stories and focus on the questions in bold and explain the image with the lines in Italics.