Exploring America:
History, Literature, and Faith
by Ray Notgrass
About Exploring America Second Edition
Exploring America is an American history high school curriculum combining American history, American literature, and Bible. It helps high school students gain a fuller understanding of our nation's past as they read the history narrative, read classic American literature, complete writing assignments, and study what the Bible says about issues and ideas in American history.
Exploring America is designed to be easy-to-use for parent and student. Each of the 30 weekly units has an introduction that features a summary of the material covered, a list of lessons, books required for that unit, and suggested writing assignments. Each of the 150 daily lessons (five lessons per week) includes the history text and the reading assignments for that day (and those in progress). A focused student can direct his own study, and the parent can offer as much interaction as needed. Depending on how fast your child reads and how much time he spends on the writing assignments, he may need an average of 2-3 hours for each daily lesson. Completing the full course provides your child with a year's high school credit in American History, English (literature and composition), and Bible.
- Bible-based. Understand history from the perspective of faith in God and respect for His Word. Each unit highlights spiritual issues related to events in American history.
- Comprehensive. Learn about events and issues from European exploration to the war on terror, with extensive coverage of the twentieth century.
- Features classic literature and original documents. Enjoy studying history through the words of people who made it by reading classic American literature, poetry, documents, and speeches. (Except for the literature, the required readings are all found in American Voices, so you don't have to hunt for hard-to-find books!)
- Provides a year of credit in three subject areas. Earn one year’s credit in three high school subjects: American History, English (literature and composition), and Bible.
About the Author
Ray Notgrass holds a bachelor’s degree in history and master’s degrees in history and religion. He has written two other high school courses, Exploring World History and Exploring Government. Ray is also the coauthor of Tennessee and Georgia state history curricula.
What Parents Are Saying
"I truly feel [Exploring America and Exploring World History] have been the most pain-free homeschool products I've ever purchased!" -- Arizona
"Thank you so much for the wonderful school year. We had the best year because of your great, wonderful, awesome history. It was a delightful way to teach history. Thanks for all your time, energy, and prayers." -- Georgia
"[My daughter] is using your American History curriculum and absolutely loves it! She says she likes it because it is easy to read (not dry) and doesn't just give you the facts about history, it tells you about the people and politics that lead up to events in history. She loves to read the speeches and documents that go along with it too. We plan on using your curriculum for all of our history needs, and other curriculum that you have available." -- Pennsylvania
"I was very thankful to find a history curriculum that looked at history from God's perspective. I especially like the Bible study that is included in each unit because it really shows the student God's perspective on what man was doing during that time period. This curriculum has enabled me to feel confident that my daughter is getting a good education but not one that is boring and dry." -- Oregon
"I enjoy the completeness of the volumes. It is immeasurably beneficial to be able to purchase and have an all inclusive curriculum (such as the English-Bible-History course we are going through right now). This helps our organization, our continuity and our sanity." -- Tennessee
You can join an e-mail discussion group to talk with other parents who are using Exploring America and Exploring World History. Membership requests are approved by the moderator (not by us), so please share some brief information about why you would like to join at the time you submit your membership request. Blank membership requests may be denied. This is part of an effort to keep spammers out of this group. Send your subscription request to ExploringAmerica_users-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.
Sample Pages
These files are in PDF format. Left click on a link to open it in your web browser, or save the file to your computer by right clicking on the link and selecting the option "Save Target As".
- Exploring America Table of Contents
- American Voices Table of Contents
- Curriculum Introduction
- Unit 4: Revolution
- Unit 19: The Triumph of Progressivism
- Sample Review Questions, Quizzes, and Answers
- Guide for Parents and Teachers Using Exploring America