For world history I have been very impressed with Story of the World. It is broken up into Ancient Times, The Middle Ages, Early Modern Times and The Modern Age. Each section takes about a full school year to finish. They come with a book for you to read aloud, activity pages and even tests if you want them.
I'm not a big fan of tests, so instead of taking the tests we play a game. Before you judge me my kids came up with this game. My kids like to stand in a line and I ask one of the questions; whoever raises their hand first and answers the question correctly receives a point. The one with the most points at the end wins a prize from our treasure box. The treasure box sometimes contains great prizes, like a book or toy. Other times it has some crappy prizes, like old lip gloss (I wish that was a joke).
We have actually studied all four of the books, so we will be starting over with Ancient Times. I usually have my kids color one of the activity pages while I read, then we would do one of the suggested activities. We have had some fun with those; we have made "hardtack" (it's disgusting), we've created kites, and one time when we read about the Great Fire of London, and we made a little London village that I set on fire (my kids didn't know I was going to burn it, and they may have cried on that one; ok they cried a lot).
The books do a great job of giving an overview of history, but now that my kids are getting older I feel like the big ones are ready for a bit more meat. I am going to supplement them with different biographies of the people we are studying. I will have them read it own their own. I am hoping that it helps them get a better understanding of history and why and how things happen.
I am using STOW 1 with my kiddos this year (5 & 7). We've only done the first couple lessons, but I think we are really going to like it. I was really hesitant about it for some reason. But I think it is going to work out.
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