I wrote about you for my assignment on the positive effects of homeschooling over mainstream schools. My lecturer loved it and said that she got hooked on your videos.
As a retired first grade teacher, I completely agree with your way of teaching the k thru 2 kids. Making it a priority to do Reading Writing and Arithmetic is best. They pick up the rest easily later. With allowing them to participate if they want to, is great. I don't see how you manage toddlers and a baby while homeschooling though. You are amazing.
We LOVE master books! My girls were struggling with the good and the beautiful and they are now THRIVING with Masterbooks for math, and English and history. Next year we are trying science and their Bible study. My oldest daughter did teaching textbook but got bored with her, she is great at math but it was to much repeating for her. She loves the Stories in masterbooks
could you do a video on how much time you actually spend on homeschooling every week/month/starting out? like how much time your kids spend working alone, how much time you spend teaching vs prepping? It just seems like an overwhelming amount of work!
TGTB language arts has been great for us. We've been using it for three years now, and it's worked so well. My kids writing skills are blossoming. A lot of good stuff there! :)
We're using The Tuttle Twins books in our homeschool concerning the Constitution and law in general, even my 5 year old is getting something from it. It's definitely a priority for us, especially right now!
Esperanza Rising and A Long Walk to Water were such great books! I thoroughly enjoyed them myself! Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry and the following 3 books in that series are AMAZING!
Did you see that the author released a new book about the Logan family this year? It's called All the Days Past, All the Days to Come. It follows the family from World War II through the Civil Rights Movement.
This is my first year homeschooling and I immediately felt drawn to Charlotte mason and unschooling because we have a farm and do so much life lesson teaching anyway. So when I saw masterbooks I felt in love!! My son will be 2nd grade and I went ahead and got the whole curriculum. I’m so excited to see how it goes. I was drawn most to it for how Christ centered it was and the story approach. This was very helpful and I am curious about teaching textbooks in the future. Thanks again!! :)
I loved the video you did a while ago about how you beefed up topics. I think it was the human body one. And you shared lots of Usborne books that helped etc. Would love more of those types of videos. My kiddo devours books.
We really enjoy doing read alouds and audiobooks together. I love what Sarah says about it creating inside jokes and family memories. Those are some great books. We are reading Daughter of the Mountains and Esparanza Rising next year- can't wait!
I’ve heard you comment on how you teach history a couple different times but it’s very vague. I am assuming that you are referencing trying to teach history in an ethical an accurate way… I want a video on it! It’s really hard to find homeschooling resources for history that take into consideration all of the oppression and injustice that has happened through history.
I LOVE TO READ!! And having a daughter that hated reading absolutely threw me for a loop. I never read aloud to her or purchased books on tape, which,looking back, may have helped her tremendously !!
We switched to Gather Round Homeschool this year, and it completely changed our homeschool. They are Charolette Mason inspired unit studies. It covers everything but math.
I highly recommend Build Your Library to anyone who loves reading aloud and wants something that includes a bit of everything. People do adjust the work for their kids ages when teaching multiple kids at once too, there are helpful FB groups for it where they talk about how to do that. We tried The Good and The Beautiful LA/History but had to skip so many history lessons in it and my kid hated the LA while I liked it. BYL has been amazing and has such great literature included.
Well, I've got loads of experience as a homeschool mom of 13 years and I was homeschooled for 8 years myself. So, here's what we use. Math U See for math, Mystery of History (more classical education than Charlotte Mason, but close, lots of read alouds and hands on activities and different levels within the lessons, takes 4 years to chronologically go through history), very "unschooling" and hands on and eclectic/unit study approach for science until high school, where we are using Jay Wile's series. Abeka Lanugage Arts to start off with reading and spelling etc until 4th grade, and then Institute of Excellence in Writing has grammar and a unique way of teaching writing. We do read alouds with our history program, and I"m the same way. It took me a while to really enjoy the read alouds and see the benefits, but I love it now. Yeah for Read Aloud Revival! She's awesome! I have heard of Masterbooks, Teaching Textbooks, and the Good and the Beautiful, all excellent curriculums. I would urge watchers/listeners, like you, to not be a slave to the curriculum. Make it your own, especially in K-8. High school is a different animal sort of speak, and needs to be a bit more standardized if you are to have a transcript that colleges will accept. Standard subjects that can be handled in different ways of course according to the student. I was very, very pleasantly surprised that I agreed with everything you said homeschooling wise. That's a bit uncommon for me. I haven't really looked at the curriculum you use, but your approach to homeschooling is so solid. I've learned so much from listening to how others homeschool, so I know your words are going to help a ton of people. Don't forget, and I know that you do, that you can show more UA-cam videos for the water unit and such while we can go on our beloved field trips (my kids hate field trips now because I've taken them on so many! lol! I just love learning how everything works!) For example, the Museum of the Bible in Washington. D.C. had a series on Instagram about the "Lonely Curator." So many museums are doing online virtual tours. You can do 360 tours online of Mount Vernon (although, you probably don't live that far from there). I can't wait to see how you talk about testing, too. Our state here in Indiana doesn't require it, but when I grew up, my state of NH did. It's not a big deal as most think it is. We don't do them in our homeschool because I just don't feel they are helpful to us. Anyway, I'll save the rest of those comments for the next video. Great job, Angela! Keep it up!
We truly enjoyed our read aloud this year too. “A Long walk to water water” was amazing. My girls loved it. We Did Apologia Astronomy this year and got the lab kit/box and it was the best.
Hi Angela! Thanks for sharing. One thing we’ve loved this year is Masterbooks Elementary Zoology. It was fun and we learned a ton. A lot of learning is read aloud based. Such a great way to dive into history and science, especially!
This video brought a different perspective. With all that's been going on in regards to distance learning I was able to figure out my son's learning style. He will be 7 years old in July and he, like many other kids that age, still learn through play. The fact that you mentioned that at that young age they need the basics made me even more confident in starting the homeschool journey. Watching your video was like the final peace of the puzzle for me. Thank you!
Your view on not requiring your younger kiddos to join in on the group subjects made me feel so much better. I was struggling this spring with getting my 5 year old to pay attention/retain information that was just over his head. This fall I will give him more grace and let him make the decision to join in or not.
I'm so glad you talked about what age/grade you do history. I've been stressed about starting history or not. My oldest is 7.5 and has high functioning autism. Just getting language arts and math done is hard enough (we use TGTB). I feel better about waiting to do history. Science right now has been playing outside, books about animals and nature, and UA-cam videos of what he's interested in.
I am very excited about all the material you will offer us. I look forward to seeing the next videos! It's great that new parents/homeschoolers have someone to rely on. Thank you!
We loved, loved, loved The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place series and The Wingfeather Saga this year. We listened to them on audiobook and they were incredible.
I was homeschooled growing up and we loved the Exploring Creation science books from Apologia, the author is really great, especially for people like me who aren't super into science
Growing up we used Bob Jones curriculum (great for elementary school) and a few Abeka. BJ can get challenging in high school, especially math and science, but their LA and history textbooks were amazing.
I don’t remember learning it at all 😳😳😳. That’s why we chose to homeschool my daughter from here on out. And our first curriculum is American history and the preamble is in the first week. I AM SO EXCITED!!!!!!
Check out School House Rock (search you tube) they have the preamble in song. It has always stuck with me from learning it to music! (I also always easily remembered what a "conjunction" was from SHR! 😄)
Would love to hear more! We are starting our homeschooling journey next year with a 4th grader, 2nd grader and pre-K kid. Unlike most newbies, we are not doing it because of pandemic, but because of a move and new location. Can’t wait to watch more of your homeschooling videos.
Homeschooling was something myself and my husband researched before my daughter was school aged and we both feel in love with the idea, but as I am the stay at home parent, of course, I would be responsible for teaching her. I chickened out. The pandemic definitely lit a fire under me. I just ordered everything for her curriculum yesterday and I’m super excited. I got a few things for my younger son as well to get him ready to start doing pre-k work once he’s 4.
I very recently found your channel and binged all your declutter videos. You are so fun to watch! I also have a 5yr old starting kindergarten in the fall and a 3yr old (almost 4) who is starting PreK. I am considering home school as an option so I have been watching your videos on all of that too. Thank you for so much information! God bless you and your family.
I really like teaching cursive first. I've been an educator for 12 years, teaching mostly K-2. Cursive writing with phonics instruction has been the fastest way to get dyslexic kids writing too.
Did cursive only and phonics with all of mine, it worked wonderfully. I think more important than the question of cursive first is the question, is the child ready to read and write in the first place? Once a child is ready, cursive comes naturally.
Apologias exploring creation with biology and exploring creation with physical science are so wonderful! The workbooks by Vicki Dincher are a life saver!!
Apologia science is AMAZING. We’ve tried a lot of science curriculum and it’s the best we’ve found. I get the lab kit from Home Science Tools and it has literally every single thing you need. The curriculum has tons of hands on. I HATE hands on anything and even I enjoy, well maybe not enjoy but can actually tolerate, this curriculum. Having all the supplies really helps. I will not go buy random stuff for science experiments. I hate them so I am not hunting down random items for them. So the kit is well worth it, the labs are excellent in showing exactly what they’re learning in the book, and it’s written in an engaging way. My 10 year old loves it. She never wants to use a different science curriculum (and she makes sure to remind me of this weekly ha). My non hands on liking 8 year old even enjoys participating.
I'd love for you to do a video on homeschooling Rosie and how it differs/is the same for your other kids. We're considering homeschooling next year but I have a daughter with neurological differences and I worry about her missing her IEP supports...
Gather Round' is a great family curriculum where it allows you to just dive deeper into subjects that the kids want to. We have had so much fun with it this year!
I was starting to loose my love for TGTB LA, and my kids too. But the updated versions of levels K-3 are SO much better. They like it more and I definitely do. I have thought master books looks good too tho.
Yesss!! We loved Daughter of the Mountains as well. Been putting off Esperanza so you just pushed me over the edge to order. And thanks, never heard of A Long Walk to Water!! ❤️❤️
I grew up overseas and we learned cursive first. In fact, we never "learned" print writing, it just kind of comes naturally. We were allowed to pick which one we used in 5th grade. I switched to print.
I love the good and the beautiful history as a launch pad. And I could fill in with different books and activities. Because it's so affordable, there is enough wiggle room to get fun things to add in.
Loved this! I just stumbled upon Woke Homeschooling’s American History. It’s called Oh! Freedom. Because I love TGTB and have similar issues to yours, I’m planning to add in this curriculum as a supplement to our history. Rumor has it from the creator, she’s developing a World History as well.
We read a lot of missionaries stories this year and it was so so good. George Muller, Nate saint, Cameron Townsend, Amy Carmichael, Gladys Albright ( I’m sure I misspelled one of those names 🧐) All from my fathers world curriculum
My daughter is 12. Technically she would be going into 8th. Some is high school level. Others is upper elementary/ junior high. History- Notgrass World History Science- the Beautiful Feet, history of science. My daughter is enjoying learning about the different scientists and their discoveries and inventions. Bible- we will be learning about world religions. I am pulling together my own for that. For Math- Life of Fred and adding Right Brained Math fractions. Grammar- Abeka God's Gift of Language C Spelling-Structures in Spelling Cursive- Handwriting without tears We too school year round.
Thank you so much for this!! This year was a trial year for my four year old to see if I wanted to homeschooling for kindergarten instead of public school and it was a great success thanks to your recommendation of the good and the Beautiful in a passed video. I'm eager to look up apologia and master books now! 🙏🙏 thank you! You are truly an inspiration🙌 I don't know how you do it with eight kids and UA-cam I have three (under 5)and I'm struggling with UA-cam 😩🤣 God Bless!!
We love Teaching Textbooks too. So, I'm always just trying to figure out what to do until then. We have used Master Books in the past and it was a good fit.
We just finished Water and our World as well. Our field trip was videos I found online and then doing experiments outside with the hose. Field trips can be so helpful in beefing up their science. Great book by the way!
Loved this friend! We are doing a bible curriculum for the first time this coming year too. Also, just received apologia health for my oldest for next year and it’s pretty awesome if you can get past the “textbook”. I think you’d like it!
We do the same thing with math! master books from k to 2 and then teaching textbooks 3+ My Favorite this year was the Imagination station book series from focus on the family that we used as read alouds, my kids love them!
We used Abeka for LA for my first grader and blended in some TGTB. At the end of the year I decided I could’ve done without TGTB, they just don’t have a strong enough writing or spelling portion that would make me want to stick with it for my daughter when she’s old enough. TGTB is just such a new curriculum and they need to develop it some more before I think we could use it as an “all in one” program.” Abeka has such a strong phonics program and I LOVE their readers. We’ll continue using their readers for second grade but will do LLFALE as a core book instead. For math we used Abeka also did some TGTB and used it as a “living math” add on. Next year I’m using Teaching Textbooks for my second grader since he is advanced in math. For Science, we used God’s design for life beginners and really LOVED it, we didn’t finish the book so we’ll continue with that. For social studies I used BJU Press and Evan Moor Geography. Next year we’ll be using My Story 1 from Masterbooks.
My kids love apologia science. We can use it as a one room school house approach and you don't have to start at any particular level. I just sit and read it to them and we watch videos on what we read or do coloring pages. Or do a project. My kids loved just me reading it to them so I chose to do that again this year instead of each kid doing their own science based on their level.
I remember you saying you were doing a social justice looping basket this year. I think maybe you called it something else. I would *love* to hear about that! How do you deal with white washing in history curriculum? That's something I'm particularly concerned with.
We did Masterbooks for my 4th grader as well. My 1st grader did a lot here and there and that is my fault because I couldn’t find something that fit me and him. He ended up liking and thriving in CLE (Christian Light Education) Math and Language arts! In our homeschool we do Math, language arts, and Bible up until 3rd grade where I add in Science and Social Studies/History.
We have both AiG God’s Design and Apologia Young Explorers. In the YE books we love the extremely interesting presentation of the material. They could be read for hours without getting bored. There’s in depth and well thought out information. I found for myself though that it didn’t break down well into a reasonable daily block. Some of the books also felt like it was almost overkill to try to only do that all year. (I might try again later by treating each chapter as a mini 2-3 week unit study). The AiG books are better for us at being discrete chunks and enough variety for interest to be held over weeks. I use them as the spine of our unit study and then pursue further interest within the YE.
i highly recommend reading "A Long Way Gone" since you guys like "A Long Walk To Water" with your oldest daughter in about a year or two. I say that due to how graphic it can be at times but that book is amazing, such a good read.
Agreed! I had the pleasure of meeting the author of A Long Way Gone at a journalism conference at Columbia about 12 years ago and his story has left such an impression on me. Very good book and incredible story.
Beast Academy is great it's grade 2-5 but depending on where your kids are you can adjust (those who struggle with math might want to go down a level) Each quarter comes with 2 books, the guide and the practice. The guide is comic book style and teaches how to do the math and then the practice book is where the students actually try the math.
My kids have absolutely loved the God's Design Science! We did a few others but that was their favorite. Since we school year-round also and are dealing with a lot of unknowns with our daughter (she's a competitive dancer and our seasons are now overlapping), we opted to go with A Reason For Science this coming year. Its more open and go and they have the science kits. I do like that the Apologia Science has the audio cds so the kids can be listening to the lesson while I prep anything that may need to be used for that lesson. I would recommend the Astronomy!!! For Handwriting, we've been curious about TGATB but currently we use A Reason For. My daughter really wants to start cursive and her manuscript is not the greatest so we've opted for cursive as her actual handwriting curriculum but anything that requires copy work, she has to do in manuscript so she's working on both. We love read aloud time!!! Right now we're reading Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims and they are absolutely loving it! We got the whole set gifted to us from the publishers during the lockdown giveaway. I'm definitely going to check out the ones you guys loved!!
Thank you for this! We are in our first year and using Horizons curriculum and while I love it, it’s a bit redundant. I want to try another curriculum next year. The Good and the Beautiful sounds interesting.
My children didn’t love TGTB LA either. I found in level 3 the lessons were quite intense and it was hard to do 3 different levels with my kids. In the fall we will be going back and forth between using Gather Round Homeschool units and then Brave Writer. During our Brave Writer months we have a variety of science and other things that we can do along with it. As for math we tried MLFLE for my grade 1 and 2 children this year and we just found it too easy and my kids finished it so fast. I’m not 100% what we will use for them next year. My oldest son uses Beast Academy and we really love it. It’s challenging and makes them think in a different way.
Check out Berean Builders, too - The creator previously wrote for Apologia but it’s geared toward elementary! Short lessons, a fun and easy experiment everyday and it’s biblical based.
I found a new curriculum that’s been amazing for our family. Is called Gather round homeschooling. Its a combination of unit studies approach and minimalism (so you can either do the lessons as is or use it as a spine and dig deeper). And the best thing about it you can do it with all your children of all levels (pre-reading to high school) you should check it out to see if you’re kids would like it. I like what you share ! You’ve inspired many of the things I’m doing or planning to do with my children . Thanks
Apoligia bible has been in My cart for months- glad to hear you like it. We are also diving Into TGATB handwriting and since the Marine unit is a free print right now we are giving it a try too! Our “core” subjects we are trying BJU press for the first time if you have any experience to share with them!
Real science 4 kids Focus On series is fantastic and I find it necessary as a prerequisite for the apologia curriculums for middle school science. The RS4K is much more digestible and then they can really get into the apologia, it really preps them well
We loved Berean Builders and Apologia for science, Beautiful Feet Books did an amazing job for history, and a Bravewriter knocked it out of the park for LA and writing this year. Teaching textbooks and Life of Fred are long time favorites too.
Love your eclectic home school stye. Looking into home schooling my kids and think I will be different in my stye not one for boxed curriculum. Already have my kids listening to audio books they help on car rides. Thanks
Thank you so much! Great to get insight into curriculums as there are so many out there. Its difficult to know where to begin. God bless u all xxxxxxxxxx
I would love to know what resources, books, lessons you used to talk to your kids about the Bill of Rights/ Constitution. In my search for a curriculum I found that most of it was designed for high schoolers. I want something for my kids that are 4th and 5th grade.
I’ve always used apologia for all my kiddos- it’s definitely wordy, so the kids will have a lot of reading, but I LOVE apologia! I love that they start lab sheets at an early age, and learning to really use the scientific method before they enter highschool. Our co-op started using Gods Design last year for elementary grades and it’s ok- I’m not in love with it- I would’ve rather just stuck with apologia!
Oh my goodness A Long Walk to Water was such a tough but good book! Actually all 3 of your picks we have read and loved! We actually did A Long Walk to Water as an audiobook and they had different readers for the different "characters" and we loved that! We did Sonlight's eastern hemisphere this year and it was eye opening learning right along side of my 7th grader! I am still deciding my plan for next year!
I wrote about you for my assignment on the positive effects of homeschooling over mainstream schools. My lecturer loved it and said that she got hooked on your videos.
As a retired first grade teacher, I completely agree with your way of teaching the k thru 2 kids. Making it a priority to do Reading Writing and Arithmetic is best. They pick up the rest easily later. With allowing them to participate if they want to, is great. I don't see how you manage toddlers and a baby while homeschooling though. You are amazing.
This is the kind of content I most like seeing on your channel!!
I just joined the channel in September, so I hadn't seen many of her homeschool videos yet, so I was excited to see this one!
We LOVE master books! My girls were struggling with the good and the beautiful and they are now THRIVING with Masterbooks for math, and English and history. Next year we are trying science and their Bible study. My oldest daughter did teaching textbook but got bored with her, she is great at math but it was to much repeating for her. She loves the Stories in masterbooks
could you do a video on how much time you actually spend on homeschooling every week/month/starting out? like how much time your kids spend working alone, how much time you spend teaching vs prepping? It just seems like an overwhelming amount of work!
Curriculum development is my favorite part of homeschooling too. We use the Easy Peasy All-in-One curriculum as our base. Love it! 😊
TGTB language arts has been great for us. We've been using it for three years now, and it's worked so well. My kids writing skills are blossoming. A lot of good stuff there! :)
Yes, reading, writing, arithmetic. I'm with you on that! Eclectic homeschooler here too!
We have loved Math-u-see this year for my daughter's "kindergarten" year. She's a visual learner and it works well for both of us!
That’s amazing! Aww!!
We're using The Tuttle Twins books in our homeschool concerning the Constitution and law in general, even my 5 year old is getting something from it. It's definitely a priority for us, especially right now!
Just got ours yesterday. Can't wait to dig into them and to see where they lead us
Esperanza Rising and A Long Walk to Water were such great books! I thoroughly enjoyed them myself! Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry and the following 3 books in that series are AMAZING!
We just finished roll of thunder hear my cry. We went on to Let the circle be unbroken, and it's even better and we've only made it to chapter 3!
Did you see that the author released a new book about the Logan family this year? It's called All the Days Past, All the Days to Come. It follows the family from World War II through the Civil Rights Movement.
“Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry” is solidly one of my favorite ever books. I can’t wait until my oldest is ready to read it,
This is my first year homeschooling and I immediately felt drawn to Charlotte mason and unschooling because we have a farm and do so much life lesson teaching anyway. So when I saw masterbooks I felt in love!! My son will be 2nd grade and I went ahead and got the whole curriculum. I’m so excited to see how it goes. I was drawn most to it for how Christ centered it was and the story approach. This was very helpful and I am curious about teaching textbooks in the future. Thanks again!! :)
I loved the video you did a while ago about how you beefed up topics. I think it was the human body one. And you shared lots of Usborne books that helped etc. Would love more of those types of videos. My kiddo devours books.
We really enjoy doing read alouds and audiobooks together. I love what Sarah says about it creating inside jokes and family memories. Those are some great books. We are reading Daughter of the Mountains and Esparanza Rising next year- can't wait!
I’ve heard you comment on how you teach history a couple different times but it’s very vague. I am assuming that you are referencing trying to teach history in an ethical an accurate way… I want a video on it! It’s really hard to find homeschooling resources for history that take into consideration all of the oppression and injustice that has happened through history.
I second this! I am very curious as to what your opinions are!
I LOVE TO READ!! And having a daughter that hated reading absolutely threw me for a loop. I never read aloud to her or purchased books on tape, which,looking back, may have helped her tremendously !!
We switched to Gather Round Homeschool this year, and it completely changed our homeschool. They are Charolette Mason inspired unit studies. It covers everything but math.
Was wondering if Angela has seen Gather 'Round. Seems like it would work well for her family with multiple ages etc.?
We are going to try one of their units over summer and I am SO excited!!!!
Agreed, gather round is AMAZING and has restored joy to our homeschool 😍
I highly recommend Build Your Library to anyone who loves reading aloud and wants something that includes a bit of everything. People do adjust the work for their kids ages when teaching multiple kids at once too, there are helpful FB groups for it where they talk about how to do that. We tried The Good and The Beautiful LA/History but had to skip so many history lessons in it and my kid hated the LA while I liked it. BYL has been amazing and has such great literature included.
Notgrass History! We used Our Star-Spangled Story this year and loved it!
Well, I've got loads of experience as a homeschool mom of 13 years and I was homeschooled for 8 years myself. So, here's what we use. Math U See for math, Mystery of History (more classical education than Charlotte Mason, but close, lots of read alouds and hands on activities and different levels within the lessons, takes 4 years to chronologically go through history), very "unschooling" and hands on and eclectic/unit study approach for science until high school, where we are using Jay Wile's series. Abeka Lanugage Arts to start off with reading and spelling etc until 4th grade, and then Institute of Excellence in Writing has grammar and a unique way of teaching writing. We do read alouds with our history program, and I"m the same way. It took me a while to really enjoy the read alouds and see the benefits, but I love it now. Yeah for Read Aloud Revival! She's awesome! I have heard of Masterbooks, Teaching Textbooks, and the Good and the Beautiful, all excellent curriculums. I would urge watchers/listeners, like you, to not be a slave to the curriculum. Make it your own, especially in K-8. High school is a different animal sort of speak, and needs to be a bit more standardized if you are to have a transcript that colleges will accept. Standard subjects that can be handled in different ways of course according to the student. I was very, very pleasantly surprised that I agreed with everything you said homeschooling wise. That's a bit uncommon for me. I haven't really looked at the curriculum you use, but your approach to homeschooling is so solid. I've learned so much from listening to how others homeschool, so I know your words are going to help a ton of people. Don't forget, and I know that you do, that you can show more UA-cam videos for the water unit and such while we can go on our beloved field trips (my kids hate field trips now because I've taken them on so many! lol! I just love learning how everything works!) For example, the Museum of the Bible in Washington. D.C. had a series on Instagram about the "Lonely Curator." So many museums are doing online virtual tours. You can do 360 tours online of Mount Vernon (although, you probably don't live that far from there). I can't wait to see how you talk about testing, too. Our state here in Indiana doesn't require it, but when I grew up, my state of NH did. It's not a big deal as most think it is. We don't do them in our homeschool because I just don't feel they are helpful to us. Anyway, I'll save the rest of those comments for the next video. Great job, Angela! Keep it up!
We truly enjoyed our read aloud this year too.
“A Long walk to water water” was amazing. My girls loved it. We Did Apologia Astronomy this year and got the lab kit/box and it was the best.
Hi Angela! Thanks for sharing. One thing we’ve loved this year is Masterbooks Elementary Zoology. It was fun and we learned a ton. A lot of learning is read aloud based. Such a great way to dive into history and science, especially!
Sonlight does a great job with a lot of read-aloud
This video brought a different perspective. With all that's been going on in regards to distance learning I was able to figure out my son's learning style. He will be 7 years old in July and he, like many other kids that age, still learn through play. The fact that you mentioned that at that young age they need the basics made me even more confident in starting the homeschool journey. Watching your video was like the final peace of the puzzle for me. Thank you!
We use Abeka. We just finished our 3rd year of homeschool. I love it!
Your view on not requiring your younger kiddos to join in on the group subjects made me feel so much better. I was struggling this spring with getting my 5 year old to pay attention/retain information that was just over his head. This fall I will give him more grace and let him make the decision to join in or not.
I'm so glad you talked about what age/grade you do history. I've been stressed about starting history or not. My oldest is 7.5 and has high functioning autism. Just getting language arts and math done is hard enough (we use TGTB). I feel better about waiting to do history. Science right now has been playing outside, books about animals and nature, and UA-cam videos of what he's interested in.
I am very excited about all the material you will offer us. I look forward to seeing the next videos! It's great that new parents/homeschoolers have someone to rely on. Thank you!
We loved, loved, loved The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place series and The Wingfeather Saga this year. We listened to them on audiobook and they were incredible.
I'm reading the Incorribles now. And my kids are in college. It is fantastic!!
We're using Master Books this year with my first grader. We are both so excited about it!
I love masterbooks
We are as well and for first grade ☺️ I’m excited to see how my son responds to the curriculum.
I HIGHLY recommend Build Your Library
for a history curriculum that is accurate and not whitewashed.
I was homeschooled growing up and we loved the Exploring Creation science books from Apologia, the author is really great, especially for people like me who aren't super into science
Growing up we used Bob Jones curriculum (great for elementary school) and a few Abeka. BJ can get challenging in high school, especially math and science, but their LA and history textbooks were amazing.
I memorized the Preamble to the Constitution in 3rd grade and I’m a college freshman now! It really sticks with you
I don’t remember learning it at all 😳😳😳. That’s why we chose to homeschool my daughter from here on out. And our first curriculum is American history and the preamble is in the first week. I AM SO EXCITED!!!!!!
Check out School House Rock (search you tube) they have the preamble in song. It has always stuck with me from learning it to music! (I also always easily remembered what a "conjunction" was from SHR! 😄)
I’m 36. Learned it in 7th grade and I can still repeat it. Lol.
I love how eclectic your curriculum is. Our's is too. I just can't find a "one stop shop" for everything.
Would love to hear more! We are starting our homeschooling journey next year with a 4th grader, 2nd grader and pre-K kid. Unlike most newbies, we are not doing it because of pandemic, but because of a move and new location. Can’t wait to watch more of your homeschooling videos.
Homeschooling was something myself and my husband researched before my daughter was school aged and we both feel in love with the idea, but as I am the stay at home parent, of course, I would be responsible for teaching her. I chickened out. The pandemic definitely lit a fire under me. I just ordered everything for her curriculum yesterday and I’m super excited. I got a few things for my younger son as well to get him ready to start doing pre-k work once he’s 4.
I very recently found your channel and binged all your declutter videos. You are so fun to watch! I also have a 5yr old starting kindergarten in the fall and a 3yr old (almost 4) who is starting PreK. I am considering home school as an option so I have been watching your videos on all of that too. Thank you for so much information! God bless you and your family.
The rhythm of handwriting from the Logic of English has a very interesting philosophy on doing cursive first. Worth looking into 👍
I really like teaching cursive first. I've been an educator for 12 years, teaching mostly K-2. Cursive writing with phonics instruction has been the fastest way to get dyslexic kids writing too.
I wish I could homeschool! Maybe if we move back to the US someday but I’m not sure with work and all.
We do this! Its a must for littles with dyslexia, i have a 9 year old with dyslexia and a 4 year old showing some serious signs.
I used Logic Of English with my son this year and it’s been wonderful!
Did cursive only and phonics with all of mine, it worked wonderfully. I think more important than the question of cursive first is the question, is the child ready to read and write in the first place? Once a child is ready, cursive comes naturally.
Apologias exploring creation with biology and exploring creation with physical science are so wonderful! The workbooks by Vicki Dincher are a life saver!!
Apologia science is AMAZING. We’ve tried a lot of science curriculum and it’s the best we’ve found. I get the lab kit from Home Science Tools and it has literally every single thing you need. The curriculum has tons of hands on. I HATE hands on anything and even I enjoy, well maybe not enjoy but can actually tolerate, this curriculum. Having all the supplies really helps. I will not go buy random stuff for science experiments. I hate them so I am not hunting down random items for them. So the kit is well worth it, the labs are excellent in showing exactly what they’re learning in the book, and it’s written in an engaging way. My 10 year old loves it. She never wants to use a different science curriculum (and she makes sure to remind me of this weekly ha). My non hands on liking 8 year old even enjoys participating.
I'd love for you to do a video on homeschooling Rosie and how it differs/is the same for your other kids. We're considering homeschooling next year but I have a daughter with neurological differences and I worry about her missing her IEP supports...
Gather Round' is a great family curriculum where it allows you to just dive deeper into subjects that the kids want to. We have had so much fun with it this year!
I was starting to loose my love for TGTB LA, and my kids too. But the updated versions of levels K-3 are SO much better. They like it more and I definitely do. I have thought master books looks good too tho.
Yesss!! We loved Daughter of the Mountains as well. Been putting off Esperanza so you just pushed me over the edge to order. And thanks, never heard of A Long Walk to Water!! ❤️❤️
I grew up overseas and we learned cursive first. In fact, we never "learned" print writing, it just kind of comes naturally. We were allowed to pick which one we used in 5th grade. I switched to print.
I love the good and the beautiful history as a launch pad. And I could fill in with different books and activities. Because it's so affordable, there is enough wiggle room to get fun things to add in.
Loved this! I just stumbled upon Woke Homeschooling’s American History. It’s called Oh! Freedom. Because I love TGTB and have similar issues to yours, I’m planning to add in this curriculum as a supplement to our history. Rumor has it from the creator, she’s developing a World History as well.
We read a lot of missionaries stories this year and it was so so good. George Muller, Nate saint, Cameron Townsend, Amy Carmichael, Gladys Albright ( I’m sure I misspelled one of those names 🧐) All from my fathers world curriculum
My daughter is 12. Technically she would be going into 8th. Some is high school level. Others is upper elementary/ junior high.
History- Notgrass World History
Science- the Beautiful Feet, history of science. My daughter is enjoying learning about the different scientists and their discoveries and inventions.
Bible- we will be learning about world religions. I am pulling together my own for that.
For Math- Life of Fred and adding Right Brained Math fractions.
Grammar- Abeka God's Gift of Language C
Spelling-Structures in Spelling
Cursive- Handwriting without tears
We too school year round.
Nice!
The Good and Beautiful are updating a lot of their Curriculum.
I love your videos so much and can not wait to see your end of the year testing video! Would love to see your approach to preschool. ❤
I can't wait for your upcoming homeschool videos! 😍😍😍 We use Teaching Textbooks as well and LOVE it!
I loved hearing about your favorite books. I would LOVE to hear more of these!
Thank you so much for this!! This year was a trial year for my four year old to see if I wanted to homeschooling for kindergarten instead of public school and it was a great success thanks to your recommendation of the good and the Beautiful in a passed video.
I'm eager to look up apologia and master books now! 🙏🙏 thank you! You are truly an inspiration🙌 I don't know how you do it with eight kids and UA-cam I have three (under 5)and I'm struggling with UA-cam 😩🤣 God Bless!!
We love Teaching Textbooks too. So, I'm always just trying to figure out what to do until then. We have used Master Books in the past and it was a good fit.
Always love to watch your homeschool videos. Wonderful insight. Have a happy day 😊
One of our favorite read alouds this year was Nory Ryan's Song. In fact, we loved it SO much, we got all 3 books to see how it ends.
We are loving the beautiful and natural and whole family elements of the Hearth Magic Literature guides on Etsy!
Love your channel. Thanks for providing great content for other homeschool moms. I appreciate you sharing your journey with us!
We just finished Water and our World as well. Our field trip was videos I found online and then doing experiments outside with the hose. Field trips can be so helpful in beefing up their science. Great book by the way!
We loved Apologia. My son is now a senior in college majoring in a biology related field. It helped us all to enjoy science.
Loved this friend! We are doing a bible curriculum for the first time this coming year too. Also, just received apologia health for my oldest for next year and it’s pretty awesome if you can get past the “textbook”. I think you’d like it!
This mama loves audiobooks for myself!!! This is my first time watching your content and I got some helpful information, thank you!
We do the same thing with math! master books from k to 2 and then teaching textbooks 3+ My Favorite this year was the Imagination station book series from focus on the family that we used as read alouds, my kids love them!
We used Abeka for LA for my first grader and blended in some TGTB. At the end of the year I decided I could’ve done without TGTB, they just don’t have a strong enough writing or spelling portion that would make me want to stick with it for my daughter when she’s old enough. TGTB is just such a new curriculum and they need to develop it some more before I think we could use it as an “all in one” program.” Abeka has such a strong phonics program and I LOVE their readers. We’ll continue using their readers for second grade but will do LLFALE as a core book instead. For math we used Abeka also did some TGTB and used it as a “living math” add on. Next year I’m using Teaching Textbooks for my second grader since he is advanced in math. For Science, we used God’s design for life beginners and really LOVED it, we didn’t finish the book so we’ll continue with that. For social studies I used BJU Press and Evan Moor Geography. Next year we’ll be using My Story 1 from Masterbooks.
My kids love apologia science. We can use it as a one room school house approach and you don't have to start at any particular level. I just sit and read it to them and we watch videos on what we read or do coloring pages. Or do a project. My kids loved just me reading it to them so I chose to do that again this year instead of each kid doing their own science based on their level.
I remember you saying you were doing a social justice looping basket this year. I think maybe you called it something else. I would *love* to hear about that!
How do you deal with white washing in history curriculum? That's something I'm particularly concerned with.
Also interested in this issue!
We need a video!!!
Yes! I want to hear this too
I am also interested in how you did this loop!
Yes I’m looking so hard for different resources to over come this problem!
We did Masterbooks for my 4th grader as well. My 1st grader did a lot here and there and that is my fault because I couldn’t find something that fit me and him. He ended up liking and thriving in CLE (Christian Light Education) Math and Language arts! In our homeschool we do Math, language arts, and Bible up until 3rd grade where I add in Science and Social Studies/History.
Just starting out and am so very thankful for all the information you shared. Thank you!
We have both AiG God’s Design and Apologia Young Explorers.
In the YE books we love the extremely interesting presentation of the material. They could be read for hours without getting bored. There’s in depth and well thought out information. I found for myself though that it didn’t break down well into a reasonable daily block. Some of the books also felt like it was almost overkill to try to only do that all year. (I might try again later by treating each chapter as a mini 2-3 week unit study). The AiG books are better for us at being discrete chunks and enough variety for interest to be held over weeks. I use them as the spine of our unit study and then pursue further interest within the YE.
What are YE books?
i highly recommend reading "A Long Way Gone" since you guys like "A Long Walk To Water" with your oldest daughter in about a year or two. I say that due to how graphic it can be at times but that book is amazing, such a good read.
Agreed! I had the pleasure of meeting the author of A Long Way Gone at a journalism conference at Columbia about 12 years ago and his story has left such an impression on me. Very good book and incredible story.
Beast Academy is great it's grade 2-5 but depending on where your kids are you can adjust (those who struggle with math might want to go down a level) Each quarter comes with 2 books, the guide and the practice. The guide is comic book style and teaches how to do the math and then the practice book is where the students actually try the math.
My kids have absolutely loved the God's Design Science! We did a few others but that was their favorite. Since we school year-round also and are dealing with a lot of unknowns with our daughter (she's a competitive dancer and our seasons are now overlapping), we opted to go with A Reason For Science this coming year. Its more open and go and they have the science kits. I do like that the Apologia Science has the audio cds so the kids can be listening to the lesson while I prep anything that may need to be used for that lesson. I would recommend the Astronomy!!! For Handwriting, we've been curious about TGATB but currently we use A Reason For. My daughter really wants to start cursive and her manuscript is not the greatest so we've opted for cursive as her actual handwriting curriculum but anything that requires copy work, she has to do in manuscript so she's working on both. We love read aloud time!!! Right now we're reading Rush Revere and the Brave Pilgrims and they are absolutely loving it! We got the whole set gifted to us from the publishers during the lockdown giveaway. I'm definitely going to check out the ones you guys loved!!
God's Design units are great... Informative, focused, quick lessons! :)
Another huge fan of Gather Round homeschool. We are actually using it as a science and geography units then future units will be humanities as well.
My boys and I are reading these books this year! So glad to hear they will be good!
I'm not sure when you actually filmed this, but FYI The Homeschool Room has reopened a few weeks ago 😊
I love your channel so much! You have been a real inspiration for me starting my own channel. 💗👍
The marine biology was my kids FAVORITE!!!! The Thinking Tree Funschool has been a success this year
I just ordered my kids curriculum last night. Excited for next year already.
I can’t wait to start either lol
Thank you for this! We are in our first year and using Horizons curriculum and while I love it, it’s a bit redundant. I want to try another curriculum next year. The Good and the Beautiful sounds interesting.
Sonlight HBL F has a lot of great books you would probably like.
My children didn’t love TGTB LA either. I found in level 3 the lessons were quite intense and it was hard to do 3 different levels with my kids. In the fall we will be going back and forth between using Gather Round Homeschool units and then Brave Writer. During our Brave Writer months we have a variety of science and other things that we can do along with it. As for math we tried MLFLE for my grade 1 and 2 children this year and we just found it too easy and my kids finished it so fast. I’m not 100% what we will use for them next year. My oldest son uses Beast Academy and we really love it. It’s challenging and makes them think in a different way.
Check out Berean Builders, too - The creator previously wrote for Apologia but it’s geared toward elementary! Short lessons, a fun and easy experiment everyday and it’s biblical based.
we are going to give TGTB history a try this year :) looks fun!
I really focused on read a louds this year too. Thx for sharing your faves! Adding them to my list.
I found a new curriculum that’s been amazing for our family. Is called Gather round homeschooling. Its a combination of unit studies approach and minimalism (so you can either do the lessons as is or use it as a spine and dig deeper). And the best thing about it you can do it with all your children of all levels (pre-reading to high school) you should check it out to see if you’re kids would like it. I like what you share ! You’ve inspired many of the things I’m doing or planning to do with my children . Thanks
Apoligia bible has been in My cart for months- glad to hear you like it. We are also diving Into TGATB handwriting and since the Marine unit is a free print right now we are giving it a try too! Our “core” subjects we are trying BJU press for the first time if you have any experience to share with them!
Real science 4 kids Focus On series is fantastic and I find it necessary as a prerequisite for the apologia curriculums for middle school science. The RS4K is much more digestible and then they can really get into the apologia, it really preps them well
Love watching your homeschooling videos, hope to see lots more!!!
I’m buying your book today!! Can’t wait to dig in!!!
❤️
We loved Berean Builders and Apologia for science, Beautiful Feet Books did an amazing job for history, and a Bravewriter knocked it out of the park for LA and writing this year. Teaching textbooks and Life of Fred are long time favorites too.
Love your eclectic home school stye. Looking into home schooling my kids and think I will be different in my stye not one for boxed curriculum. Already have my kids listening to audio books they help on car rides. Thanks
Thank you so much!
Great to get insight into curriculums as there are so many out there. Its difficult to know where to begin.
God bless u all xxxxxxxxxx
Thank you so much for sharing! I've read 2 of your read aloud books and YES, they are great books!! Esperanza Rising and A Long Walk to Water
My son LOVES marine animals right now. I've learnt so much 😁
I would love to know what resources, books, lessons you used to talk to your kids about the Bill of Rights/ Constitution. In my search for a curriculum I found that most of it was designed for high schoolers. I want something for my kids that are 4th and 5th grade.
We are loving Sonlight and Masterbooks.
Masterbooks (science) Life for Beginners- My girls love it!
I’ve always used apologia for all my kiddos- it’s definitely wordy, so the kids will have a lot of reading, but I LOVE apologia! I love that they start lab sheets at an early age, and learning to really use the scientific method before they enter highschool. Our co-op started using Gods Design last year for elementary grades and it’s ok- I’m not in love with it- I would’ve rather just stuck with apologia!
Oh my goodness A Long Walk to Water was such a tough but good book! Actually all 3 of your picks we have read and loved! We actually did A Long Walk to Water as an audiobook and they had different readers for the different "characters" and we loved that! We did Sonlight's eastern hemisphere this year and it was eye opening learning right along side of my 7th grader! I am still deciding my plan for next year!