I've had the same struggles with history, there aspects I like of the different styles. So I think what I decided to do is use Master Books America's or World's story as a spine, and pull in the book list from Sunlight for the corresponding topic (either American or world history), to get those great extra books in!
We started this year for my 5th grade son with Beautiful Feet Books American History Intermediate because I didn’t want to do the “boring” textbook approach, but it actually wasn’t right for us and we ended up switching to Notgrass America the Beautiful and we are loving it! It really is not a typical textbook/traditional curriculum even though at first glance it looks that way. It is kind of like a unit study organized into textbook form and it also has an optional literature portion as well which we are doing also. I do separate the lessons into 2 days. So we do the textbook reading the 1st day and the various activities (map work, timeline, historical poems letters, songs, speeches, etc.book) and literature reading the 2nd day. I think it is worth looking more into while you make your decision.
We used America’s Story 1 with Story of the world Volume 3. The timeline lines up perfectly and it was great to read about what was happening in the world while each event was happening in America. We used SOTW more as a read aloud and America’s Story as an actual curriculum.
That’s an idea! I really like that! I forgot to mention in the video that I did want something that showed time frames of what was happening in different countries in the world during a set time frame. Love this idea!
The Mennonite curriculums, Christian Light and Rod and Staff, have in depth Bible studies for homeschoolers. They don’t get too specific on differing theologies, they stick to mainstream Christian ideas but they teach you to dissect what is in the Bible. A lot of chronological history.
I really appreciate you sharing your thoughts. There are lots of videos on final pics, but I like this one sharing what the process is like getting to those pics.
I agree! Rod and staff digs deep in study, and I haven't found theological issues for our family. I've been so impressed at how much my daughter has learned.
Consider adding audiobooks to your history choice. That takes the stress off of having to read the chapter books but everyone can still listen to them while you tend to baby.
I appreciate videos like these so much. I know a few homeschooling moms from a local group in our small town, but if I ask what curriculum they use, I’m met with blank stares and shrugs. “A bit of this and a bit of that.” Or, “whatever we’re into at the moment.” I was starting to feel like I was crazy overthinking it all, looking at different curricula, thinking about what we liked and didn’t like, what worked and didn’t work. I’m glad there are other homeschooling moms who put a lot of thought into it. This is our first year homeschooling and it’s been such a journey and we’ve both learned so much. I’m already excited for next year.
Haha yes we’ve all run into those homeschool moms (which, hey, that’s totally fine), but sometimes I have felt the same way because I like to research too (and why I love making RUclips videos about it). To each their own ❤️ but you’re definitely not alone ☺️
It sounds like you would enjoy the answers in genesis ABC homeschool curriculum. It isn’t bible stories, it delves deep into different subjects and the character of God. It is amazing. I wanted something deeper this year for my 2,3,4th graders. They love it 🙂
I can't find sample pages for the kids workbooks. Do you find them to be advanced or on grade level? My son will be in 4th grade but I'm wondering how challenging the 4-5 book will be.
I think we’re going to try this next year. I’ve been struggling to find a Bible curriculum that incorporates both Bible knowledge and some basic theology in an engaging way for early elementary. Sonlight was just reading a daily children’s Bible, and Lifepac was dumbed down to idiocy.
Thank you for doing this early!! I love it! Most people wait until the new school year starts or right before, and it’s too late! I hope you are feeling well! ❤️
For your Bible study, I would highly recommend checking out Not Consumed Ministries Faithipedia. They have an Old Testament and a New Testament option. Both are full year long programs and have leveled journals to accompany them. Each study dives into the books of the Bible with historical information on when it was written, audience it was for, and purpose it was written, plus more.
We are 2nd grade using Beautiful Feet Around the World part 2 for world history/geography, Logic of English level D for phonics, the old edition of The Good and The Beautiful level 2 for grammar plus a Teacher Pay Teachers worksheet compilation for grammar practice, Memoria Press for spelling, Masterbooks/Sassafras and misc for science. We are making a change in our math from Singapore to Math U See because Singapore was too fast-paced for my son. We will do several other things this year but these are the main ones. We have enjoyed all of these but we just started Sassafras so I can’t speak to that one. I am very thankful for each one of these curriculums bc they really helped me and my son make the most of this homeschooling journey. I would highly recommend any of these if it fits your learning and format styles.
We did fo Apologia Flying Creatures, but only did the birds lessons. Later we did a mini study on bats from it. We intend to look at insects later. We then did the lessons on whales from the Swimming Crwaturez book from Apologua. So I am mixing the topics to bring variety. It will take several years to do all the lessons (if we do all of them) but will give us variety and choice. Just a thought.
I loved the idea of a literature based history program (and still do) but my kids haven't always been interested in the books I wanted to read. I have really enjoyed Notgrass because the incorporate stories in many of the lessons. It's also nice because if we are not very interested in a topic we can move on and not feel like we are stuck in a long book. We read several of the suggested chapter books along with it, but not all of them. They have an additional list of books beyond their book pack. I am excited to try the World Geography program from Beautiful Feet next year though. Enjoyed hearing your thoughts about it all! Totally agree with you about spending a year on birds lol.
I’m going through the same thing with bible this year! I’m looking at Christian light education bible curriculum for next year and it looks really good from my initial research!
My girls also have Sunday school lessons, Jr. Church, and Awana. For our Bible in homeschool, we have been using Foundations A 260- Day Bible reading plan for kids. We have all really enjoyed it.
This is our second year using Notgrass and we love it. It's a great mix of textbook, reader/ read alouds, and activities. It's helped me feel better about possible "gaps" after years of literature-based history. As far as Bible, we have done numerous things, we enjoy changing it up throughout the year. You may like the Wise Up (devotions on Proverbs) devotional by Marty Machowski, he wrote The Ology (which we have not used) but my kids, ages 3-17, all enjoyed this one but I think there are other themes/subjects in the same series.
@@fab5bailey369 yes we did and we did complete it in a year. We did all the textbook, literature, lesson review, and most of the writing actvities. I thought it went well and my son learned a ton. Some of the days there was a lot of reading and I would read the chapter in the textbook out loud or have the reader on audio which did help (my son doesn't love reading).
I’ve heard only good things about notgrass BUT their books are like 1,000 pages for a year long course, and that seems like a LOT 😳 my college history books weren’t that large. It does look like a great program though with the moving parts that it has.
@@thepracticalhomeschooler they are a hefty textbook. My oldest (12th grade) sounds a lot like your oldest and mine loves Notgrass. We combined our next 3 (4th, 6th, 9th) to one of the middle school levels and I read the textbook out loud to them and then they do different activities based on age/skill level.
We are loving Notgrass this year! It’s textbook style but they also have a literature portion you can do as well. My 7th grader has enjoyed it and I plan to do it with my younger boys next year. 😊
If you're looking for a Bible study that goes deeper into how to study the Bible, might be worth checking out my new release, Elementary Exegesis--the premise is teaching exegetical Bible study principles to kids. Understanding that Scripture was written with a purpose and building tools for understanding even those scriptures that are difficult to understand. I just don't know if it might be too high of a level for your little one--I posted a flip through of it earlier in January.
We started using Veritas press self-paced curriculum for Bible and History(My oldest is 5th grade). It uses videos with characters and games for review. There are timeline songs they learn that runs throughout. The company runs BOGO sales a few times a year. Also, they have a free trial period. My oldest is old enough to work the computer and the younger ones will sit and listen. It is classical style and we absolutely love it!!! I like it because I can listen and be there to help, but I can get something done or nurse the baby.
I love curriculum talk! A couple thoughts for your history. We have used Sonlight for 4 years and love it! They have world history in 2 years, HBL B & C. It is geared for kids a little younger than yours but even I learned so much through it! One down fall would be the family read alounds and student readers don't correlate to the history cycle but thats pretty easy to supplement. The book A Child's History of the World is excellent. They also have a 2year cycle for older kids, HBL G & H. They use Story of the World but use 2 books/year. My SIL is using SOTW this year and they're on their third book I think. If your just reading through it, it sounds easy to get through more than one a year. It was fun to hear your thoughts!
My twin daughters are in a Memoria Press cottage school. If I re-enroll them, they will be taking Famous Men of Greece, Geography II, Second Form Latin, Literature D, and Classical Composition III: Chreia and Maxim. For Science, they will do the Book of Trees and possibly Biology. For Math, I am considering The Good and the Beautiful.
Masterbooks American History can be done in 2 years if you move a little faster than the schedule. We used this and read books from Bookshark/Sonlight. I have also done Bookshark (only 1st year of American History) I really loved it but it was overwhelming for my daughter.
Yea I was thinking of ditching the teacher guide and going at a faster pace to get it done in 2 years if we went that route. I can see how bookshark could be overwhelming
I haven't used it personally, but there is a 2-year American history program called All American History from Bright Ideas Press. I considered it at one point, but ultimately we ended up with Masterbooks and SOTW for World History, and Notgrass/MFW/BFB for US history. I've used something different almost every year, but we're settling into Masterbooks and Notgrass primarily. I love a literature approach, but I'm just supplementing books with our current topics right now. For Apologia science, a lot of people do Flying Creatures one semester and Swimming Creatures the next semester. Also, look into Berean Builders Science in the Beginning if you want a wide variety of topics in one year. Last, Journey Homeschool Academy has video-based elementary science courses, which may come in handy for you if you've got a new little one coming next year! Congrats!
I love hearing what others are enjoying or planning on using. Thanks for sharing! I really struggled with finding a really good and fun history for my kids this year and I'm very happy with what we chose. We picked notgrass, the our star spangled history - i got it with the literature pack and I'm so glad I did. It's novels, not picture books but the stories have been so great my kids love them. Our star spangled history is recommended for grades 1 through 4 but it could easily go to 5th or 6th grade in my opinion. Especially if the older student does the writing prompts instead of the drawing option. It also has an end of unit project that's optional and those have been really great. Highly recommend it! I also struggle with Bible, but this year we have been doing the studies from not consumed and they've been wonderful. On Fridays we do a Bible story and correlating craft, kind of Sunday school style. It's been fun and engaging! I'm totally making that part up as I go
We are doing Americas Story this year. We finished Americas Story 1 before our halfway point in the year because my son enjoys the chapters so much, we often will read an entire chapter vs only reading until the Narration Break. So, keep in mind it MAY not be a three year curriculum for every child. I had ordered the 2nd and 3rd books and we will likely finish them before we begin our new year in August. Also, the first two in the series have an audiobook (and the 3rd is coming), since I know you have mentioned you don't love reading aloud a ton. I had purchased it when I lost my voice this winter, and the author is the narrator and the same as the podcast (which I highly highly recommend the podcast! Our whole family enjoys it.) We used BF books Early American History last year and absolutely loved it.
Yes, originally when I was planning to use Americas story, I was going to do in 2 years, not 3 but we ultimately went with BFB. I didn’t realize they had an audiobook to go along. So although I don’t love chapter books, I actually don’t mind reading aloud at all (just something about chapter books lol)!
We have only used Sonlight and Beautiful Feet Books since we started homeschooling a few years ago. My son loathed history when he was in Christian school, but found a love for history using literature based programs. However, I watch my grandsons 2 days a week (1 infant and 1 toddler) and it is a bit of a struggle some days that they are here. SL and BFB are not something I could execute with a little one full time. We will stick with literature based for now, though I do wonder if my daughter would do better with traditional, as she is more cut to the chase. My son loves Apologia Chemistry and Physics (6th grader) and says it’s his favorite science ever, but he does it mostly independently. He will move into Apologia General Science next year, and I’m still figuring out my daughter (they do separate science). This year we do daily Bible reading with discussion and application. We also add in Bible reference books to understand the historical context, the key people in the Bible reading, and geography. I plan to continue this next year. It has been amazing to watch my kids dive deeper into God’s Word.
I enjoyed this video and your thought process. You're blessed that you can use standard curriculum and not be concerned with special needs or artistic students. Your children sound very smart and academic. I hope your newborn will be an easy baby
We really love the Masterbooks Gods Design science and the Bible from Christian Light Education. We used Notgrass OSS this year but I was torn between that and Americas Story. My kids are enjoying OSS though.
Thanks for sharing. We are undecided about which language arts for my 10 year old. You’d probably get through two apologia books in an academic year. We have done them for 2 years, and it’s been really easy to do 2 a year. We use it for our 10 year old, he does it totally independently using the journal. My 7 year old will be doing Sonlight science A.
We’ve enjoyed Science Shepherd this year. We don’t use the workbook because it doesn’t align with how I teach, but the videos were a great springboard for further inquiry. Just enough hands on activities to get kids excited and not overwhelm me. I’m considering using the Curiosity Show on RUclips in a similar manner next year
Have you thought about starting a catechism with them? The truth and grace memory books are fantastic. I use the first level with all of my kids. Even though it is only meant for up to 4th grade, that catechism is extremely deep. Things like what is sin, what did Christ accomplish in the covenant of grace, what is a covenant, what does atonement mean, how were people saved before the coming of Christ. And those are only up to question 50 or so. There are many that go even further into doctrine and theology.
I think it's so important to go deeper with kids than the normal Bible stories. Life is hard now a days. We tell are kids not to lie, steal ETC but they need.know why. They need learn when little how to live a godly life. So many false teachings now a days!!!
I've decided to do learning History through living books this year too. We're doing Notgrass, Our Star-Spangled Story as a read a loud and adding in a couple videos on things that interest us more when we come across them. We'll see how it goes. I'm hoping it goes great because my plan is to do it altogether with my rising 1st, 3rd and 5th graders!
There are so many comments, so I don't know if it has been said, but Notgrass History has read aloud suggestions that you can add in for each section. That might be a way to bridge the want to do text book yet also do read alouds.
@@thepracticalhomeschooler thought I would add - we just dropped the Book Shark History lol. My oldest expressed that she was becoming so confused with history, because we had to jump around so much. To be fair, we were using 3 different spines, plus the read aloud, plus the switching between poems and nursey rhymes - just for history alone. We decided to switch back to Not Grass Our Star Spangled Banner. Her and her younger sister are much happier.
Have you looked into Answers in Genesis? I really enjoy their homeschool Bible curriculum. It is based on bible stories but it’s heavy on theology, not just the retelling of bible stories. The entire curriculum breaks down the 7C’s of creation: creation, corruption, catastrophe, confusion, Christ, cross, consummation. I have a playlist where I talk about year 1 curriculum (they have 3 years available).
You're not alone, we have been going through the same thoughts. We did end up buying Abeka for our twins for 2nd grade, I binge-watched your 2nd grade reviews. Thank you so much! We made the decision to purchase all the subjects for Abeka but parent-led with the curriculum plans, not the academy as the videos are just too much for my younger children. I've been toying with the idea of purchasing/creating unit studies though to fill in the gaps for the electives. Additionally, I do have some plans for educational games from Timberdoodle, Historical pockets and also Dave Ramsey for Money (aka economics). It's the state studies I have a loss for as here in our state of California, we must have 1 class of it.
My oldest is a 3rd grader now. From the time she was a preschooler through her 1st grade year, I was adamant that we would do a lit-based curriculum like BookShark or Build Your Library. I love the beautiful stacks of books, but I learned the hard way that while I love the idea of learning through "living books," neither my kids nor I actually love sitting through reading all those books. It is a heavy amount of reading that I don't know how other people's 4-5-6-year-olds sit through all of it. Maybe I'm not the only one. It took us 2 years just to get through the preschool level of Bookshark, so that was pre-K and kindergarten for us. Then I tried Build Your Library level K for her 1st grade year, and it was the same situation. We didn't like all the reading, we were skipping a lot of books. I finally accepted that this wasn't working for us. That's when I switched to a more traditional textbook/workbook style but with some Charlotte Mason elements. First Masterbooks for 2nd grade, then the Good and the Beautiful and Abeka for 3rd grade. We like those so much better now.
Sometimes it takes trying something for a while before you realize you love the idea of it more than the actual curriculum. Been there before! Glad you’ve found what’s working for you guys!
I’ve had the same struggles as well. I have decision fatigue now because I have to decide rather quickly. I agree with apologia science, I choose to use the swimmers one this year after getting overwhelmed with all the Abeka stuff and my son particularly hated it, he wants Abeka back and I didn’t enjoy reading the same old as well. But I’m not set on anything even tho my kids say they enjoy Abeka science and history which I do too. I’ll have to find ways to possibly tweak them, it gets so much harder as they get older though.
I am also having a hard time deciding History this year, but having done Abeka history this whole year and it was all USA history, I'm kind of leaning towards Story of the World 1 Ancient history or a similar more Christian one called Mystery of History. I like that i can play a recording of the spine (and get a break from all our usual read alouds) and that the activity book is pretty much open and go, just need one for all kids and make copies. Great for visual learners, auditory learners, and kinesthetic. Was thinking of mixing in some Sunlight books as a fun addition. I know eventually we'll get back to regular US history either through Abeka or MB so that's what motivating me to step away from it for a bit! This is my history curriculum "brain dump" too 😂😂😂
I def think you should go with MasterBooks for history mainly because it's open and go and you will need that with a new baby!!! Having a new baby and homeschooling was my biggest struggle. Don't even ask me how it went when he started walking!! 😬 My girl will be in 2nd grade next year and for social studies we have decided to go with My Story 2 from MasterBooks. It will be my first purchase from them but I am excited about it. We are also doing Notgrass 50 states and the Tuttle Twins History. For Bible we started Apologia's Word in Motion which my 6 year old loves and it's going well. We will keep doing it next year. For science we are doing Generation Genius videos which is so wonderful!!! And we recently came across A Reason For Science and we decided on that. We just started A Reason For Handwriting and we love it because it's biblically based so we are excited to start the science part! You do experiments and worksheets. We are also doing Abeka Health, safety and manners which I think you did and had a video on! Math we will be doing RightStart Math which I'm beyond excited about along with Mathseeds workbooks that we have done since the beginning. language Arts we are doing All About Spelling/Reading, Reading Eggs Workbook, Real-world writing from Evan Moor, A Reason for Handwriting, and Fix it Grammar. We also supplement with Versatiles books (which we loveeeee) and The Learning Pallet!! We just decided on these things last week so I'm super excited!!!!! Now I just need a loan to buy it all!! 🤣 😆 😂
Yes, definitely need a loan for it 😂 but it’s the ONE thing I “splurge” on…I don’t mind spending money for their education (but still try to get things second hand when I can) ❤️
For Bible, we are really enjoying Apologia’s Word in Motion. This year we’ve been studying the Old Testament. Next year we will study the New Testament. I was looking for something deeper as well and have been very pleased with Word in Motion.
I found this very sweet American History called CM Simple Studies America. It uses one spine of amazing stories and then it has suggested books for every age range and chapter and you pick what works for you. It's maybe less than $10. It's very light in its approach. You could easily do this and read an American history "textbook" with the corresponding chapters. I plan on doing this and using Abeka history.
My son (4th grade) and I love Masterbooks Americas Story 1 and we paired it with book sharks America history lapbook…also since he is so into Americas beginning and the revolutionary war we are branching off now and are doing Gather round history mini unit “Rise to Independence”. We paused MB after chapter 11 but we will go back to Masterbooks after our mini-unit 🥰 We also really love TGATB science units and plan on doing them next year too along with some of Campfire Curriculums and Gather around units
I have been having the same struggles with history. We did TGTB last year and masterbooks this year. I didn’t fully dislike either of them but really want to see what TGTB releases this summer, I am hoping it fits the in-between I’m looking for. For science we have loved TGTB but we will also be doing at least one campfire curriculum unit next year and see how it goes. We have done their Thanksgiving and getting ready to start Valantines and my kids loved that their unit selections are more job/real world based.
What we do for our bible is out church gives us devotions for our kids weekly and it has Bible verses for the week along with a kids little magazine with a color page and story for everyday of the week. We use that for bible and the sections goes over the whole bible in a year and has study. For each age is different . We are seventh day Adventist so ours are called sabbath quartleys. My bible first is a place you can check out if interested.
I'm torn with history also! My kids are in 5th, 2nd/3rd-ish, and K right now. I started my oldest with MB America's story when she was in 3rd. Then I took a break and we did MB Passport to the US with my older 2 and this year I decided on Notgrass OSSS because the workbook was more age appropriate for my middle than MB. America's Story would have been too much for him. However, I think MB went into much more detail than Notgrass (of course their American history spans over 3 years while Notgrass is done in 1 yr). Now I'm looking into starting world history next year as we haven't done any of that yet. I'm torn between going back to MB and doing World's Story, Notgradd From Adam to Us, or now I've heard amazing things about Generations curriculum and their history. Their history is more based on continent rather than time period, so I'm having trouble deciding if I'm good with that or if I prefer a more traditional approach. We are also enjoying TGATB science units this year, because my kids get to pick what they want to learn about and they're only around 12 lessons long so we can fit in several per year. We are also enjoying Apologia's Word in Motion Old Testament this year. We plan on doing the New Testament next year and then I thought about going into the Who is God series after that, but I'm not completely sure. I might do the answers books from MB or Answers in Genesis.
We are in the same place for bible and history. I love the idea of story of the world, but a whole year on one time period makes my brain want to bleed. I don’t think I could do it. We’re pairing Notgrass with BFB and are giving it a go. We’ve done it in the past with OSSS and BFB. I like the text book (ish) version of Notgrass with the literature they pair and then adding in picture books and crafts for my youngers. Honestly my oldest (5th this year) always ends up joining. Next year we’ll do America the beautiful and pair it with BFB again or move up to the intermediate version. I also always come back to Sonlight and the compromise I’ve found is buying the reader curriculum for the grade (it’s like $10) and then having them do the readers. It’s worked really well. Our 4th was a baby this year and I had to really look at what curriculum I wanted to do with three others to teach and have reasonable expectations. I know I have to have reasonable expectations next year too, because our fourth is on a whole other level lol
“Makes my brain want to bleed” so relatable! 😆 I love the idea of OSSS but that on its own is a full curriculum and I’d want to pair all the extras with it and then to add that with BFF…I think might be too much for us. How did it go with baby 4 and doing all that? That’s my main, main thing I’m trying to keep in mind. Lack of sleep makes me want to do bare minimum
@@thepracticalhomeschooler it went really well, but I prepared myself in advance to know a few things. 1. It can go two years of needed considering the two books are divided halfway through AH and plenty of curriculums divide it up like that. 2. I can always read the actual text and have my oldest read a few of the read alouds as assigned readers, we can gwt audio books or skip some of the read alouds if that season is busier (our library has almost all of them to download for free). 3. Incorporating BFB can (and often did) look like my oldest reading the picture book from the same time period. My oldest loves to read to her siblings though so it wasn’t me putting too much on her. If that’s something your oldest would enjoy I’d consider that. It really solidified the overall picture for my oldest doing that. 4. We used the workbooks only as a discussion piece and sometimes just utilized the questions at the end of each lesson as talking points. We enjoyed it so much that we’re wanting to do it again with leveling up in texts. As a side note I think it got much easier after about half way through the first book.
I’ve been looking into Old Story New by the same author as The Ology. It’s a meant to be a 10 minute devotional but you also read scripture and discuss questions to dive deeper and pray together. They also have an Old Testament version. 😊
I am in the same boat with history…so many choices but I don’t LOVE any of them. I haven’t liked any Masterbooks curriculum I’ve ever tried so I’m hesitant to try their history. My children love book work and worksheets but also literature so maybe combining a bit of both would work??? Glad I’m not alone!!!
I honestly haven’t liked any of their stuff either (🫣🤦🏻♀️) except for More than Words. But I have read several chapters of Americas story and for me, it was really good. Felt more engaging than a regular textbook.
Let me throw an idea out of LAPBOOKS..Pinterest explains but it’s yellow folders,fold each side again, print out lapbook pieces and they can color them, write info on them…make the learning come Alive. We also did mystery of history in 6-8 , printed out people from pinterest(it’s on there type in mystery of history), bought poster board,drew the line and they colored the piece each day that coordinated with what they read.
My daughter really does better with independent subjects. Things she does on her own completely. So we switched to Lifepac for Language Arts midyear and we’re probably going to continue on with other subjects for next year. If I have time and energy (with a newborn and toddler) we’ll incorporate some books and reading to go along with it. 🤷🏻♀️ But if I don’t, I know she’s still learning. ❤
For Bible study, I have a kindergarten and a third grader and we do a combination of Abeka's 3rd Grade Bible curriculum mixed with the fruits of the spirit. We have a fruits of the spirit road trip guide book that is hands on and really great. :) And Abeka does go much more in depth with their lessons. I'm not sure if you've tried these before since you are familiar with Abeka.
Master books has an elementary apologetics course that uses the Answers for Kids books. They also have a new series with 2 levels called Where Faith Grows. The levels out now are geared towards younger kids though but it looks pretty good! They are planning to continue the series for older kids eventually.
We like traditional curriculum too. For History I’m planning to use BJU’s new Heritage Study “World Regions” & also use Beautiful Feet Around the World picture book selection to add to it.
I loved this video. I always struggle with picking science and history. I'll start something and then get bored or busy with other things and never follow through. I'm definitely going to look into more of smaller unit studies and see if that helps. 🤔
I have the same sort of dilemma with history. I don't want to do a 4-year cycle. I haven't covered world history with my 6th grader. We have done a few unit studies skimming different eras (which we have enjoyed) but I'm looking for a nonexistent 1-year program that is literature based. I like your idea of combining programs.
We purchased the cat dog curriculum set for this year, and only did a few weeks before looking for something else. It just wasn't deep enough, for my 6th grader. We switched to apologia Who Is God? Book 1 and liked it better, but are struggling to decide if we should go to book 2 next year as well.
Yes my oldest was thinking the elementary one of cat and dog would be too young for her too. I definitely can see that it didn’t work across the ages for you guys.
I have outsourced Science and History this year with power homeschool. It's traditional and simple. It's $25 per month but you can get up to 7 subjects any level or subject. So technically I could get Science and History for all three of my children for $25 per month! For the other subjects we do abeka K-2nd Then my third grader is doing Saxon 3 with Nichole the Math Lady Growing with Grammar Abeka reading All about Spelling
We’re giving Simply Charlotte Mason history, Bible, and geography (combined) a shot. I needed to simplify my life and get everybody together. I also love the idea of literature based, but not 590 books. SCM seems thorough, easy to implement, and not overwhelming. It is a cycle (which I don’t mind) but looking over it and comparing to other curricula I’ve used, it seems that you could easily jump into and out of the cycle as you need/want.
Checked it out! It looks good, as does their enrichment curriculum…it was giving me some more ideas to contemplate….which I’m not sure is a good thing or bad 🤣🤣🥴
Already started looking for next year too! My 5th grader LA - TGTB level 4 w/ Fix It Grammar Math - TGTB level 5 History - Notgrass OSS Science - Easy Peasy Intro to Chemistry Reading - AAR Level 2 My 10th grader LA - IEW Math - Math Tutor DVD History - Notgrass and use their literature for her English credit Science - Shormann Dive Electives - I don’t know yet
Tgtb history does different time periods. They also have it where you can get 4 read alouds to go along with it. We were doing apologia and I had to stop too much talk about birds. Were doing gods design life, it has plants, human body and animals. Next year we’re doing the energy one. For math we’re considering switching to Saxon. Mine asked for black and white math. We might stay with tgtb l.a and fix it grammar. For history we’re doing generations and it includes church history as well. Bible were doing generations.
Biblioplan! It is history and bible at the same time. And it can cover all age groups. It's so inclusive with read alongs, videos, and can be used and paired with other history curriculums. We love it!
I find we prefer bible studies but I’ve yet to use bible curriculum!!! I want something deeper as well!!! I mainly do it with a 11 year old, 12 year old twins and a 14 year old!!! My youngest daughter does more bible story’s at the moment but she’s 5!!! I struggle with history as we did story of the world and my older daughter came to me and said she hated it and we started using sonlight!!! Our local history curriculums are textbook based!!! We are doing a gather round unit study with my older son and daughter as it’s history they need to know but my sister in law is taking a break from sonlight while we do this. The other boys are taking a break from history!!! We’ve done a lot of different science!!! We love the unit study approach and my daughter does more than a term on one subject in her pre medical class!!! We love TGTB and easy peasy!!! We love their projects!!!
We loved beautiful feet books for history this year! We are currently using the ology for Bible and journaling what we read. I don’t love it so we are looking for something else for next year. and science!! I’m so lost haha! I could do animal and plants all day. Count me out for you earth science or chemistry/machines/etc. I’m like you..I don’t want to spend a whole year on birds lol I’m considering science shepherd: introductory and then adding in books/YT/documentaries/etc as my girls are interested. I haven’t heard much on this science curriculum though! I like that it’s short and sweet and to the point. I can check it off and dive deeper *if* we want. my girls will be 1st & 3rd graders next year! 😊
Wanted to add- about beautiful feet books. I know it seems daunting bc of all the chapter books. But it isn’t. They break it up to just a few pages a day, and it can be done as a 2 year curriculum instead of one.
I’ve been trying to figure this one out as well. This years plan was biblioplan, the third year, so we could cover American and world history at the same time. I have all the stuff but it didn’t work out. We were on the mission field for the start of the year and then we lived in Michigan with my mother in law (which we did almost no school) then we moved after that again, abd we are moving again. 😬😬 Anyway that being said I really wanted to love biblioplan! However it wasn’t really my favorite. We only did 2 weeks worth of work. I already had story of the world volume 3 so I’ve simply been reading from that, abd because of the moving, it’s working well with how behind we are. I feel the same way about bible curriculum. We used the apologia one and it wasn’t really new information. I have no idea what to use. For me it’s the hardest one to decide on. This year I’m using the answers for kids books from answers in genesis. It’s ok. It’s not my favorite either. There was a weird question/answer about the ice age that used a scripture completely out of context. For reference next year I’ll have an 8th grader, 2 6th graders, a 3rd grader, a first grader, a 4 year old so I guess pre k? And a 2 year old!! So for history I’m actually almost thinking about doing almost what you are thinking about. I saw the American history with picture books and that looks really good! (For the first and third), then possibly the worlds story for the older ones. I’ve tried sonlight and it was just too much reading. I used 2 cores too. The independent readers for my oldest had some things in them that were inappropriate as well and I was disappointed with that. We tried sonlight science because we had used apologia and felt the same you did about doing only one science subject all year. No idea what I’ll use this year. We are doing apologia because I wanted to do space but I may take a look at the good and the beautiful now that they have re done the units. It helps that you’ve done them! Would you still recommend doing a separate science for a first grader?
I think it depends on the first grader. I had two separate sciences this year for my 5th and 1st grader but she always wants to participate in her older sisters lessons. And she actually gets what’s going on and retains it. I’d say with 7 children, eliminate what’s not necessary. I don’t think you’d need a whole science for your first grader. But if you want to do something special or just have that one on one time, TGTB has a science for littler kids and it takes us 5-10minutes for a lesson. And there are only 30 lessons. We love it!
They both look so good I can’t decide! Maybe I’ll have to see what my first/third grader think 😊 It will be interesting to see what you are changing for math and LA. This is our first year using the good and the beautiful and I love that LA has so much stuff that I wouldn’t have thought to add in.
We are really loving Science Shepherd Science because the kids can do it independently. And I’m looking into adding some good and beautiful science at my own pace just for fun. :) We’re also loving Beautiful Feet Early American History this year! Currently reading Pilgrim stories and it’s so good! I’m learning as much as the kids are. 😂 Language arts and Math on the other hand…I can’t decide!! We’ve been using TGTB but looking to switch to CLE possibly. I can’t decide and my son is almost done with his current Language Arts! So much pressure to choose the right one. 😅 It will all work out!
It actually incorporates like missions stories from around the world, and focuses on godly behavior vs. selfish behavior. I really think it looks good 😄
I feel the same way about Apologia Science. We do it at Co op. And I want to like it...but it just doesn't work for us. We tried Biblioplan for History this year and I think I will either go back to Sonlight next year or try Beautiful Feet.
I’m new to homeschooling and looking at all three of those you mentioned for history. Leaning towards Sonlight and Beautiful Feet books. Curious what you didn’t like about Biblioplan?
@@allisonsmith7360 The main book is textbook style. And while I think the information is good....it's just very dry. I went to a conference and sat in on a session the author led. She said that you need to make history engaging. I just have a hard time making it engaging. Lol, it probably is me but I find it hard to take the book information and engage the kids vs just reading it to them. It may also depend on the ages of kids. I have a 5 year age gap and I tried Biblioplan for the family style. My oldest (12 years old, 7th grade) likes it and retains the information. My twins (7 years old 2nd grade) have retained zero things. Whereas they still remember some facts from Sonlight history that we did last year. Hope that helps a little bit.
@@sherrybolosan7066 That is very helpful! Thank you for the response. Sonlight definitely looks appealing especially with all the books. That’s great to hear it’s been a good fit for your family.
Maybe checking out good and beautiful history it’s 4 cycles but each cycle goes from ancient to modern so you aren’t stuck in one period the whole year. And has literature options. I believe their new one will be out before next school year. Also notgrass was a good combo of traditional but great stories each unit and really good literature books. Plus the homeschool history subscription goes along with them so well for activities and rabbit holes. Mystery of history is one I’d like to check out personally as well
@@maggiehermanson6298 have you heard about new release date. Every update they do seems to be better than original so I’m trying to hold out. We haven’t used it yet as we’ve been using notgrass and torn for next year what I want tomdo
@@terrim2448 I heard 2024 at one point, so I scooped up the original ones last year. My youngest is 2 so I'll happily buy the updated ones when they come out :). I've heard great things about notgrass too though!
So funny…I had a section in this video talking about how I wanted to try TGTB history (the new one when it comes out) and that even though it’s 4 years, I liked that it went from ancient to modern with each year. But the video was getting too long 🥴 but yes, can’t wait to see what it looks like!
As we've worked through this first semester and winter break, I've really been able to pinpoint what is NOT working for us in History. Textbooks are just not drawing my kiddos in (3rd, 2nd, Kinder/1st). HOWEVER, anytime the oldest and I read a historical fiction story out loud from his Reading curriculum reader. Every single one of the kids is able to share facts and interesting things with their Dad later that day. They NEVER mention anything we studied in our textbook lesson. So it seems literature really engages my kiddos and they retain A LOT. So, I started looking around and found Heart of Dakota. I've watched as many videos as I can find and I found a very reasonably priced used teacher's guide for the level I want to do and we're just gonna jump in right now, midyear. I'm not buying the whole curriculum. I'm not spending hundreds on book packs and notebooking journals. I'm just getting the spine and the book list, then hitting the library. We'll see how it goes. If we like it, if it's feasible, and makes sense for us, then next year (when my Curriculum coffers are refilled by the Principal 😉) I can look at getting in deeper and investing in book packs and whatnot. We've started gathering some of the books on their list and the kids are ALREADY excited to start reading them so I'm hopeful we might hit our stride with history finally. What I liked most about HOD is that they encourage you to piece together a package that best suits you. So if you don't want an all in one box curriculum, then you can customize it pretty easily. And if you really prefer every subject being taken care of by one publisher than you can totally do that with HOD too and make it completely open and go. I figure, if we really fall in love with the curriculum over the next couple months, I can begin to drop pieces of our current curriculum and still use Heart of Dakota fully without overwhelming everyone.
This video is my brain...lol! I am with you on NOT doing one topic for the WHOLE year. I actually break up History and Science by semesters, History during Fall semester and Science during winter. This has helped to keep it exciting. Next year, not sure what curriculum but I do have our topics... History-Ancient Times, Science-Physical Science and Bible-Not Consumed.
Hi! I’m completely new to the homeschool world, just dipping my toes with my preschoolers. But I wanted to know your thoughts - for something like History, what are some pros and cons of using a typical [public school] textbook, instead of using a traditional homeschool curriculum? Thanks!
A lot of people find textbooks dry and boring and find that the material is more engaging and memorable/better retention when using literature based programs. But in reality, what will stick is what the child is actually interested in (whether textbook or other styles).
We tried to love Sonlight. My kids hated it. We switched to ACE last year and they are doing so much better and enjoying it. I still read aloud great literature, but at our pace and our choices.
Same we have done it for two years and it’s a lot of reading and my kids and I find most of the stories boring. I haven’t heard of ACE will look into it
Next year will be my first year having 5 children I'll be schooling ranging from 9th grade down to Kindergarten and I'm struggling with planning. Who do group together, morning time that is interesting to everyone....it's consuming me haha
Question! I’m intrigued by the textbook type science/history. How do you do this with multiple kids? Do they do it separate or together? I don’t want to have to read grade 6 AND grade 3. I’ve been doing gather round unit studies since we started in 2020 and I can’t do separate teaching, I like all together. Can that work with textbook-type subjects? Thanks!
When we did it, I chose the grade in between. I had a 3rd grader and a 1st grader, so I chose 2nd grade and it was right for both of them. For you, depending on how much they love science/how much info they can retain, I’d say grade 4 or 5 would work. It obviously wouldn’t work well if you had like an 8th grader and 1st grader, but if they’re fairly close in age, then you can make it work
I had a baby in my daughters first grade year and now coming at the end of third grade! Keep your curriculum simple during the baby toddler years. 😊You can always beef things up later on. I’m glad I’m not the only one that can’t do a year on one Science topic. Ugh. No thank you.
I’ve homeschooled with a toddler but never a baby 🫣 I’ve heard it can be harder with a toddler since they’re into everything, but I also assume it would depend on the baby/toddler. Either way, it’s definitely at the forefront of my brain haha
@@thepracticalhomeschooler The sleep deprivation can be worse with the baby depending on the personality but in my opinion toddlers are way way harder when it comes to school 😂😂😂😂
We also love bju online for a few subjects for more independent textbook learner. We also do sonlight for science and history and readers. So we do half textbook half literature based!
@@brittneydisesa2186 yes have currently changed aomethings bc my son was getting jealous of my daughter doing school with me. Now he is doing bju math,reading,english,spelling,handwriting. We do science, history,bible, literature with sonlight and i love it!! My daughter is also doing the bju english...and then random other things. I feel like bju is solid and colorful and not too much. And the sonlight is AMAZING! I havent tried their LA just because I wanted more work for my kids 🤷♀️
@@brittneydisesa2186 yes we do sonlight science everyday. We dont do all the experiments..we are doing mostly animals now with magnets mixed it. I do not like experiments or crafty things, so mostly they watch videos about it and then occasionally we will do one.
I know looked through it but My Father's World is pretty good. Nothing is perfect. And no, you don't HAVE to start with countries and cultures. The lessons aren't super long. The last 2 in the family learning cycle combine World history with US history. Having said that, I'm still deciding and making myself nuts.
@The Practical Homeschooler I hear you. I don't really like Apologia science and whenever I look into bible curriculum, 1. I want it to be good and sound 2. I don't want my children to end up hating God. I feel I've looked at all the curriculum and I don't feel great about any of them. Just FYI, my bachelor's is in history and my masters degree is in theology. I feel overwhelmed and underwhelmed at the same time. I'm curious as to what you will choose.
@@jocelyngrace2023 o cool! I know what you mean about overwhelmed and underwhelmed (not that I have a bachelors in those fields), lol. But I know what you mean about their relationship with God….it’s definitely scary but ultimately, it’s our job to show them what and why we believe, but it’s up to them to decide for themselves what they will choose. It’s hard to realize and accept it, and like I said, I TOTALLY know how you feel about that!
@The Practical Homeschooler So, I think I have decided on curriculum for next year. Notgrass for history, Berean builders for science for my oldest, TGTB science units for my younger two. Bible will be bible stories, memorization, missionary and hero stories, as well as some church history figures and hymn study.
I love the concept of this video. I wish more people would do videos of this sort, working through their thought process.
I've had the same struggles with history, there aspects I like of the different styles. So I think what I decided to do is use Master Books America's or World's story as a spine, and pull in the book list from Sunlight for the corresponding topic (either American or world history), to get those great extra books in!
Great idea! Love it ❤️
We started this year for my 5th grade son with Beautiful Feet Books American History Intermediate because I didn’t want to do the “boring” textbook approach, but it actually wasn’t right for us and we ended up switching to Notgrass America the Beautiful and we are loving it! It really is not a typical textbook/traditional curriculum even though at first glance it looks that way. It is kind of like a unit study organized into textbook form and it also has an optional literature portion as well which we are doing also. I do separate the lessons into 2 days. So we do the textbook reading the 1st day and the various activities (map work, timeline, historical poems letters, songs, speeches, etc.book) and literature reading the 2nd day. I think it is worth looking more into while you make your decision.
Great idea to break it up like that! It can be overwhelming otherwise.
We used America’s Story 1 with Story of the world Volume 3. The timeline lines up perfectly and it was great to read about what was happening in the world while each event was happening in America. We used SOTW more as a read aloud and America’s Story as an actual curriculum.
That’s an idea! I really like that! I forgot to mention in the video that I did want something that showed time frames of what was happening in different countries in the world during a set time frame. Love this idea!
The Mennonite curriculums, Christian Light and Rod and Staff, have in depth Bible studies for homeschoolers. They don’t get too specific on differing theologies, they stick to mainstream Christian ideas but they teach you to dissect what is in the Bible. A lot of chronological history.
I really appreciate you sharing your thoughts. There are lots of videos on final pics, but I like this one sharing what the process is like getting to those pics.
I agree! Rod and staff digs deep in study, and I haven't found theological issues for our family. I've been so impressed at how much my daughter has learned.
Consider adding audiobooks to your history choice. That takes the stress off of having to read the chapter books but everyone can still listen to them while you tend to baby.
I appreciate videos like these so much. I know a few homeschooling moms from a local group in our small town, but if I ask what curriculum they use, I’m met with blank stares and shrugs. “A bit of this and a bit of that.” Or, “whatever we’re into at the moment.”
I was starting to feel like I was crazy overthinking it all, looking at different curricula, thinking about what we liked and didn’t like, what worked and didn’t work. I’m glad there are other homeschooling moms who put a lot of thought into it. This is our first year homeschooling and it’s been such a journey and we’ve both learned so much. I’m already excited for next year.
Haha yes we’ve all run into those homeschool moms (which, hey, that’s totally fine), but sometimes I have felt the same way because I like to research too (and why I love making RUclips videos about it). To each their own ❤️ but you’re definitely not alone ☺️
It sounds like you would enjoy the answers in genesis ABC homeschool curriculum. It isn’t bible stories, it delves deep into different subjects and the character of God. It is amazing. I wanted something deeper this year for my 2,3,4th graders. They love it 🙂
Another vote for Answers in Genesis homeschool Bible curriculum! This is our second year using it and we love it!
I agree! I started using this for Bible this year and my girls love it.
I can't find sample pages for the kids workbooks. Do you find them to be advanced or on grade level? My son will be in 4th grade but I'm wondering how challenging the 4-5 book will be.
@@shannonbolton553 they are on grade level, not too advanced🙂
I think we’re going to try this next year. I’ve been struggling to find a Bible curriculum that incorporates both Bible knowledge and some basic theology in an engaging way for early elementary. Sonlight was just reading a daily children’s Bible, and Lifepac was dumbed down to idiocy.
Thank you for doing this early!! I love it! Most people wait until the new school year starts or right before, and it’s too late! I hope you are feeling well! ❤️
For your Bible study, I would highly recommend checking out Not Consumed Ministries Faithipedia. They have an Old Testament and a New Testament option. Both are full year long programs and have leveled journals to accompany them. Each study dives into the books of the Bible with historical information on when it was written, audience it was for, and purpose it was written, plus more.
We use Positive Action for Bible and we love it!! We are also going to rotate using Not consumed studies (like my brother's keeper and contentment)
We are 2nd grade using Beautiful Feet Around the World part 2 for world history/geography, Logic of English level D for phonics, the old edition of The Good and The Beautiful level 2 for grammar plus a Teacher Pay Teachers worksheet compilation for grammar practice, Memoria Press for spelling, Masterbooks/Sassafras and misc for science. We are making a change in our math from Singapore to Math U See because Singapore was too fast-paced for my son. We will do several other things this year but these are the main ones. We have enjoyed all of these but we just started Sassafras so I can’t speak to that one. I am very thankful for each one of these curriculums bc they really helped me and my son make the most of this homeschooling journey. I would highly recommend any of these if it fits your learning and format styles.
We did fo Apologia Flying Creatures, but only did the birds lessons. Later we did a mini study on bats from it. We intend to look at insects later. We then did the lessons on whales from the Swimming Crwaturez book from Apologua. So I am mixing the topics to bring variety. It will take several years to do all the lessons (if we do all of them) but will give us variety and choice. Just a thought.
That’s a great idea to switch things up a bit!
I loved the idea of a literature based history program (and still do) but my kids haven't always been interested in the books I wanted to read. I have really enjoyed Notgrass because the incorporate stories in many of the lessons. It's also nice because if we are not very interested in a topic we can move on and not feel like we are stuck in a long book. We read several of the suggested chapter books along with it, but not all of them. They have an additional list of books beyond their book pack. I am excited to try the World Geography program from Beautiful Feet next year though. Enjoyed hearing your thoughts about it all! Totally agree with you about spending a year on birds lol.
Have you looked into "Not Consumed" they have bible studies that focus more on character? Not sure if it fits what you need.
A few years ago I did!
I’m going through the same thing with bible this year! I’m looking at Christian light education bible curriculum for next year and it looks really good from my initial research!
We use Christian Light Bible, we’ve used levels 1 and 2 and we have really enjoyed it.
My daughter loves CLE Bible!!
We love the Bible and their reading too! ( we use it as an extra reading cause I love it so much) we use sonlight for history,science & reading!
We have loved Notgrass, they go up through high school too.
Now I'm very curious for your math & LA video!
Stay tuned lol
My girls also have Sunday school lessons, Jr. Church, and Awana. For our Bible in homeschool, we have been using Foundations A 260- Day Bible reading plan for kids. We have all really enjoyed it.
This is our second year using Notgrass and we love it. It's a great mix of textbook, reader/ read alouds, and activities. It's helped me feel better about possible "gaps" after years of literature-based history. As far as Bible, we have done numerous things, we enjoy changing it up throughout the year. You may like the Wise Up (devotions on Proverbs) devotional by Marty Machowski, he wrote The Ology (which we have not used) but my kids, ages 3-17, all enjoyed this one but I think there are other themes/subjects in the same series.
Did you do Adam to Us and what was your schedule like? Did you complete it in a year?
@@fab5bailey369 yes we did and we did complete it in a year. We did all the textbook, literature, lesson review, and most of the writing actvities. I thought it went well and my son learned a ton. Some of the days there was a lot of reading and I would read the chapter in the textbook out loud or have the reader on audio which did help (my son doesn't love reading).
Ahh you totally unleashed a memory for me! We did wise up in 7th grade Bible class! 😄
I’ve heard only good things about notgrass BUT their books are like 1,000 pages for a year long course, and that seems like a LOT 😳 my college history books weren’t that large. It does look like a great program though with the moving parts that it has.
@@thepracticalhomeschooler they are a hefty textbook. My oldest (12th grade) sounds a lot like your oldest and mine loves Notgrass. We combined our next 3 (4th, 6th, 9th) to one of the middle school levels and I read the textbook out loud to them and then they do different activities based on age/skill level.
We are loving Notgrass this year! It’s textbook style but they also have a literature portion you can do as well. My 7th grader has enjoyed it and I plan to do it with my younger boys next year. 😊
If you're looking for a Bible study that goes deeper into how to study the Bible, might be worth checking out my new release, Elementary Exegesis--the premise is teaching exegetical Bible study principles to kids. Understanding that Scripture was written with a purpose and building tools for understanding even those scriptures that are difficult to understand. I just don't know if it might be too high of a level for your little one--I posted a flip through of it earlier in January.
Not even sure what exegetical means 😂 but I’ll definitely check it out! ☺️❤️
@@thepracticalhomeschooler It's written exactly to make "exegesis" way less intimidating than it sounds.
It sounds like you might like the Foundation Worldview Bible curriculums. They have one on studying the Bible and one on comparative worldviews.
Oooo yes I bet she would like that because it's a lot deeper than just Bible stories! I have looked into it and plan on using it next year also!
I’ll check it out. Thanks!
We started using Veritas press self-paced curriculum for Bible and History(My oldest is 5th grade). It uses videos with characters and games for review. There are timeline songs they learn that runs throughout. The company runs BOGO sales a few times a year. Also, they have a free trial period. My oldest is old enough to work the computer and the younger ones will sit and listen. It is classical style and we absolutely love it!!! I like it because I can listen and be there to help, but I can get something done or nurse the baby.
Sounds awesome!
I love curriculum talk! A couple thoughts for your history. We have used Sonlight for 4 years and love it! They have world history in 2 years, HBL B & C. It is geared for kids a little younger than yours but even I learned so much through it! One down fall would be the family read alounds and student readers don't correlate to the history cycle but thats pretty easy to supplement. The book A Child's History of the World is excellent. They also have a 2year cycle for older kids, HBL G & H. They use Story of the World but use 2 books/year. My SIL is using SOTW this year and they're on their third book I think. If your just reading through it, it sounds easy to get through more than one a year. It was fun to hear your thoughts!
My twin daughters are in a Memoria Press cottage school. If I re-enroll them, they will be taking Famous Men of Greece, Geography II, Second Form Latin, Literature D, and Classical Composition III: Chreia and Maxim. For Science, they will do the Book of Trees and possibly Biology. For Math, I am considering The Good and the Beautiful.
I had the same desires for Bible curriculum and found Positive Action and have really enjoyed it!
Masterbooks American History can be done in 2 years if you move a little faster than the schedule. We used this and read books from Bookshark/Sonlight.
I have also done Bookshark (only 1st year of American History) I really loved it but it was overwhelming for my daughter.
Yea I was thinking of ditching the teacher guide and going at a faster pace to get it done in 2 years if we went that route. I can see how bookshark could be overwhelming
I haven't used it personally, but there is a 2-year American history program called All American History from Bright Ideas Press. I considered it at one point, but ultimately we ended up with Masterbooks and SOTW for World History, and Notgrass/MFW/BFB for US history. I've used something different almost every year, but we're settling into Masterbooks and Notgrass primarily. I love a literature approach, but I'm just supplementing books with our current topics right now.
For Apologia science, a lot of people do Flying Creatures one semester and Swimming Creatures the next semester. Also, look into Berean Builders Science in the Beginning if you want a wide variety of topics in one year.
Last, Journey Homeschool Academy has video-based elementary science courses, which may come in handy for you if you've got a new little one coming next year! Congrats!
I love hearing what others are enjoying or planning on using. Thanks for sharing! I really struggled with finding a really good and fun history for my kids this year and I'm very happy with what we chose. We picked notgrass, the our star spangled history - i got it with the literature pack and I'm so glad I did. It's novels, not picture books but the stories have been so great my kids love them. Our star spangled history is recommended for grades 1 through 4 but it could easily go to 5th or 6th grade in my opinion. Especially if the older student does the writing prompts instead of the drawing option. It also has an end of unit project that's optional and those have been really great. Highly recommend it! I also struggle with Bible, but this year we have been doing the studies from not consumed and they've been wonderful. On Fridays we do a Bible story and correlating craft, kind of Sunday school style. It's been fun and engaging! I'm totally making that part up as I go
We are doing Americas Story this year. We finished Americas Story 1 before our halfway point in the year because my son enjoys the chapters so much, we often will read an entire chapter vs only reading until the Narration Break. So, keep in mind it MAY not be a three year curriculum for every child. I had ordered the 2nd and 3rd books and we will likely finish them before we begin our new year in August. Also, the first two in the series have an audiobook (and the 3rd is coming), since I know you have mentioned you don't love reading aloud a ton. I had purchased it when I lost my voice this winter, and the author is the narrator and the same as the podcast (which I highly highly recommend the podcast! Our whole family enjoys it.)
We used BF books Early American History last year and absolutely loved it.
Yes, originally when I was planning to use Americas story, I was going to do in 2 years, not 3 but we ultimately went with BFB. I didn’t realize they had an audiobook to go along. So although I don’t love chapter books, I actually don’t mind reading aloud at all (just something about chapter books lol)!
We used MB America's Story with historical fiction supplements for all 3 volumes. We absolutely loved it. I would definitely do it again.
Did you choose your own? Or select from resources like BFB or Sonlight?
We have only used Sonlight and Beautiful Feet Books since we started homeschooling a few years ago. My son loathed history when he was in Christian school, but found a love for history using literature based programs. However, I watch my grandsons 2 days a week (1 infant and 1 toddler) and it is a bit of a struggle some days that they are here. SL and BFB are not something I could execute with a little one full time. We will stick with literature based for now, though I do wonder if my daughter would do better with traditional, as she is more cut to the chase. My son loves Apologia Chemistry and Physics (6th grader) and says it’s his favorite science ever, but he does it mostly independently. He will move into Apologia General Science next year, and I’m still figuring out my daughter (they do separate science). This year we do daily Bible reading with discussion and application. We also add in Bible reference books to understand the historical context, the key people in the Bible reading, and geography. I plan to continue this next year. It has been amazing to watch my kids dive deeper into God’s Word.
I enjoyed this video and your thought process. You're blessed that you can use standard curriculum and not be concerned with special needs or artistic students. Your children sound very smart and academic. I hope your newborn will be an easy baby
We’re using EAH from Beautiful Feet Books and are having so much fun with it. You’ll love the books if you add them in
I’ve been eyeing that one for a few years ☺️
We really love the Masterbooks Gods Design science and the Bible from Christian Light Education. We used Notgrass OSS this year but I was torn between that and Americas Story. My kids are enjoying OSS though.
Thanks for sharing. We are undecided about which language arts for my 10 year old.
You’d probably get through two apologia books in an academic year. We have done them for 2 years, and it’s been really easy to do 2 a year. We use it for our 10 year old, he does it totally independently using the journal. My 7 year old will be doing Sonlight science A.
We’ve enjoyed Science Shepherd this year. We don’t use the workbook because it doesn’t align with how I teach, but the videos were a great springboard for further inquiry. Just enough hands on activities to get kids excited and not overwhelm me.
I’m considering using the Curiosity Show on RUclips in a similar manner next year
Science shepherd did look good too!
So excited for you!!! Congratulations!!! God bless you and your family!!
Thank you!!
Have you thought about starting a catechism with them? The truth and grace memory books are fantastic. I use the first level with all of my kids. Even though it is only meant for up to 4th grade, that catechism is extremely deep. Things like what is sin, what did Christ accomplish in the covenant of grace, what is a covenant, what does atonement mean, how were people saved before the coming of Christ. And those are only up to question 50 or so. There are many that go even further into doctrine and theology.
The Not Consumed Ministries studies are excellent! We are using Faithipedia this year and have really enjoyed it.
I think it's so important to go deeper with kids than the normal Bible stories. Life is hard now a days. We tell are kids not to lie, steal ETC but they need.know why. They need learn when little how to live a godly life. So many false teachings now a days!!!
I've decided to do learning History through living books this year too. We're doing Notgrass, Our Star-Spangled Story as a read a loud and adding in a couple videos on things that interest us more when we come across them. We'll see how it goes. I'm hoping it goes great because my plan is to do it altogether with my rising 1st, 3rd and 5th graders!
There are so many comments, so I don't know if it has been said, but Notgrass History has read aloud suggestions that you can add in for each section. That might be a way to bridge the want to do text book yet also do read alouds.
Yes, I have seen that! ☺️
@@thepracticalhomeschooler thought I would add - we just dropped the Book Shark History lol. My oldest expressed that she was becoming so confused with history, because we had to jump around so much. To be fair, we were using 3 different spines, plus the read aloud, plus the switching between poems and nursey rhymes - just for history alone. We decided to switch back to Not Grass Our Star Spangled Banner. Her and her younger sister are much happier.
Have you looked into Answers in Genesis? I really enjoy their homeschool Bible curriculum. It is based on bible stories but it’s heavy on theology, not just the retelling of bible stories. The entire curriculum breaks down the 7C’s of creation: creation, corruption, catastrophe, confusion, Christ, cross, consummation. I have a playlist where I talk about year 1 curriculum (they have 3 years available).
Here’s a flipthrough of year 1 teachers manual and one of the student workbooks. ruclips.net/video/dDi7sdFBp4g/видео.html
You're not alone, we have been going through the same thoughts. We did end up buying Abeka for our twins for 2nd grade, I binge-watched your 2nd grade reviews. Thank you so much! We made the decision to purchase all the subjects for Abeka but parent-led with the curriculum plans, not the academy as the videos are just too much for my younger children. I've been toying with the idea of purchasing/creating unit studies though to fill in the gaps for the electives. Additionally, I do have some plans for educational games from Timberdoodle, Historical pockets and also Dave Ramsey for Money (aka economics). It's the state studies I have a loss for as here in our state of California, we must have 1 class of it.
Beautiful Feet has a study on California. Not sure if it would fulfill the requirements you have.
I hope Abeka works well for you!! ☺️
Masterbooks God’s Design is great. The science lessons are short and easy. Worksheets are available in the teachers guide.
That’s what we use and love. Both of my kids really enjoy it.
My oldest is a 3rd grader now. From the time she was a preschooler through her 1st grade year, I was adamant that we would do a lit-based curriculum like BookShark or Build Your Library. I love the beautiful stacks of books, but I learned the hard way that while I love the idea of learning through "living books," neither my kids nor I actually love sitting through reading all those books. It is a heavy amount of reading that I don't know how other people's 4-5-6-year-olds sit through all of it. Maybe I'm not the only one. It took us 2 years just to get through the preschool level of Bookshark, so that was pre-K and kindergarten for us. Then I tried Build Your Library level K for her 1st grade year, and it was the same situation. We didn't like all the reading, we were skipping a lot of books. I finally accepted that this wasn't working for us. That's when I switched to a more traditional textbook/workbook style but with some Charlotte Mason elements. First Masterbooks for 2nd grade, then the Good and the Beautiful and Abeka for 3rd grade. We like those so much better now.
Sometimes it takes trying something for a while before you realize you love the idea of it more than the actual curriculum. Been there before! Glad you’ve found what’s working for you guys!
Notgrass History would be my recommendation because it’s text book and optional historical fiction.
I’ve had the same struggles as well. I have decision fatigue now because I have to decide rather quickly. I agree with apologia science, I choose to use the swimmers one this year after getting overwhelmed with all the Abeka stuff and my son particularly hated it, he wants Abeka back and I didn’t enjoy reading the same old as well. But I’m not set on anything even tho my kids say they enjoy Abeka science and history which I do too. I’ll have to find ways to possibly tweak them, it gets so much harder as they get older though.
I am also having a hard time deciding History this year, but having done Abeka history this whole year and it was all USA history, I'm kind of leaning towards Story of the World 1 Ancient history or a similar more Christian one called Mystery of History. I like that i can play a recording of the spine (and get a break from all our usual read alouds) and that the activity book is pretty much open and go, just need one for all kids and make copies. Great for visual learners, auditory learners, and kinesthetic. Was thinking of mixing in some Sunlight books as a fun addition. I know eventually we'll get back to regular US history either through Abeka or MB so that's what motivating me to step away from it for a bit! This is my history curriculum "brain dump" too 😂😂😂
Sometimes you need a break from the norm to switch things up a bit and then get back to it. I think there’s many benefits to that.
I def think you should go with MasterBooks for history mainly because it's open and go and you will need that with a new baby!!! Having a new baby and homeschooling was my biggest struggle. Don't even ask me how it went when he started walking!! 😬 My girl will be in 2nd grade next year and for social studies we have decided to go with My Story 2 from MasterBooks. It will be my first purchase from them but I am excited about it. We are also doing Notgrass 50 states and the Tuttle Twins History.
For Bible we started Apologia's Word in Motion which my 6 year old loves and it's going well. We will keep doing it next year.
For science we are doing Generation Genius videos which is so wonderful!!! And we recently came across A Reason For Science and we decided on that. We just started A Reason For Handwriting and we love it because it's biblically based so we are excited to start the science part! You do experiments and worksheets. We are also doing Abeka Health, safety and manners which I think you did and had a video on!
Math we will be doing RightStart Math which I'm beyond excited about along with Mathseeds workbooks that we have done since the beginning.
language Arts we are doing All About Spelling/Reading, Reading Eggs Workbook, Real-world writing from Evan Moor, A Reason for Handwriting, and Fix it Grammar. We also supplement with Versatiles books (which we loveeeee) and The Learning Pallet!!
We just decided on these things last week so I'm super excited!!!!! Now I just need a loan to buy it all!! 🤣 😆 😂
Yes, definitely need a loan for it 😂 but it’s the ONE thing I “splurge” on…I don’t mind spending money for their education (but still try to get things second hand when I can) ❤️
@@thepracticalhomeschooler yes exactly! And it's great when you can reuse things for the next child!!!
For Bible, we are really enjoying Apologia’s Word in Motion. This year we’ve been studying the Old Testament. Next year we will study the New Testament. I was looking for something deeper as well and have been very pleased with Word in Motion.
Same here! My kids have been loving the hand motions. We just started the second part of the OT book where they go through each book of the OT.
What age group is Word in Motion for? My son is 9…
I found this very sweet American History called CM Simple Studies America. It uses one spine of amazing stories and then it has suggested books for every age range and chapter and you pick what works for you. It's maybe less than $10. It's very light in its approach. You could easily do this and read an American history "textbook" with the corresponding chapters. I plan on doing this and using Abeka history.
Such a great deal! They have a lot of sweet resources on their website!
My son (4th grade) and I love Masterbooks Americas Story 1 and we paired it with book sharks America history lapbook…also since he is so into Americas beginning and the revolutionary war we are branching off now and are doing Gather round history mini unit “Rise to Independence”. We paused MB after chapter 11 but we will go back to Masterbooks after our mini-unit 🥰
We also really love TGATB science units and plan on doing them next year too along with some of Campfire Curriculums and Gather around units
I have been having the same struggles with history. We did TGTB last year and masterbooks this year. I didn’t fully dislike either of them but really want to see what TGTB releases this summer, I am hoping it fits the in-between I’m looking for. For science we have loved TGTB but we will also be doing at least one campfire curriculum unit next year and see how it goes. We have done their Thanksgiving and getting ready to start Valantines and my kids loved that their unit selections are more job/real world based.
TGTB isn’t releasing until spring of 2024 😕
@@thepracticalhomeschooler I just saw that, so bummed!!
What we do for our bible is out church gives us devotions for our kids weekly and it has Bible verses for the week along with a kids little magazine with a color page and story for everyday of the week. We use that for bible and the sections goes over the whole bible in a year and has study. For each age is different . We are seventh day Adventist so ours are called sabbath quartleys. My bible first is a place you can check out if interested.
Love it ❤️
I'm torn with history also! My kids are in 5th, 2nd/3rd-ish, and K right now. I started my oldest with MB America's story when she was in 3rd. Then I took a break and we did MB Passport to the US with my older 2 and this year I decided on Notgrass OSSS because the workbook was more age appropriate for my middle than MB. America's Story would have been too much for him. However, I think MB went into much more detail than Notgrass (of course their American history spans over 3 years while Notgrass is done in 1 yr). Now I'm looking into starting world history next year as we haven't done any of that yet. I'm torn between going back to MB and doing World's Story, Notgradd From Adam to Us, or now I've heard amazing things about Generations curriculum and their history. Their history is more based on continent rather than time period, so I'm having trouble deciding if I'm good with that or if I prefer a more traditional approach.
We are also enjoying TGATB science units this year, because my kids get to pick what they want to learn about and they're only around 12 lessons long so we can fit in several per year.
We are also enjoying Apologia's Word in Motion Old Testament this year. We plan on doing the New Testament next year and then I thought about going into the Who is God series after that, but I'm not completely sure. I might do the answers books from MB or Answers in Genesis.
We are in the same place for bible and history. I love the idea of story of the world, but a whole year on one time period makes my brain want to bleed. I don’t think I could do it. We’re pairing Notgrass with BFB and are giving it a go. We’ve done it in the past with OSSS and BFB. I like the text book (ish) version of Notgrass with the literature they pair and then adding in picture books and crafts for my youngers. Honestly my oldest (5th this year) always ends up joining. Next year we’ll do America the beautiful and pair it with BFB again or move up to the intermediate version.
I also always come back to Sonlight and the compromise I’ve found is buying the reader curriculum for the grade (it’s like $10) and then having them do the readers. It’s worked really well.
Our 4th was a baby this year and I had to really look at what curriculum I wanted to do with three others to teach and have reasonable expectations. I know I have to have reasonable expectations next year too, because our fourth is on a whole other level lol
“Makes my brain want to bleed” so relatable! 😆
I love the idea of OSSS but that on its own is a full curriculum and I’d want to pair all the extras with it and then to add that with BFF…I think might be too much for us. How did it go with baby 4 and doing all that? That’s my main, main thing I’m trying to keep in mind. Lack of sleep makes me want to do bare minimum
@@thepracticalhomeschooler it went really well, but I prepared myself in advance to know a few things.
1. It can go two years of needed considering the two books are divided halfway through AH and plenty of curriculums divide it up like that.
2. I can always read the actual text and have my oldest read a few of the read alouds as assigned readers, we can gwt audio books or skip some of the read alouds if that season is busier (our library has almost all of them to download for free).
3. Incorporating BFB can (and often did) look like my oldest reading the picture book from the same time period. My oldest loves to read to her siblings though so it wasn’t me putting too much on her. If that’s something your oldest would enjoy I’d consider that. It really solidified the overall picture for my oldest doing that.
4. We used the workbooks only as a discussion piece and sometimes just utilized the questions at the end of each lesson as talking points.
We enjoyed it so much that we’re wanting to do it again with leveling up in texts.
As a side note I think it got much easier after about half way through the first book.
I’ve been looking into Old Story New by the same author as The Ology. It’s a meant to be a 10 minute devotional but you also read scripture and discuss questions to dive deeper and pray together. They also have an Old Testament version. 😊
I am in the same boat with history…so many choices but I don’t LOVE any of them. I haven’t liked any Masterbooks curriculum I’ve ever tried so I’m hesitant to try their history. My children love book work and worksheets but also literature so maybe combining a bit of both would work??? Glad I’m not alone!!!
I honestly haven’t liked any of their stuff either (🫣🤦🏻♀️) except for More than Words. But I have read several chapters of Americas story and for me, it was really good. Felt more engaging than a regular textbook.
Let me throw an idea out of LAPBOOKS..Pinterest explains but it’s yellow folders,fold each side again, print out lapbook pieces and they can color them, write info on them…make the learning come Alive. We also did mystery of history in 6-8 , printed out people from pinterest(it’s on there type in mystery of history), bought poster board,drew the line and they colored the piece each day that coordinated with what they read.
Love that idea and love lapbooks, but unfortunately they’ve never been a huge success around here 🫣 🥴
Notgrass History is so so good. We dropped a lot of our LA because it’s got so much in it, and my kids are absolutely loving it!!
A lot of people love that one!
My daughter really does better with independent subjects. Things she does on her own completely. So we switched to Lifepac for Language Arts midyear and we’re probably going to continue on with other subjects for next year. If I have time and energy (with a newborn and toddler) we’ll incorporate some books and reading to go along with it. 🤷🏻♀️ But if I don’t, I know she’s still learning. ❤
For Bible study, I have a kindergarten and a third grader and we do a combination of Abeka's 3rd Grade Bible curriculum mixed with the fruits of the spirit. We have a fruits of the spirit road trip guide book that is hands on and really great. :) And Abeka does go much more in depth with their lessons. I'm not sure if you've tried these before since you are familiar with Abeka.
Master books has an elementary apologetics course that uses the Answers for Kids books. They also
have a new series with 2 levels called Where Faith Grows. The levels out now are geared towards younger kids though but it looks pretty good! They are planning to continue the series for older kids eventually.
We like traditional curriculum too. For History I’m planning to use BJU’s new Heritage Study “World Regions” & also use Beautiful Feet Around the World picture book selection to add to it.
That sounds like a good pairing for history!
I loved this video. I always struggle with picking science and history. I'll start something and then get bored or busy with other things and never follow through. I'm definitely going to look into more of smaller unit studies and see if that helps. 🤔
Great idea!
I have the same sort of dilemma with history. I don't want to do a 4-year cycle. I haven't covered world history with my 6th grader. We have done a few unit studies skimming different eras (which we have enjoyed) but I'm looking for a nonexistent 1-year program that is literature based. I like your idea of combining programs.
Sonlight has a combined 1 year world history course.
@@jocelyngrace2023 I will give it a look. :)
I’m thinking 2 years is minimum, unless you go with traditional textbook style.
We purchased the cat dog curriculum set for this year, and only did a few weeks before looking for something else. It just wasn't deep enough, for my 6th grader. We switched to apologia Who Is God? Book 1 and liked it better, but are struggling to decide if we should go to book 2 next year as well.
Yes my oldest was thinking the elementary one of cat and dog would be too young for her too. I definitely can see that it didn’t work across the ages for you guys.
I have outsourced Science and History this year with power homeschool. It's traditional and simple. It's $25 per month but you can get up to 7 subjects any level or subject. So technically I could get Science and History for all three of my children for $25 per month!
For the other subjects we do abeka K-2nd
Then my third grader is doing
Saxon 3 with Nichole the Math Lady
Growing with Grammar
Abeka reading
All about Spelling
That sounds awesome!
We’re giving Simply Charlotte Mason history, Bible, and geography (combined) a shot. I needed to simplify my life and get everybody together. I also love the idea of literature based, but not 590 books. SCM seems thorough, easy to implement, and not overwhelming. It is a cycle (which I don’t mind) but looking over it and comparing to other curricula I’ve used, it seems that you could easily jump into and out of the cycle as you need/want.
Checked it out! It looks good, as does their enrichment curriculum…it was giving me some more ideas to contemplate….which I’m not sure is a good thing or bad 🤣🤣🥴
@@thepracticalhomeschooler I think their enrichment stuff is the most popular of their offerings based on the RUclips videos floating around.
@@de5889 really? I only found one. I’ve been searching for them haha
@@thepracticalhomeschooler I guess it’s the algorithm for me then. I see them all the time! 🤷🏻♀️😆
Already started looking for next year too!
My 5th grader
LA - TGTB level 4 w/ Fix It Grammar
Math - TGTB level 5
History - Notgrass OSS
Science - Easy Peasy Intro to Chemistry
Reading - AAR Level 2
My 10th grader
LA - IEW
Math - Math Tutor DVD
History - Notgrass and use their literature for her English credit
Science - Shormann Dive
Electives - I don’t know yet
Love when you finally get it all (or mostly) figured out!
Tgtb history does different time periods. They also have it where you can get 4 read alouds to go along with it. We were doing apologia and I had to stop too much talk about birds. Were doing gods design life, it has plants, human body and animals. Next year we’re doing the energy one.
For math we’re considering switching to Saxon. Mine asked for black and white math. We might stay with tgtb l.a and fix it grammar. For history we’re doing generations and it includes church history as well. Bible were doing generations.
Yes, I’m so curious what the new TGTB history will look like…have to wait on that one though!
Biblioplan! It is history and bible at the same time. And it can cover all age groups. It's so inclusive with read alongs, videos, and can be used and paired with other history curriculums. We love it!
This looks great! The more subjects I can combine the better our homeschool is!!
I find we prefer bible studies but I’ve yet to use bible curriculum!!! I want something deeper as well!!! I mainly do it with a 11 year old, 12 year old twins and a 14 year old!!! My youngest daughter does more bible story’s at the moment but she’s 5!!! I struggle with history as we did story of the world and my older daughter came to me and said she hated it and we started using sonlight!!! Our local history curriculums are textbook based!!! We are doing a gather round unit study with my older son and daughter as it’s history they need to know but my sister in law is taking a break from sonlight while we do this. The other boys are taking a break from history!!! We’ve done a lot of different science!!! We love the unit study approach and my daughter does more than a term on one subject in her pre medical class!!! We love TGTB and easy peasy!!! We love their projects!!!
We loved beautiful feet books for history this year! We are currently using the ology for Bible and journaling what we read. I don’t love it so we are looking for something else for next year. and science!! I’m so lost haha! I could do animal and plants all day. Count me out for you earth science or chemistry/machines/etc. I’m like you..I don’t want to spend a whole year on birds lol I’m considering science shepherd: introductory and then adding in books/YT/documentaries/etc as my girls are interested. I haven’t heard much on this science curriculum though! I like that it’s short and sweet and to the point. I can check it off and dive deeper *if* we want. my girls will be 1st & 3rd graders next year! 😊
Wanted to add- about beautiful feet books. I know it seems daunting bc of all the chapter books. But it isn’t. They break it up to just a few pages a day, and it can be done as a 2 year curriculum instead of one.
Science shepherd does look good, but yes, I haven’t heard much about it either
Have you looked into or tried answers in genesis bible curriculum
BJU Bible Truths curriculum looks amazing! I’m stuck between Notgrass and BJU heritage studies 4
I’ve been trying to figure this one out as well. This years plan was biblioplan, the third year, so we could cover American and world history at the same time. I have all the stuff but it didn’t work out. We were on the mission field for the start of the year and then we lived in Michigan with my mother in law (which we did almost no school) then we moved after that again, abd we are moving again. 😬😬
Anyway that being said I really wanted to love biblioplan! However it wasn’t really my favorite. We only did 2 weeks worth of work. I already had story of the world volume 3 so I’ve simply been reading from that, abd because of the moving, it’s working well with how behind we are. I feel the same way about bible curriculum. We used the apologia one and it wasn’t really new information. I have no idea what to use. For me it’s the hardest one to decide on. This year I’m using the answers for kids books from answers in genesis. It’s ok. It’s not my favorite either. There was a weird question/answer about the ice age that used a scripture completely out of context.
For reference next year I’ll have an 8th grader, 2 6th graders, a 3rd grader, a first grader, a 4 year old so I guess pre k? And a 2 year old!!
So for history I’m actually almost thinking about doing almost what you are thinking about. I saw the American history with picture books and that looks really good! (For the first and third), then possibly the worlds story for the older ones. I’ve tried sonlight and it was just too much reading. I used 2 cores too. The independent readers for my oldest had some things in them that were inappropriate as well and I was disappointed with that. We tried sonlight science because we had used apologia and felt the same you did about doing only one science subject all year. No idea what I’ll use this year. We are doing apologia because I wanted to do space but I may take a look at the good and the beautiful now that they have re done the units. It helps that you’ve done them! Would you still recommend doing a separate science for a first grader?
Also do you recommend around the world with picture books or early American?
I think it depends on the first grader. I had two separate sciences this year for my 5th and 1st grader but she always wants to participate in her older sisters lessons. And she actually gets what’s going on and retains it. I’d say with 7 children, eliminate what’s not necessary. I don’t think you’d need a whole science for your first grader. But if you want to do something special or just have that one on one time, TGTB has a science for littler kids and it takes us 5-10minutes for a lesson. And there are only 30 lessons. We love it!
I haven’t used early American but it looks great. We love around the world with picture books!
They both look so good I can’t decide! Maybe I’ll have to see what my first/third grader think 😊
It will be interesting to see what you are changing for math and LA. This is our first year using the good and the beautiful and I love that LA has so much stuff that I wouldn’t have thought to add in.
We are really loving Science Shepherd Science because the kids can do it independently. And I’m looking into adding some good and beautiful science at my own pace just for fun. :)
We’re also loving Beautiful Feet Early American History this year! Currently reading Pilgrim stories and it’s so good! I’m learning as much as the kids are. 😂
Language arts and Math on the other hand…I can’t decide!! We’ve been using TGTB but looking to switch to CLE possibly. I can’t decide and my son is almost done with his current Language Arts! So much pressure to choose the right one. 😅 It will all work out!
Yes it will all work out! ❤️
I'll be excited to see what you decide in the end😄 That cat and dog Bible study looks hilarious! I haven't heard of that one🤣
It actually incorporates like missions stories from around the world, and focuses on godly behavior vs. selfish behavior. I really think it looks good 😄
@@thepracticalhomeschooler Sounds fun!😃
I love this video. I am also currently in that search/decisions making phase of what to choose for next year. I’m glad to know I’m not alone lol
Totally not alone!
I’m looking at More than Words for bible next year. I’m trying to make it less of a “class” and more of time with God
I feel the same way about Apologia Science. We do it at Co op. And I want to like it...but it just doesn't work for us.
We tried Biblioplan for History this year and I think I will either go back to Sonlight next year or try Beautiful Feet.
I’m new to homeschooling and looking at all three of those you mentioned for history. Leaning towards Sonlight and Beautiful Feet books. Curious what you didn’t like about Biblioplan?
@@allisonsmith7360 The main book is textbook style. And while I think the information is good....it's just very dry. I went to a conference and sat in on a session the author led. She said that you need to make history engaging. I just have a hard time making it engaging. Lol, it probably is me but I find it hard to take the book information and engage the kids vs just reading it to them.
It may also depend on the ages of kids. I have a 5 year age gap and I tried Biblioplan for the family style. My oldest (12 years old, 7th grade) likes it and retains the information. My twins (7 years old 2nd grade) have retained zero things. Whereas they still remember some facts from Sonlight history that we did last year.
Hope that helps a little bit.
@@sherrybolosan7066 That is very helpful! Thank you for the response. Sonlight definitely looks appealing especially with all the books. That’s great to hear it’s been a good fit for your family.
Maybe checking out good and beautiful history it’s 4 cycles but each cycle goes from ancient to modern so you aren’t stuck in one period the whole year. And has literature options. I believe their new one will be out before next school year.
Also notgrass was a good combo of traditional but great stories each unit and really good literature books. Plus the homeschool history subscription goes along with them so well for activities and rabbit holes.
Mystery of history is one I’d like to check out personally as well
We've been liking TGATB history too! It's nice to not be stuck in the same area for too long, and we love the tie in to the Bible.
@@maggiehermanson6298 have you heard about new release date. Every update they do seems to be better than original so I’m trying to hold out. We haven’t used it yet as we’ve been using notgrass and torn for next year what I want tomdo
@@terrim2448 I heard 2024 at one point, so I scooped up the original ones last year. My youngest is 2 so I'll happily buy the updated ones when they come out :). I've heard great things about notgrass too though!
So funny…I had a section in this video talking about how I wanted to try TGTB history (the new one when it comes out) and that even though it’s 4 years, I liked that it went from ancient to modern with each year. But the video was getting too long 🥴 but yes, can’t wait to see what it looks like!
@@terrim2448 I just checked the site the other day and it’s set for spring 2024 for the first volume.
As we've worked through this first semester and winter break, I've really been able to pinpoint what is NOT working for us in History. Textbooks are just not drawing my kiddos in (3rd, 2nd, Kinder/1st). HOWEVER, anytime the oldest and I read a historical fiction story out loud from his Reading curriculum reader. Every single one of the kids is able to share facts and interesting things with their Dad later that day. They NEVER mention anything we studied in our textbook lesson. So it seems literature really engages my kiddos and they retain A LOT. So, I started looking around and found Heart of Dakota.
I've watched as many videos as I can find and I found a very reasonably priced used teacher's guide for the level I want to do and we're just gonna jump in right now, midyear. I'm not buying the whole curriculum. I'm not spending hundreds on book packs and notebooking journals. I'm just getting the spine and the book list, then hitting the library. We'll see how it goes. If we like it, if it's feasible, and makes sense for us, then next year (when my Curriculum coffers are refilled by the Principal 😉) I can look at getting in deeper and investing in book packs and whatnot.
We've started gathering some of the books on their list and the kids are ALREADY excited to start reading them so I'm hopeful we might hit our stride with history finally. What I liked most about HOD is that they encourage you to piece together a package that best suits you. So if you don't want an all in one box curriculum, then you can customize it pretty easily. And if you really prefer every subject being taken care of by one publisher than you can totally do that with HOD too and make it completely open and go.
I figure, if we really fall in love with the curriculum over the next couple months, I can begin to drop pieces of our current curriculum and still use Heart of Dakota fully without overwhelming everyone.
That’s a great idea!
This video is my brain...lol! I am with you on NOT doing one topic for the WHOLE year. I actually break up History and Science by semesters, History during Fall semester and Science during winter. This has helped to keep it exciting. Next year, not sure what curriculum but I do have our topics... History-Ancient Times, Science-Physical Science and Bible-Not Consumed.
My daughter at school is doing this. She just finished science for the year and has recently started history. I think it’s a great idea!
I would suggest Masterbooks Science
Hi! I’m completely new to the homeschool world, just dipping my toes with my preschoolers. But I wanted to know your thoughts - for something like History, what are some pros and cons of using a typical [public school] textbook, instead of using a traditional homeschool curriculum? Thanks!
A lot of people find textbooks dry and boring and find that the material is more engaging and memorable/better retention when using literature based programs. But in reality, what will stick is what the child is actually interested in (whether textbook or other styles).
I wanted to do Who Am I? Next year, but with finances the way they are, I decided not next year…
I purchased the book on eBay for around $15 and then we didn’t do the student journals…we just discuss what we read
We tried to love Sonlight. My kids hated it. We switched to ACE last year and they are doing so much better and enjoying it. I still read aloud great literature, but at our pace and our choices.
Same we have done it for two years and it’s a lot of reading and my kids and I find most of the stories boring. I haven’t heard of ACE will look into it
Next year will be my first year having 5 children I'll be schooling ranging from 9th grade down to Kindergarten and I'm struggling with planning. Who do group together, morning time that is interesting to everyone....it's consuming me haha
I can totally imagine the thought process behind 5 kids, and it’s definitely a lot! You got this though!
What would you recommend a starter bible study? I have a 4 year old and 7 year old.
Either children’s Bibles or More than Words from masterbooks!
Have you heard of Bible road trip?
Question! I’m intrigued by the textbook type science/history. How do you do this with multiple kids? Do they do it separate or together? I don’t want to have to read grade 6 AND grade 3. I’ve been doing gather round unit studies since we started in 2020 and I can’t do separate teaching, I like all together. Can that work with textbook-type subjects? Thanks!
When we did it, I chose the grade in between. I had a 3rd grader and a 1st grader, so I chose 2nd grade and it was right for both of them. For you, depending on how much they love science/how much info they can retain, I’d say grade 4 or 5 would work. It obviously wouldn’t work well if you had like an 8th grader and 1st grader, but if they’re fairly close in age, then you can make it work
@@thepracticalhomeschooler thank you! 🙂👌🏻
I had a baby in my daughters first grade year and now coming at the end of third grade! Keep your curriculum simple during the baby toddler years. 😊You can always beef things up later on.
I’m glad I’m not the only one that can’t do a year on one Science topic. Ugh. No thank you.
I’ve homeschooled with a toddler but never a baby 🫣 I’ve heard it can be harder with a toddler since they’re into everything, but I also assume it would depend on the baby/toddler. Either way, it’s definitely at the forefront of my brain haha
@@thepracticalhomeschooler The sleep deprivation can be worse with the baby depending on the personality but in my opinion toddlers are way way harder when it comes to school 😂😂😂😂
Cat and Dog theology made me laugh. Not what I was expecting! 😅❤️
When I saw it I was like “what in the world is this?!” Bahaha
We also love bju online for a few subjects for more independent textbook learner. We also do sonlight for science and history and readers. So we do half textbook half literature based!
What subjects do you do w bju online? How have you used sonlight science ? Everyday? Thanks!
@@brittneydisesa2186 yes have currently changed aomethings bc my son was getting jealous of my daughter doing school with me. Now he is doing bju math,reading,english,spelling,handwriting. We do science, history,bible, literature with sonlight and i love it!! My daughter is also doing the bju english...and then random other things. I feel like bju is solid and colorful and not too much. And the sonlight is AMAZING! I havent tried their LA just because I wanted more work for my kids 🤷♀️
@@brittneydisesa2186 yes we do sonlight science everyday. We dont do all the experiments..we are doing mostly animals now with magnets mixed it. I do not like experiments or crafty things, so mostly they watch videos about it and then occasionally we will do one.
😂 my daughter would love the cat and dog one! 😂😂😂
🥴🤣
I know looked through it but My Father's World is pretty good. Nothing is perfect. And no, you don't HAVE to start with countries and cultures. The lessons aren't super long. The last 2 in the family learning cycle combine World history with US history. Having said that, I'm still deciding and making myself nuts.
I’ve looked into MFW but didn’t love their science or their Bible, so that knocks out a lot of the curriculum unfortunately 😕
@The Practical Homeschooler I hear you. I don't really like Apologia science and whenever I look into bible curriculum, 1. I want it to be good and sound 2. I don't want my children to end up hating God. I feel I've looked at all the curriculum and I don't feel great about any of them. Just FYI, my bachelor's is in history and my masters degree is in theology. I feel overwhelmed and underwhelmed at the same time. I'm curious as to what you will choose.
@@jocelyngrace2023 o cool! I know what you mean about overwhelmed and underwhelmed (not that I have a bachelors in those fields), lol.
But I know what you mean about their relationship with God….it’s definitely scary but ultimately, it’s our job to show them what and why we believe, but it’s up to them to decide for themselves what they will choose. It’s hard to realize and accept it, and like I said, I TOTALLY know how you feel about that!
@The Practical Homeschooler So, I think I have decided on curriculum for next year. Notgrass for history, Berean builders for science for my oldest, TGTB science units for my younger two. Bible will be bible stories, memorization, missionary and hero stories, as well as some church history figures and hymn study.