A delightful story-driven study of the early history of South Africa, from the pre-colonial era to the early 1900s, for ages 8-14 years.
Stories make learning unforgettable!
Modern scientific research has confirmed that children remember information better when it is presented in the centuries-old format of storytelling. Why? Because when you read or hear an engaging story, your attention is captivated, your emotions are stirred and the information is driven more deeply into the memory centres of the brain. In other words, stories make learning UNFORGETTABLE!
It’s also much more enjoyable and stress-free for families than textbook-driven programmes or online schooling.
In this South African homeschool curriculum even the factual background historical information in the parent guide is presented as a granny telling a story!
Teach your children to recognise historical bias and think critically
Footprints – The Early Years highlights the essential lesson that history is always presented from someone’s point of view, usually that of the dominant regime of the day. The stories we include often present opposing perspectives. We drive home the need to always read between the lines, to watch out for bias and to always look for an alternative point of view and to use the information you find to formulate your own ideas of what really happened. We don’t tell your children what to think, we teach children that they need to think for themselves!
Footprints – The Early Years highlights the political scandals, corruption and cultural clashes that have existed throughout South Africa’s history in an age-appropriate way, giving families tools to teach their children to navigate the sensitivities of South Africa’s past and present. You have the freedom to teach your family your moral values and guide them as they face the potentially conflicting values of the world they live in.
Our most-loved South African homeschool curriculum, now updated after 20 years
Footprints on our Land has always been our best-selling literature-based curriculum. Footprints – The Early Years is the 2023 updated edition, centred around the same South African historical fiction, but this version focuses mainly the history of our country.
What’s in the new edition?
The updated curriculum manual, which provides the factual historical background to the 20 historical fiction novels, is written with the narration and dialogue of a grandmother recounting the story of South Africa to two of her grandchildren over tea. Along with them, your children will discover centuries-old mysteries, political cover-ups and anecdotes that make history intriguing, rather than a boring list of names and dates. Granny Stella and her two grandchildren will get you to investigate your family history and heritage, look at the history of your local area and learn how global events, like oceanic exploration, colonialism, wars in Europe and slavery, impacted South Africa’s early development.
This new edition includes expanded information about indigenous African tribes, slavery and its impact on the population of South Africa. A new chapter highlights the British-Zulu wars, which were not included in the previous edition. There are some new stories included, to give fresh insights into topics that were not previously addressed in much detail and the conversational tone of the new edition, with Granny Stella’s anecdotes, makes the history much more engaging and relevant to modern children.
Importantly, to give a more well-rounded Charlotte Mason-style learning experience we have added:
- South African art featuring the scenes from the history of South Africa for art appreciation,
- a new selection of mostly South African poetry and
- a fun selection of music, mainly by well-known South African artists such as Miriam Makeba, Johnny Clegg, Jonathan Butler, PJ Powers and others for music appreciation
- additional stories that relate to the main topics in each section
- a multi-media course webpage
The stories in this programme begin in 1488 when the Khoe tribes (formerly known as Khoikhoi) encountered Bartholomeu Dias after he rounded the Cape, and they continue through time, ending in the early 1900s, just after the South African War.
Through this historical fiction, your children will get to know significant characters like Van Riebeeck, Van der Stel, Mzilikazi, Shaka, Rhodes, Kruger and others who played a role in shaping South Africa’s colourful past. Instead of reading facts and dates so typical of history textbooks, you will discover the facts about our country’s history through the eyes of the characters in the readers. Our nation’s history will come alive through the stories!
More than just history …
Footprints – The Early Years is NOT just a history curriculum, however. Being a unit study, the lesson plans are built around the children’s literature which is included and in this way other subjects are also covered namely:
- Geography and Mapwork
- Music Appreciation
- Poetry
- Language Arts
- Writing Assignments
- History Timeline
- Cooking
- Art Appreciation
- Crafts
- Technology
- Bible Study and more!
Absolutely love Footprints, it’s made me fall in love with literature again and I have seen such a change in my children.
I am so thankful for their appreciation of books.
~May Coomer
Real Life Learning through Activities and Excursions
With Footprints – The Early Years children are not only captivated by gripping stories, but it offers ideas for activities and trips to interesting places that bring the learning experience to life. No matter where, in South Africa, you live, there will be something that you can go out and explore. For example, you will research the history of your town and you can investigate the first people who lived in your area. You can visit monuments which honour famous South Africans, museums and local battle sites. You can explore art galleries, wagon trails and any other places of interest. Some home educating families, using our various programmes, have undertaken extensive cross-country tours to give their children first-hand experience of South Africa. Even if you can’t tour the whole country, there are sure to be fascinating places to visit right where you live.
What do you get with Footprints – The Early Years?
We have carefully chosen South African ‘living books‘ in this literature based curriculum, that will ignite your children’s thought environment and enrich them in knowledge and character. As many of the books are out of print, with copyright permission, we supply specially reprinted copies to you in a package form, so that you need not hunt in second hand bookshops or wait endlessly for inter-library loans.
A comprehensive Curriculum Guide, a unique South African timeline book and a large laminated map of the outline of South Africa are also included to give you a well-rounded programme. A picture disc representing each story is supplied that can be placed on the map, giving your children a visual reminder of each story and its geographical setting.
We offer a playlist of our selection of South African music on the course website, which also includes links to videos and other material that will enhance your family’s multi-sensory learning experience.
We also provide additional books that you can add to your daily reading or let your children read alone, if you prefer.
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Footprints – The Early YearsR7 150.00
The Curriculum Guide
At the beginning of each lesson in this literature-based curriculum there is:
- a checklist of topics to be covered
- a list of resources: books, music, art and poetry to enjoy
- suggestions of possible field trips,
- a summary of the stories included
- titles of additional reading material
- a synopsis of movies to view that relate to the theme
As you progress through each chapter, there are story prompts telling you which books to start reading aloud together and assignments to do that relate to the content. Then at the end of the chapter, there is a checklist for you to check that you have completed your selected assignments.
Sample pages of Footprints – The Early Years
You will need Adobe Reader (the latest version is recommended) installed on your computer in order to open and read this selection of pages from sample lesson. You can get Adobe Reader here (a new window will open so you can download without leaving this page).
I especially, am very appreciative of all the effort and extras you have put into the manual. You have it all there for me.
~ Kerry McDonald
Timeline book
A timeline book is provided for your child to keep a chronological record of significant events in the history of South Africa. One page has space for drawings and notes, the other side is to add dates along the timeline and the picture discs or other pictures you wish to add.
If you use Footprints with more than one child, be sure to order an additional timeline book/s. One is included in your Footprints package.
The Map and Picture Discs
The Footprints package includes a large laminated map of the outline of South Africa for you to customise as you learn together. You can write on the map with whiteboard markers and plot the places you learn about. Mark off boundaries, rivers, mountain ranges or historical battle sites. Add paper cut-outs of the provinces, notes, photos, the Footprints picture discs or anything else you choose.
Order Footprints – The Early Years
Optional Language Arts
Charlotte Mason-style language activities, based on the natural way of acquiring language skills, are included. Narration is the main tool for developing language arts skills but copy work, recitation, dictation, spelling and creative writing are used as well.
The language arts assignments are suggested for you in the Curriculum Guide. We encourage you to using gentle and age-appropriate methods to help your children become great thinkers and users of the English language.
In addition to the above, the Footprints – The Early Years offers an optional extra printable Language Arts programme, based on the stories in the package. This makes the English lessons relevant to the topics you are reading about in the stories. These lessons are supplied in digital format. There are two levels, to suit children at beginner or advanced levels in English.
Beginner Level – best for children who can read and are at about Grade 1-3 level
Advanced Level – children roughly at Grade 4-7 level.
Both of these products can be purchased once and re-used or printed multiple times for the various children in your family.
Click here to download some random sample pages from the Footprints Language Arts programme.
We are doing Footprints on Our Land. You cannot go wrong. My boys LOVE the stories. There are no time limits, you work at your own pace… definitely our favourite part of our homeschool day.
~ Candice Sudbury
The Course Website
Footprints – The Early Years includes a private course webpage offering multi-media material to enhance your learning experience. You don’t have to spend hours searching the internet, we’ve done it all for you! We provided everything you need at your fingertips to make learning interactive and ‘full colour’!
“During my childhood and teen years, we were fed such terrible propaganda. It has been a delight to read of other’s perspectives and experiences through the wonderful collection of literature, and I find a renewed understanding of our history.” ~ Nadene Esterhuizen
What else do you need to know?
We recommend that you take a year or more if necessary to complete Footprints – The Early Years, so that you can work at a relaxed, comfortable pace. Home education does not have to resemble school-at-home. In fact, we believe that it shouldn’t!
Take many days for field trips to places of interest, where you can see and experience first-hand, the things you are learning about. We believe that these outings build priceless memories and strengthen your relationship with your children, through the shared experiences they give you. Tangible events are much more valuable than sticking to a schedule and only learning from books! We encourage you to use our lesson plans as a launch pad and to dig deeper, or to go down “rabbit trails”, especially if your children are interested in any specific topic. That’s how you give them an enjoyable, personalised learning experience. It also gives you the opportunity to discover your children’s personalities and interests.
You will need to add a maths programme and for science, we suggest you use Footprints Nature Quest, which is a story-based safari that explores South Africa’s natural environment – the nine biomes in South Africa and their magnificent flora and fauna. This should also take you about two years.
Should you try and run on a very tight one-year schedule, you will certainly miss out on the wonderful opportunity to cater to your children’s unique delights and interests.
Worldview
This programme contains some Bible lessons and short Bible verses as copywork exercises, as the authors and most of our clients have a Christian worldview. However, families of other faiths, including Buddhists, Muslims and atheists have used our programmes and enjoyed them. The Bible lessons mainly focus on moral lessons that almost all parents are comfortable with, such as honouring parents, facing problems, overcoming fears, being kind to others. However, they can easily be omitted if you choose.
Optional South African History Lapbook Projects
We offer a series of nine South African History file folder projects and lapbooks to reinforce your children’s learning on these topics. They are digital products which you print and then cut and fold to make each lapbook together. They can be purchased as a set or one by one as you go. Pay online and download each one instantly.
- The San of Africa
- The Dutch at the Cape
- The French Huguenots at the Cape
- The Xhosa
- The 1820 Settlers
- The Great Trek
- The Zulu
- Gold & Diamonds
- The South African War
Order Footprints On Our Land
Since nearly all the essential books for this programme are out of print, you have to purchase this programme in package form.
Buy Footprints – The Early Years
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Footprints – The Early YearsR7 150.00
