Annaz,
This is a great question! As we head into the high school years, the books do get more challenging and include more names, dates, places, etc. So, while I agree that this is a living book, I also agree that it has a more challenging feel to it with all of the factual information wound within its pages. You will also notice as you progress through this book that the chapters vary as to how many different episodes or events are contained within them. Consequently, your student's narrations will really vary as well!
Learning to narrate from a book such as this is great practice, as the coming books at the high school level will contain this upped level of challenge too. You will notice that we vary the types of oral narrations in this guide, teaching 5 different types of oral narrations. In World History, we teach 6 types, and in U.S. History I we teach 7 types of oral narration. This just shows that when narrating, there are many different ways to approach narration (and they are all viable). But, as students practice these varying types of narrating, they will also eventually learn what type of narration best fits each type of book.
To give you a glimpse down the road, in the U.S. History I guide, we also take those 7 types of oral narrations and have kiddos practice doing 7 different types of written narrations. We purposefully wait until the U.S. History I guide to have students do this task, as we are desiring for them to practice orally narrating in various ways for years prior to doing a specific type of written narration. We are also desiring for students to have much practice in open-ended written narrations prior to be asked to write a specific type of written narration.
So, with all of this in mind, I would encourage your child to experiment with her written narrations in the World Geography Guide. It is fine to try summary-style narrations and descriptive narrations. It is fine to narrate more fully upon one episode that struck her or to insert her opinions within the narrations. Practice in learning to use transition sentences comes as well as students try to link the paragraphs in their narration together in a cohesive fashion. Looking back in the book as students write their narration also becomes essential, as the volume of pages and the inclusion of names, dates, and places increases. This mimics some note-taking skills, which are also essential to have!
So, you can see that this first year of high school is training ground for the skills to come. The skills students hone as they try various types of oral narrations and try to figure out how to narrate in writing upon a variety of authors and styles is good practice for future learning. They will truly sift and sort and find what works for each book they encounter, but it takes time to find the pattern that works for each author. The skills are in the sifting and sorting and are also in borrowing some of the author's style!
To encourage you, I will share that I can see the fruit now in my own son, who is currently doing the U.S. History I guide. He did not balk at writing the written narrations in a certain style each week, as the oral narrations he had practiced for years made the transition seemless. I can also see that his wheels are turning as to what type of narration works best for each type of book.
These skills are great life preparation and great college preparation too. They prepare kiddos to write at the drop of a hat in a variety of styles in response to all different types of authors. It is a very different education than the one that I received, but I can definitely see the benefits!
Blessings,
Carrie
