My Favorite Homeschool Curriculums

Favorite Homeschool Curriculums

As some of you may know, we started out as VERY unconventional homeschoolers. I literally pulled the kids out of school on a Friday, not knowing what in the world I was going to do with them on Monday! I had been a lower elementary (1st-3rd grade) Montessori teacher for 12 years and had lots of Montessori materials from my Montessori tutoring service I had started, so we started that way, and some A Beka history and science books paid for and FOUGHT FOR when I pulled them out of a private, Christian school.

I found out through being at home with my children, that they learn best WITHOUT textbooks, workbooks, anything considered “fill in the blanks.”

My favorite curriculum we ever used was “Learning Adventures.” It took us 2 ½ years to go through the first book. I would have loved to have continued; but, unfortunately, I realized that by the time the author finished writing all five volumes, my 15 yr old dd would be about 21 yrs. old! So I immediately began investigating other ways to get my kids into learning in the most painless way possible!

Here are my list of favorites so far:

The Great Editing Adventure – in the past we tried Easy Grammar and Winston Grammar and others. My kids simply do not retain and apply rules. Great Editing Adventure shows them real-life situations (newspaper articles) in which we need grammar. When they get to a rule they don’t know, THAT’S when I teach it! This curriculum requires the use of a dictionary and thesaurus, as well!

Math U See – in the past we tried Saxon, Making Math Meaningful, Singapore, and lots of workbook type approaches. We had tried the old version of MUS in the past, which did not work well for us. The new edition is MUCH improved, but I tweaked it so that the girls don’t forget last week’s lesson. Monday – do pages A & D; Tuesday – do pages B & E; Wednesday – do pages C & F. If they do F with few errors, we go to the next lesson. If they need more review, I use the test as more practice. Otherwise, I do not use the tests at all.

Fallacy Detective – we did this orally for logic. Again, no fill in the blanks for us. Much too time consuming for what they retain.

Mind Benders by Critical Thinking Press – loved it on paper; can’t stand it on CD!

Reading Detective by Critical Thinking Press – very thorough reading comprehension. You can’t just look in the passage for the answer. Have to really think!

Primary Thinking Analogies, Ridgewood Analogies, Analogies by Educators Publishing Service– Why did they take analogies off the SAT? These are sooooo good!

Sequential Spelling – we tried Spelling Workout, Building Spelling Skills, Spelling Power, with NO success! Sequential Spelling has been a Godsend. It takes patience. I did not see results until around lesson 70 in the first book. My kids were horrible spellers before Sequential Spelling. I spiced it up by making sentences up using characters that we were reading about in our read alouds!

Vocabulary Cartoons – some people laugh at the title. We have tried Wordly Wise, again, another workbook program – not for my kids! My artistic 15 yr old illustrates each cartoon, writes the definition, and writes a sentence for it. If she can’t think of one, she copies the one provided. My 12 yr old who hates to draw simply writes definitions, etc. and writes her own sentence. It is AMAZING how these words continue to show up in our read alouds, their chapter books, and reading comprehension exercises!

Think Analogies on CD-Rom: Nothing could be simpler. We started with Level A, which is kindergarten thru 3rd grade level and worked up to a higher level. Think of this as the game of “Concentration” with a twist. Not only do they have to find the answer, but tell why that answer is the best!

Reading Comprehension books from EPS: We tried BJU Literature, Progeny Press, and more for literature and reading comprehension. My kids hated them. What we were basically doing was having them dissect stories or only read excerpts from some great works of literature. I want them to read the entire book and enjoy it! So it’s pretty painless to read a two-page passage and answer main idea, sequencing, and inferencing questions. Takes about 20 minutes. This leaves them time to read good, living books like “To Kill a Mockingbird”, “Anne of Green Gables”, “Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe.”

Trail Guide to U.S. Geography by Geography Matters – I use this book quite differently. I don’t use the whole thing. Currently, each week, my girls have a state of the U.S. to map and answer research questions about. This requires that they use a globe, atlas, encyclopedia, and almanac. The girls are also required to put each state on their timeline on the date it entered the union. When we are done with this book, we will start again with Trail Guide to World History to do the countries, and then follow with Trail Guide to Bible History.

Truth Quest History – some of you will cringe at the way I use this curriculum! I simply read aloud books recommended. We do not do the Think Write sections. I read, and the girls put the people/ events on their timelines. K15 has a timeline book; K12 insists on continuing to use our loooong timeline, which is, quite literally longer than the length of our home. She wants it laid out in the parking lot of our church the night of her graduation party. Wish you could see her picture of the Bubonic Plague and of Leif the Lucky. I will post funny pics of these later on.

Institute for the Excellence in Writing – I cannot say enough good things about this curriculum. I am sad to announce that we will not be doing it anymore because of my job situation. I will be putting them in a writing class next year. On a brighter note, their teacher uses a lot of Andrew Pudewa’s ideas in the teaching of her class. I simply cannot fit this curriculum into my work schedule anymore. The Student Writing Intensive DVD’s were the best money I ever spent because Mr. Pudewa gives the lessons to the students directly on the DVD. K15 hates writing, but is doing a much better job of putting her thoughts down on paper now!

Rosetta Stone – my 12 yr old told me she wanted to learn French! I don’t know French, only Spanish! Rosetta Stone is a great way to learn conversational anything! Not much grammar, however.

Read alouds – each day I read two books aloud, have for the past seven years. One is a classic or a good book I have heard about. Currently, we are reading “Redwall.” The other book I read is always a historical fiction or biography suggested from Truth Quest. We are currently reading the biography of Susanna Wesley from the Sower Series.

Rainbow Science – I only wish we spent more time on science, my least favorite subject to teach. My favorite thing about this curriculum – you will laugh – is that the experiments actually work!!!! All but one of them have. Neither of my kids are going to major in science or mathematics, so we do it when we get to it; I am embarrassed to say. But I also like that the passages in Rainbow are short. They don’t have to read 16 pages at a time – 3 pages max at one sitting.

***Please note: Neither of my dc are headed for a 4-yr college right away. They will either start with our community college or trade school. At this time K15 is considering photography as her area of study. K12 wants to be a missionary.

No quote tonight. Sorry, folks!


~bye for now~