All-American 2

Why You’ll Want to Be On Hand as America Creates a Culture of Change!

Amazing Books Will Have You Traveling to Historical “Hot Spots!”
See how New York tenements were built to house thousands of new immigrants, and skyscrapers were raised to new heights. Ride along with Teddy Roosevelt and his rough-riders, and watch him bust up monopolies and trusts. Feel the blaze of the Chicago fire, hear the clang of railroad track being laid down, train your ears to hear Vietnam helicopters, feel your way out of the Twin Towers to safety, and listen to America’s jazz music. Amazing, well-illustrated books will take you there!

There’s a Lot of Good-Hearted Fun in the “America Can Do It” Book!
“America Can Do It” provides historical background on American cultural happenings, and also gives you SO many “Open & Go!” activities to enjoy this year.  Ever wonder when Americans fi rst drank cola? Played baseball? Ate burgers at a fast food place? Have you ever wanted to visit distinctly American places like Mount Rushmore, Coney Island, and Wall Street? What about traveling along Route 66, or taking off to Ellis Island? There’s a lot to learn and even more to do as you discover the people, places, inventions, fads and fun that make up our American Culture. Make your own telegraph, create your own monument, and develop your own fast food item – healthy style! Buy a stock, make your own cola soda, and create a board game! The fun will go on as your student investigates and discovers American culture through the decades.

In-Depth Later American Painters Picture Study
It’s art study just the way Charlotte Mason advocated. Your student will learn about many later American painters — Mary Cassatt, James McNeill Whistler, Charles M. Russell, Grant Wood, Norman Rockwell, and Jackson Pollock — by examining the included full-color reproductions of their artwork, discussing and narrating about the art, and answering questions.

Plus, You’ll Make-Your-Own American Culture Magazine
Students will create articles, write letters to the editor, paste up headlines, and gather pictures of America!  They’ll use a cipher wheel during the Civil War, and create wanted posters for escaping lawbreakers.  They’ll travel along with pony express riders, or follow cattle drives.  They’ll help design New York’s Central Park, and struggle to make ends meet in the city’s crowded tenements.  Students will offer opinions and write on news of the times.  These pages are designed to be filed by date into your student’s looseleaf “Timelines in History” book.  They will take your student on a great journey!

Finally, You’ll Meet American Presidents
Go inside the White House with America’s leaders and trace the events that took place in their presidencies.  Presidential Profile pages are available in the ebook sets that allow students to  record key facts about each man’s time in office, and the issues he handled.  These can be filed in the student’s “Timelines in History.”

What Will We Study?

Students will study events in later American history from the Civil War to the present day.  As they go, they’ll discover the culture of the times in later American history.

THE CIVIL WAR:
Brother Against Brother

• The Road to Civil War
• The Fighting Begins
• War at Home & in Battle
• Turning Points in the War
• Hardships of War
• The Union is Preserved

SETTLING THE WEST:
Cowboys, Pioneers & Lawless Towns

• Reconstruction After War
• Politics of Reconstruction
• Homesteads in the West
• Railroads Span the Country
• Cowboys & Cattle Drives
• Final Struggles of Native Americans
• The Wild West

INDUSTRIALIZATION, IMMIGRATION & THE GROWTH OF BIG CITIES:
New Ways of Doing Almost Everything

• The Dreams of Immigrants
• American Opportunities
• Industrialization
• American Cities
• American Inventors
• The New York Subway

A NEW CENTURY & HARD TIMES:
Depression & War

• Teddy Roosevelt & the Progressives
• World War I
• The Roaring 20’s
• The Great Depression
• Hard Times & FDR
• The War in Europe
• World War II
• World War II Battles
• World War II Ends

BACK ON THE HOME FRONT:
Contented Times, Civil Rights & Communism

• The 1950’s
• The Fight for Civil Rights
• John F. Kennedy
• The Vietnam War

THE SPACE AGE ARRIVES:
The Challenge of the Future

• Space Exploration
• To the Moon!
• Life in America Today

What’s in the All-American 2 Guide?

Your All-American 2 guide will take you inside the culture and changing times of later American history.  The guide is designed to be easy to follow, with each week’s assignments laid out on just one page!  The introduction to the guide offers you oodles of teaching helps that may feel like Charlotte Mason just “friended” you — like advice she’d give you on how to grade student work!  It’s all here!

• A 36-week, 4-day schedule is laid out clearly in a grid-style on just one page
• Introductory material helps you mentor and “learn together” with your student
• Supply lists and other helps make planning quick and painless
• Narration ideas in the front of the guide help you prompt your student through the year
• Weekly schedule page reduces your paperwork and is easy to follow, with clear notes
• Resources offer a focus on activities that are “Open & Go!”
• Ratings systems for activities help you find the ones you want!
• Independent study schedules for older students eliminate writing out homework lists
• 100 Timeline Cards and games provide fun drill to retain key events
• Website and DVD suggestions take your family back to early American times
• Above all, WP offers a practical, “Can-Do-and-Want-To-Do!” approach

What Materials are Included?

This program is designed for students from 2nd to 8th grades.  The resources should provide a good challenge for middle-grade learners, and offer a variety of learning experiences to connect with every type of student.

WinterPromise Exclusives You’ll Love

• All-American 2 Guide
• Sweeping Into the West
• “Make-Your-Own” American Culture Magazine
• America Can Do It! Activity Book
• BIBLE STUDY:  Christian Cultural Values
• ART HISTORY PICTURE STUDY:  Later American Painters Picture Study
• Add-On Presidential Notebook Pages

Early American History Books

• Civil War for Kids
• Mr. Lincoln’s High-Tech War
• Ghosts of the Civil War
• Going West!
• Shutting Out the Sky
• Chicago History for Kids
• Immigrant Kids
• Growing Up in Coal Country
• Groundbreaking Life of George W. Carver
• Remarkable, Rough-Riding Teddy Roosevelt
• Building the New York Subway
• World War I
• Louis Armstrong & the Jazz Age
• Six Days in October
• Hoping for Rain
• World War II for Kids
• Great World War II Projects
• Ultra Hush-Hush
• The Civil Rights Movement in America
• Kennedy Assassinated!  The World Mourns
• Spacebusters
• Team Moon
• You Wouldn’t Want to Be on Apollo 13!
• Presidential Elections & Other Cool Facts

Additional Ebook Resources Available Only with an Ebook or Mixed Bundle

• American Culture Tablet Book Set – The Fun & Futuristic Fifties, The Cold War, and The Computer Revolution
• State Study Notebook Pages

Can I ‘Go Inside’ Key Resources?

A Focus on Easy-to-Complete, Try-It-Yourself Activities!
You’ll Love the “America Can Do It!” Book

“America Can Do It” provides historical background on American cultural happenings, and also gives you SO many “Open & Go!” activities to enjoy this year.  Ever wonder when Americans first drank cola? Played baseball?  Ate burgers at a fast food place?  Have you ever wanted to visit distinctly American places like Mount Rushmore, Coney Island, and Wall Street?  What about traveling along Route 66, or taking off to Ellis Island? There’s a lot to learn and even more to do as you discover the people, places, inventions, fads and fun that make up our American Culture.

Your student will investigate and discover American culture through activities that include a lot of background information.  They’ll truly understand the times they are studying.  Then, they’ll try the activities for themselves in ways that are largely “Open & Go!” with no prep, or very little prep.  The activities focus on experiences that give students an understanding of the real jobs or events they are studying.  There are almost 100 fantastic activities!  Here’s a sampling!

• Do It!  Be a Civil War Photographer
• Do It!  Be a Western Surveyor
• Do It!  Be a Land Office Clerk
• Do It!  Be a Pinkerton Detective
• Do It!  Be a Grub Slinger
• Do It!  Be a Trail Hand
• Do It!  Be an Ellis Island Immigrant
• Do It!  Be an Industrialist
• Do It!  Be a Stock Market Investor
• Do It!  Be a Radio Broadcaster
• Do It!  Be a Spy
• Do It!  Be a Flying Saucer Entrepreneur
• Do It!  Be a Geocache Player

What Signature WP Experiences Await Us?

WinterPromise considers itself a curriculum that embraces the “Experience Approach,” offering Charlotte-Mason style learning opportunities with up-to-date materials that make the most of technology, too.   In each WP program, you’ll encounter a lot of our signature “Experiences.”  Some of them come in key resources like our exclusive “America Can Do It!” activity book, while others are in the guide or hidden in other resources.

Here are just a sampling of the experiences your student can choose to make a part of their year:

• Assemble a Fashion-Era Portfolio for the Modern Era
• Make Your Own Civil War Movie
• Travel to Independence Rock
• Visit a New York Tenement Building
• Build Your Own Monopoly on Oil
• View “Great War” Newsreels
• Encounter Eyewitness Accounts of Disasters
• Discover How Mount Rushmore Was Carved
• Take a Skyscraper Tour
• Hear the Memories of World War II Soldiers
• Live a Day in the Life of a President
• Investigate the First Moon Landing
• Analyze 9/11 Photos

The State and Presidential Studies

The state study begun last year in American Crossing or All-American 1 is completed this year, covering the last fifteen states in the Union.   The state study completes the state notebook they began this year, then moves on to a study of the Presidents.  Students will discover the process by which a president is elected, then learn about the lives of each of the Presidents.  Along the way, they’ll also take a peek into the White House.  Students will fill out notebook pages on the states from their “State Study Worksheets” to reinforce what they are learning about each state.  Those who purchase ebook sets will fill out the included “Presidential Profiles” on each President from Washington to the present.

If you did not complete the state study last year, you do have all of the State Study Worksheets in your ebook set, and you’ll need to add  “Kids Learn America” and “The United States:  State-by-State Guide.”  If you are purchasing a print program, you’ll want to purchase  the “State Study Worksheets,” as well as those two titles.

How Do I Use Ebook Versions?

While many of our families do enjoy books, most of our ebooks would better be considered resources, rather than the types of books that families typically desire to enjoy as “books.” With all this in mind, not only might our ebooks sets be right for your family, you might just discover that they really offer you a better way to do school!  And remember – most of our programs include bonus ebook resources you can’t get any other way!  Take a look at the ways you could utilize our ebook resources:

• Consumable materials can be printed out looseleaf, and you are able to print as many copies as you want!
• Some resources are designed to function as easily flippable “Tablet Books” that look great on a tablet screen, and are in beautiful full color. They are easy to cuddle around, just like books. NOTE! These books function on any device, not just a tablet!
• Some resources just offer more functionality, as they jump you to websites and more!
• Ebook resources are most often in full color, and look unbelievable on your device!
• Almost all resources allow you to customize your experience, whether filling in assignments or printing just the right number.

Take a look at the “American” resources below. Discover how they function as ebooks, and the advantages to making them a part of your library, and then decide!

The American Culture Guide in Ebook Format
This guide brings you a wealth of functionality not present in a print guide.  Take a look:

• Recommended websites link directly to the web on devices that have web access
• Separate “Independent Study Schedules” files allow you to actually add some student assignments in the grid format!
• Guide pages are viewable in full color
• You can customize your experience: select and print any pages you’d like from the guide and view others
• Easily print extra “Independent Study Schedules” for additional students

“Make-Your-Own” Culture Magazine
This resource is easy to print looseleaf, and can be printed as many times as you like for multiple students, offering you a great savings.  By having access to this file, you can customize and print only those pages you’ll use, which is especially handy if you have younger students, or student who would rather focus on other aspects of the program.  Either way, your students are using it the same way in print or ebook.  This is a black and white resource, and need not be printed in color.

America Can Do It! Book
You’ve probably already discovered a lot about this book.  This book is handy to have in ebook format, since you can transfer it to devices each of your students use.  They will be referencing this book a lot during their year, and using it to independently complete activities.  They’ll enjoy having their own copy on their device, and you’ll appreciate not having to share one copy among several students.

State Study Worksheets
Interactive page sets allow students to build a state study notebook.  This resource is consumable.  You can customize what your student completes with this ebook.  Print looseleaf pages of your choice, up to 100 b&w (or color pages, if you prefer). You may print as many copies as you like as part of your ebook purchase.

Christian Cultural Values
Students will work with this book as a devotional a few minutes each day.  This resource is consumable, unless you have your student complete the work in a separate journal.  You may print as many copies as you like with your ebook set.  You can print looseleaf pages, OR student can view and write answers in journal or notebook.  If you print, you’ll be printing 105 looseleaf pages.

Later American Painters Picture Studies
In digital format, this resource is divided into several beautiful, full-color tablet books that allow for high-quality digital examination of the paintings.   They are meant to be viewed as easily flippable books.  This offers a great experience for your students.  A few paintings will need to be accessed online due to copyright restrictions. While you can print this resource, it is in color, so we would recommend that you use the digital version as an ebook.

Sweeping Into the West
While this resources is set up like a traditional book, it is meant to be read aloud.  Many of its pictures are black and white, but many are in color, and these are much better experienced in the color offered by ebooks.

Additional Ebook Resources – Available Only as Part of a Ebook or Mixed Bundle.

WinterPromise American Culture Tablet Book Set
These full-color books are specially designed to work well and look exceptional on tablets, laptops, or other devices.  They are designed for a widescreen format, and flip beautifully from page to page on a tablet or other device.  The three-title set includes “The Fun & Futuristic Fifties,” “The Cold War,” and “The Computer Revolution.” Digital Use: View. While you can print these books, they are in color, and specifically designed for device use, so we would recommend that you use them just as ebooks.

Presidential Profiles
Printable timeline pages to add to your Timelines in History book, profiling each president with service facts and notable events and outcomes of each man’s presidency. Digital Use: Print looseleaf; file in Timeline. 43 b&w pp, 8 color pp. You may print as many copies as you like as part of your ebook purchase.

What Items are Related to American Culture?

Below you’ll find information on products related to American Culture, including the consumables in the program, language arts programs you might want to consider, and what else to add to complete the learning.

Start by Deciding if You Need Extra of These Consumables in Print:

• “Make-Your-Own” Culture Magazine
• Christian Cultural Values

Next, Consider if You Want to Purchase a Coordinating Language Arts Program:
Coordinating language arts programs offer scheduled readers that coordinate with this theme and typically offer creative writing or narration suggestions that coordinate with this theme as well.  This theme coordinates with:

• LA 4 – “Solving the Mysteries of Grammar”
• LA 5 – “Digging into Paragraphs”
• LA 6 – “Exploring Word Pictures”
• LA 7 – “Mastering the Writing Process”
• LA 8 – “Developing Your Storywriting”
• LA HS 1 – “Intriguing Written Expression”
• LA HS 2 – “Creating Captivating Fiction”

Add a “Timelines in History” Book for Each Student if You Haven’t Purchased One
Add Timeline Figures for This Study – See Notebooking Section for American History Figures
Add a Science Program
Add a Math Program

And, If You Want Adventure Reading to Coordinate with All-American 2 . . .
WinterPromise has always included family reading with their themed programs, but as we’ve watched prices on these books go up, we feel it is better to offer parents the option to choose whether or not to purchase these books as part of their program. This way parents have the choice to collect new or used books, borrow them, or take advantage of the advent of personal reading devices and use ebooks on their devices. To give parents more choices, we are no longer including reading books in our themed programs, but listed below is detail about the adventure reading books scheduled for you in your guide.  You can still purchase this set from WP as a special order item online.

• The Great Turkey Walk
• On the Banks of Plum Creek
• Down the Yukon
• The Trouble Begins at 8
• Quake:  Disaster in San Francisco
• Letters from Rifka
• Snow Treasure
• Hookwinked!
• A Cricket in Times Square

When you’ve learned enough about All-American 2 resources, continue on to our store to order your set, following the steps one by one!

All-American 2 FAQ’s

We Loved the Time Travelers Resources in All-American 1!  Why Aren’t We Using Them Again This Year?
The Time Travelers Resources are wonderful, but we felt that after a year, most of our families would be ready for a new experience. Plus, it is a hallmark of WinterPromise that each year feels like a brand-new experience, even though many things, like good books, activities and notebooking are always a part of each year. This year, you’ll get to immerse in the American Culture with incredible, yet easy activities that reveal the American flair for innovation. Find out more in the next question.

What kinds of activities are a part of American Culture and All-American 2?
As always, there are a variety of activities! This year, activities will come from books on the wars, the development of cities and our featured resource, “American Can Do It!”  This book offers historical background on the trends, fads, landmarks, causes and fun of American society.  You’ll read passages on the history of these, then try a fun activity that will let your students have some real-life experiences of their own.  They might stage a Civil War-era photograph, evaluate homestead documents as a land office clerk, invent their own prize-winning soup, develop Pinkerton detective crime strategies, talk cowboy, re-create the Ellis Island experience, innovate clothing design, or dress a newfangled department store window, construct a wartime trench, invest in the Stock Market, create a radio drama and much more! The real-life experiences are fantastic!

How does American Culture coordinate with the American Story 2?
These two programs cover the same time period in American history:  1860 to Present.  They are for two different age groups, but they are designed so that you are working on the same concepts on the same week.  This means you can complete joint activities from time to time, perhaps share some adventure reading, and visit landmarks as a family knowing you are working on the same concepts and periods in history.

*What is the difference between American Culture and American Story 2?
American Culture is designed specifically for fifth through eighth grade students, whereas American Story 2 is designed to meet the needs of second through fourth grade students.  Compared to American Story 2, American Culture has a higher level of content, more abstract concepts, more work requirements, and a greater proportion of text-only books.  While there are still many illustrations, the pictures tend to require more base knowledge and be less concrete than those found in the American Story 2 book selection.  American Culture also spends a lot of time connecting American events to the geography that influenced that event.  This requires the student to have a little more maturity to understand and make sense of these connections.  As always, we’ve included great activities, but here again, more art skills and other fine motor skills are required to successfully complete the heart of the program.  By contrast, the American Story 2 spends more time on books  that tell straightforward stories, stressing simple events and people to help young learners master the basics of later American history in a way that connects well to their maturity level and learning strengths.

Can I purchase and use only American Culture for students between 2nd grade through eighth?
As you’ll see in the starred question above, there are significant differences in the goals and approaches used by these two early American history programs.  While it may seem easy to use American Culture for all these ages and simply require less of a younger student, the themes and concepts covered often require more maturity to  grasp, and thus enjoy.  This problem won’t really disappear by using less of the resources. Your younger student will benefit far more from having books and materials that are right at their level, and designed to help them learn and retain important facts.  We strongly encourage you not to pursue this option, as we feel your young student would most likely be “left behind” in their learning.

Can you tell me why I shouldn’t just use the American Story 2 for all my students, including middlers?
Again referring you to the starred question above, we’d like for you to really understand that your older students are going to benefit most from learning the material in a way that is right at their level.  American Culture offers material that will encourage your student to connect up facts and use them to evaluate people’s motivations, historical movements, and other abstract concepts along the way.  Also, there is very little independent work in American Story 2 — something that must be a part of your older student’s learning experience.  Finally, the books in this program are really going to interest your middle-grade student.

How can I best combine all of my students using your American resources, then?
If you have several students, one option is for you to complete both programs. But we also offer another great option for families.  We offer the All-American 2 Set, which includes a good mixture of books from both programs so that younger learners are less-likely to be left behind, and older learners are still challenged. This program comes with a separate guide book which is a blend of the other two and is more expensive, of course, than either of the programs alone. This option will work fairly well if you’ve got students who are a blend of ages. It may not be a great option for families who have students whose ages are at the extreme lower and upper ends, such as a family with a 1st and a 6th grade student, who would more likely do better having their own sets of resources.

I’d love to have my Senior High student join our study — is this possible?
We do offer an add-on set that will allow your senior high student to complete the American Culture with some additional resources for a complete upper level experience.  This American History High School Add-On Set includes an Older Learner’s Guide for American Culture,  A  History of US, Volumes 1-10, and Painless American Government.  The older learner’s guide includes substitute independent study schedules, so your student can keep track of their own work and still have American Culture assignments on the same independent work planning page.

How Do I Credit My Junior High or Senior High Student in Their Transcript?
We’ve included information about this theme and how to credit your student in our All-American 2 Scope & Sequence, which you can download and print to use in your student’s transcript.

I’ve already got a few of the items in the package.  Can I still get the package price and leave them out?
We love to offer our package prices to our parents to help them purchase a great program with a great discount.   We do, however, have to sell all the items in the package in order to honor the discount. Usually the discount outweighs the value of the resources you might already have. If not, you can choose items individually to build your program, but make sure you follow along with discounts to see what works best for you.

Which of the resources in American Culture and All-American 2 are WinterPromise Exclusives? These resources are WP Exclusives:

• American Culture or All-American 2 Guide
• “Make-Your-Own” American Culture Magazine
• Sweeping Into the West
• America Can Do It! Activity Book
• Christian Cultural Values
• Later American Painters Picture Studies
• State Study Worksheets
• Presidential Notebook Pages

Which of the resources in American Culture and All-American 2 are used for more than four weeks, other than WP Exclusives? 

Extensively Used Resources in American Culture:

• Civil War for Kids
• Mr. Lincoln’s High-Tech War
• Chicago History for Kids
• World War II for Kids
• Great World War II Projects
• Our Country’s Presidents
• Long Winter
• ALSO:  “Kids Learn America” and “The United States:  State-by-State Guide” are also used more than four weeks, but those who used American Crossing or All-American I last year should have these books.

Extensively Used Resources in All-American 2:

• Civil War for Kids
• Mr. Lincoln’s High-Tech War
• Ghosts of the Civil War
• World War II for Kids
• Great World War II Projects
• Our Country’s Presidents
• On the Banks of Plum Creek
• ALSO:  “Kids Learn America” and “The United States:  State-by-State Guide” are also used more than four weeks, but those who used American Crossing or All-American I last year should have these books.