March 11, 2023

Our Homeschooling Journey: A Look at Our Favorite Curriculum Choices

Remember how in an earlier post, I said I’m part Classical, part Charlotte Mason, part “I do what I want” for my homeschooling type? Well, here’s where you get to see a glimpse into that.

Best Homeschool Curriculum for Your Unique Teaching Type

Since we’ve been talking about the best homeschool curriculum options for your unique type, I thought I would take a minutes and show you our personal choices.

Overall, our family subscribes most closely to the Charlotte Mason approach to homeschooling. However, there are some things I absolutely love about the Classical approach. Not only do I take my own tendencies as a homeschooling parent into account, I also consider my children’s learning styles. So when we’re talking about the “best homeschool curriculum” options, they have to be the best options for your family.

In our homeschool, we read a lot of living books, we learn together as a family, and we focus on instilling a love of learning in our children. In terms of learning styles and differences, we have an auditory learner, a kinesthetic learner (who shows characteristics of dyslexia), a visual learner, a toddler and a preschooler. There’s a lot to consider when choosing the best homeschool curriculum. But the ultimate test is whether or not it works for our family.

Are you ready to see my list? Check it out!

  • Preschool: The Peaceful Preschool is our current choice, but we have also used and loved The Gentle Classical Preschool. Both are literature rich and very gentle approaches to the early years. They can take as little as 5 minutes each day, because in our home, our littles just join right along with their older siblings. However, it can be helpful to give them a little extra attention and “school time” earlier in the day. It can help “fill their tank” so they will happily play independently while you attend to the older kiddos. In theory, anyway.

  • Learn to Read: I have used All About Reading for five years. I absolutely love it. Their customer support is out of this world! One of my children was really struggling to learn how to read. They walked me through that whole process until I ultimately discovered that he was actually showing characteristics of dyslexia. At that point, I shifted gears for him and selected Barton Reading and Spelling. He has progressed in leaps and bounds in just a few short months. We may continue with Barton or we may jump back into All About Reading. I highly recommend All About Reading.

  • Literature: We do not use an official literature curriculum. Instead, we joined the Read Aloud Revival Premium monthly subscription. Each month, Sarah Mackenzie offers a family book club option. There are so many resources and experiences in these family book clubs. We love them. She also has TONS of resources to help and encourage us homeschooling mamas. Definitely worth the $19 a month!! She also has INCREDIBLE book lists that are free to everyone.

  • Math: Math U See is hands down my favorite! I have used a few other programs like Teaching Textbooks, Math Mammoth, and Math with Confidence, but ultimately we came back to Math U See. What I love about this program is how versatile it is. Each level comes with a teacher guide AND a short video with Mr. Demme teaching each concept. After the video, our kids work through the pages in their activity book, using the Math U See blocks to help them. I love that my kids can get started with their math lesson and I can check in with them to see how they’re doing and if they need help. This is a much needed option when you have a large family.

  • History/Geography: I LOVE Beautiful Feet Books. This is a literature rich curriculum. But their teacher guides have so many extra activities and experiences to make the concepts come alive. The books are beautiful, the guides are beautiful, and we have loved every set that we have used. We also use and LOVE The Tuttle Twins, which fulfills more of the civics/government side of things.

  • Science: We have tried several options for science, but we love the Sassafras Science adventures. The books about the Sassafras twins’ adventures is really entertaining . . . so much so that whenever I close the book, my kids often shout, “No! Keep going!” especially if we just stopped at a cliffhanger. The books themselves are enough, but we have also used the SCIDAT Logs, which is their version of a workbook, and the lapbooks. My lower elementary kids love the lapbook version.

  • Nature Study: CM Simple Studies is a digital curriculum that uses living books to explore nature study. She has a few other options as well, but we have only used nature studies. I love the book choices and how simple the process is. Our Journey Westward has quite a selection of nature study, but my favorite is her No Sweat Nature Study videos. They’re so fun and engaging. And my children always learn a ton watching those.

  • Morning Time: If you’re not familiar with Morning Time (or Morning Basket), you can find a lot of information online. But basically it’s a time when you gather as a family and explore truth, goodness, and beauty. For us, morning time includes Bible reading and devotions, memory work – including scripture, hymns, folk songs, poetry, and Shakespeare, habit/virtue reading or discussion, and reading aloud. Meaningful Menus, which has now merged with The Gentle, Classical Press is how I usually structure my memory work. Brighter Day Press has (at this point) three wonderful year long volumes of morning time. (and her book lists are FABULOUS!)

  • Language Arts: For my younger children, our language arts time includes their phonics program (All About Reading), spelling, and copywork or handwriting. You already know how I feel about All About Reading. They also have a program called All About Spelling that you begin once your child has started Level 2 of the reading program. Another fantastic spelling option is Spelling You See. I’ve used and loved both. Handwriting without Tears is my favorite way of teaching how to write. But once my children learn how to write, they just have daily copywork practice. And I allow them to choose a book with a topic that interests them (Narnia, Charlotte’s Web, Aesop’s fables, famous quotes, etc.)

    For my older children, we use and LOVE IEW! I resisted the video-led curriculum for a long time, but this year we jumped into it and I’m so glad we did. Mr. Pudewa is funny and engaging and my oldest is really growing in his writing skills. He also uses the Fix it Grammar books through IEW. For spelling and vocabulary, which is fairly advanced for my oldest, we use the Daily Skill Building notebooks from DailySkillBuilding.com.

  • Fine Arts: There are four areas that we like to cover in terms of fine arts: music instruction, music appreciation, art instruction and art appreciation. We have used several options, but what we’re currently using and enjoying are Sing Solfa, Simply Charlotte Mason picture studies, SQUILT, and You Are an Artist chalk pastels. Sing Solfa is a music instruction curriculum that teaches children with the instrument they all have, their voices. This is something that I can use easily, but if you’re intimidated by music, most of her lessons include youtube videos. SQUILT is another membership we have joined and it stands for Super Quiet Uninterrupted Listening Time. Each month has a different theme and Miss Mary has live zoom calls to teach a couple lessons each month. We love the listening calendar she provides, as well as all the extra picture book suggestions she provides. The Simply Charlotte Mason picture studies are wonderful! Each set comes with a manual and 8 beautiful printed full size cards with art by your featured artist. This year we have been doing some video tutorials with Nana from You Are An Artist. Our kids have loved doing chalk pastels . . . and actually I really enjoyed it as well. Next year we’re planning to use the Watercolor with Me books. And then we’ll fill in with Nana whenever we want to add some chalk pastels in.

  • Foreign Language: We pursue our foreign language study very gently . . . meaning sometimes we’ll work on this every day for a month, and then we may push it to the side for a few months. My favorite resource so far has been Speaking Spanish with Miss Mason and Francois. This book uses a series of phrases that you teach your children in English and then Spanish. You can also purchase audio versions if you’re not confident with your Spanish reading and pronunciation. Learning sign language is also near and dear to my heart. So what we do is we learn the series phrases in English and Spanish and then, using an ASL app, we learn the signs as well.

 

These are the things we’re currently using. But it has evolved over the years. We’ve been homeschooling for 7 years and I feel like this past year we really hit our stride with finding curriculum that works for us. So don’t get discouraged if you feel like something isn’t working. Allow yourself and your family the grace to keep moving forward and to keep trying.

Happy Homeschooling!