We've mostly been covering history through literature or as it comes up. I'm trying to kind of follow "What your first grader needs to know". So we've covered the Stone Age, Ancient Egypt, Ancient China, early Native American of our state and are covering Ancient Rome and then Ancient Greece. We covered Thanksgiving and MLK day and the related history as they came up.
Usually we read a couple of books, both fiction and nonfiction, and watch a film or documentary, if appropriate. We talk about where the country is located on the map and maybe visit a museum. Sometimes, we do a craft (he hates crafts) or go out to eat restaurant of the country we studied.
So for example of Ancient Egypt; we read "Mummies in the Morning" from the Magic Tree house series. We read some nonfiction books like "You wouldn't want to be a Pyramid builder" and Linda Bailey's "Good Times Travel agency" books. He also watched a couple of documentaries.
Basically, he can locate Egypt on the map. He knows about the Nile river and why it was important. He knows the Egyptians built the pyramids, made mummies, wrote in hieroglyphics, and had Pharaohs. He can recognize some art and pictures as "Egyptians", he has a vague sense of the time line, "before the Romans and after the Stone Age and dinosaurs." He made connections between Egyptians, Romans and Greeks owning slaves and how that is related the American Civil war. He does spend a lot of time trying to figure out who the good guys are. How much does a 7 year old need to know?
Usually we read a couple of books, both fiction and nonfiction, and watch a film or documentary, if appropriate. We talk about where the country is located on the map and maybe visit a museum. Sometimes, we do a craft (he hates crafts) or go out to eat restaurant of the country we studied.
So for example of Ancient Egypt; we read "Mummies in the Morning" from the Magic Tree house series. We read some nonfiction books like "You wouldn't want to be a Pyramid builder" and Linda Bailey's "Good Times Travel agency" books. He also watched a couple of documentaries.
Basically, he can locate Egypt on the map. He knows about the Nile river and why it was important. He knows the Egyptians built the pyramids, made mummies, wrote in hieroglyphics, and had Pharaohs. He can recognize some art and pictures as "Egyptians", he has a vague sense of the time line, "before the Romans and after the Stone Age and dinosaurs." He made connections between Egyptians, Romans and Greeks owning slaves and how that is related the American Civil war. He does spend a lot of time trying to figure out who the good guys are. How much does a 7 year old need to know?
, etc). We also learned about several countries/states, located them on the map, learned different facts about them (climate, famous land marks etc.), We have learned a little about community helpers (this sounds so preschool, but my first grader has learned new information from this, like what the water company does etc.). I have an astronomy unit planned soon and we will learns about NASA, astronauts, and the space race with that. That type of thing, both my first grader and my preschooler have really enjoyed most of what we have studied so far. 
. i personlly do not teach history in chronological order, and i feel it isn't necessary in the younger years. currently, we enjoy literature for studying time periods, traditions, cultures, etc. for history, we are reading the little house series & doing a lot of go-along activities. my daughter also loves biographies, so we check those out a lot as well. for geography, we enjoy rod & staff second grade curriculum (which is also literature based). hth. no worries, mama.
