Curriculum by grade › 6th Grade › History & Social Studies

6th Grade homeschool history curriculum

All 36 weeks of 6th grade history, planned and ready, with the exact topic for every week below. Start with Week 1 free, no card needed.

Open the free Week 1 lesson See plans

How 6th grade history works

History is taught from primary sources: students read real documents, letters, and speeches, then analyze who wrote them and why.

Time: about 40–50 minutes a day
Scores go straight to the gradebook and report card
Print any lesson as a worksheet with an answer key
Parent tools: hours log, weekly report, portfolio
Family plan: up to 4 students, each with their own records

The full 36-week scope & sequence

Topics and standards come straight from the live course. Standards codes are listed for reference; Life Academy is built to help meet homeschool requirements in all 50 states.

Quarter 1 (weeks 1–9)

Week	Topic	Standards
1	How we know the deep past: archaeology, writing, and what we cannot know	C3 D2.His.10.6-8
2	Why river valleys: flood, silt, surplus, specialists	D2.His.9.6-8
3	Mesopotamia: city-states, cuneiform, ziggurats, Hammurabi excerpt	C3 D2.Civ.2.6-8
4	Egypt: Nile, divine kingship, Old Kingdom tombs, hieroglyphs	D2.Civ.8.6-8
5	Indus Valley: planned cities, undeciphered script — honest limits	D2.His.1.6-8
6	Early China: Yellow River, Shang, Mandate of Heaven idea	C3 D2.His.1.6-8
7	Compare four valleys: geography as cause, not a cartoon	D2.His.14.6-8
8	Ancient Israel: a people, a law tradition, and empire neighbors	D2.Civ.6.6-8
9	Persian Empire: roads, satraps, and a multi-ethnic state	CCSS SL.6.4

Quarter 2 (weeks 10–18)

Week	Topic	Standards
10	Classical Greece: polis, citizen, exclusion (women, slaves, metics)	D2.Eco.15.6-8
11	Persian Wars and the Peloponnesian War — military facts with politics	D2.Geo.7.6-8
12	Athens vs Sparta: constitutions, not mascots	C3 D2.Geo.7.6-8
13	Greek thought: Socrates' method; Plato and Aristotle as later flowering	C3 D2.Geo.2.6-8
14	Alexander and Hellenistic mix — don't mash centuries	D2.His.2.6-8
15	Roman Republic: consuls, senate, assemblies, Twelve Tables idea	D2.His.11.6-8
16	Roman expansion and the strain of inequality	CCSS RH.6-8.6
17	Caesar 44 B.C.; Augustus and the principate — republic then empire	C3 D2.Geo.1.6-8
18	Midyear: river valleys → Rome sequence defense	D2.Geo.2.6-8

Quarter 3 (weeks 19–27)

Week	Topic	Standards
19	Roman law, roads, and army logistics — why it lasted
20	Christianity in the Roman world: a historical spread, not a sermon
21	Han China snapshot: civil service idea, Silk Road open
22	Maurya and Ashoka: edicts as primary sources
23	Ghana, then a preview of later West African states
24	Silk Roads and Indian Ocean: goods, ideas, and disease
25	Maya and Andean civilizations: cities and calendars (survey)
26	Fall of the Western Empire (476) as a process, not a movie night
27	Byzantium continues Rome in the east — sequence

Quarter 4 (weeks 28–36)

Week	Topic	Standards
28	Belief systems survey: Confucian, Buddhist, Abrahamic selections (facts)
29	Maps of Afro-Eurasia in 200 C.E. vs 700 C.E.
30	What 'civilization' does and does not mean — avoid ranking peoples
31	Document skills: authorship, date, audience, purpose
32	DBQ practice: two valley laws compared
33	Timeline construction: 3500 B.C.E. → 500 C.E.
34	Oral defense: one valley, one classical constitution
35	Map polish: rivers, seas, and empire outlines
36	World History I (ancient) credit evidence summary

Need a little extra help?

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Same grade: 6th Grade math · 6th Grade English · 6th Grade science

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FAQ

Is this 6th grade history curriculum free?

Week 1 is free with no card needed: open the Week 1 history lesson. Weeks 2–36 unlock with a Student plan ($35/month) or a Family plan for up to 4 students ($69/month).

How long is a 6th grade history lesson?

Plan on about 40–50 minutes a day for history. There is one lesson per week of the school year, broken into short daily steps.

Is Life Academy accredited?

No. Life Academy is not accredited. It's built to help meet homeschool requirements in all 50 states, and parents are the school of record. Why that's usually fine.

Can I print it?

Yes. Every lesson prints as a worksheet with a separate parent answer key.

Life Academy is a parent-directed online K–12 curriculum, built to help meet homeschool requirements in all 50 states. It is not accredited, and parents issue the homeschool transcript. Nothing here is legal advice. Check your state's law at HSLDA. Questions? Email david.dukes77102@gmail.com.