The TruthQuest History Ancient Greece guide is geared toward grades 5-12, but younger siblings can participate as well. The guide is spiral bound for ease of use and takes the student chronologically through the history of Ancient Greece including art, culture, and related spiritual truths. There are ideas for how to use the guide, including planning out the lessons.

The guide consists of commentary designed to introduce you to the Greeks and their history, as well as help you dig into spiritual truths about that point of history and the mindset of the people. Along with the thought-provoking commentary, you will also find resources to add to your learning, such as non-fiction and fiction books, cookbooks, activity books, films, and videos.

The neat thing about this guide is that even though they offer a list of resources for learning, you do not have to use those specific titles. They are suggestions, and many can be found at your library or through interlibrary loans. If you love book sales, you may already have some on your shelves. However, if you can’t find the suggested resource, simply use what your library system has available. The guide is not dependent on any particular books, but rather frees you up to use what you can find.

You will also find ThinkWrite assignments designed to make your student think about the bigger picture, such as belief systems the Greeks held. Plus, they offer a chance for the students to write about these things. In the back of the guide, there are responses for the ThinkWrite questions to help the teacher go over them.

Let me give you an idea of how we use this in our homeschool. The first thing we do is scan our own bookshelves for the listed resources. If we have any, we mark them in the guide with an O. Then we hop online to check our library system for the rest of the listed resources and then mark which ones are available at our library (with an L) and request the ones we can get through interlibrary loan (with an IL).

Then we simply read the commentary and dive into the resources we’ve gathered. Along the way, we look for things that can help my kids build a notebook on Ancient Greece. They might sketch an artifact that catches their eye or try their hand at writing something in Greek. When they come across ThinkWrite assignments, they take time to work on them and add them to the notebook.

Because none of the resources are required, my kids have the freedom to set aside a book that doesn’t grab their attention and choose one they enjoy more. Sometimes we add in resources that look interesting but aren’t on the list. The guides are completely flexible and customizable.

The TruthQuest guides are great for homeschooling families who enjoy learning with literature. My children love these guides and learning history through books, activities, and films. I love that the only thing I need to purchase is the guide. Everything else can be borrowed. Buying notebooking supplies might be fun for your student, though. You can even allow them to get creative with the video camera and record what they’ve learned.

The only cons I see are for extreme book lovers who might try to read or use every single resource. You can request them all, but flip through them and only use the ones that really appeal to you and your kids. Also, don’t be afraid to get creative with ways to record their learning. You could stick with the ThinkWrite, but if you want to add more, don’t feel overwhelmed or intimidated. Let your kids’ interests lead the way. If your son loves video making, use that. If your daughter is an artist, have her draw her favorite things. Again, these ideas aren’t necessary but definitely add to the learning.

The TruthQuest History Ancient Greece guide costs $24.95 for the spiral bound book and $19.95 for the PDF version. I definitely recommend these guides, and I think the value is worth the cost.

- Product Review by Audra Silva, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, January, 2015