So, I FINALLY got to record my curriculum choices! YAY! I know that so many of you were waiting on this so I am excited to get that out to you. Without further ado here are my final choices:
Group Studies:
- Mystery of History, Volume 1
- Homeschool in the Woods (aka History Through the Ages) timeline figures
- Wondermaps
- Real Science for Kids: Chemistry and Physics
- Memory Work
- Family Read Alouds:
- The Golden Goblet
- A Cry from Egypt
- The Children’s Homer
- Archimedes and the Door of Science
- The Ides of April
- The Bronze Bow
- The Greatest Salesman in the World
- The Best Christmas Pageant Ever
- D’Aulaires’ Book of Greek Myths
- Egyptology
- Castles, Pyramids and Palaces
- Coloring Book of Ancient Greece
- We will also be continuing to work through Training Hearts and Teaching Minds which is a book that teaches the Shorter Catechisms with daily lessons and focuses on one question a week.
To see a rundown of this curriculum and a detailed list of his readers you can watch my YouTube video HERE.
7th Grader:
- Teaching Textbooks, 7
- Daily math drills online at www.Zetamac.com
- Rod and Staff English, 6
- Ancient History-Based Writing Lessons
- Spelling Workout, F
- Typing Instructor Pro
- Bi-weekly copy work in cursive and print
- Mapping of every country in the world (2-3 times)
- Foreign Language: French
To see a rundown of this curriculum and a detailed list of his readers you can watch my YouTube video HERE.
5th Grader:
- Teaching Textbooks, 5
- Daily math drills online at www.Zetamac.com
- Rod and Staff English, 6
- Ancient History-Based Writing Lessons
- Spelling Workout, F
- Typing Instructor Pro
- Bi-weekly copy work in cursive and print
- Mapping of every country in the world (2-3 times)
- Foreign Language: French
To see a rundown of this curriculum and a detailed list of his readers you can watch my YouTube video HERE.
3rd Grader:
- Teaching Textbooks, 3
- Daily math drills online at www.Zetamac.com
- Rod and Staff English, 2
- Spelling Workout, B
- Typing Instructor Pro
- Bi-weekly copy work in print
To see a rundown of this curriculum and a detailed list of his readers you can watch my YouTube video HERE.
2nd Grader:
- Math U See, Beta
- Rod and Staff English, 2
- Spelling Workout, B
- Bi-weekly copy work in print
To see a rundown of this curriculum and a detailed list of his readers you can watch my YouTube video HERE.
Kindergartner:
- Math U See, Primer
- A Reason for Handwriting, K
- Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons
- Hooked on Phonics, grades K-2
- McGuffey’s First and Second Eclectic Readers
- Explode the Code books as needed
To see a rundown of this curriculum and a detailed list of his readers you can watch my YouTube video HERE.
Do you do different memory work each year?
We memorize some things yearly (James 1, Luke 1, US Presidents, etc) and add new stuff as well. A mix of things we have memorized before and other things that go along with curriculum.
Hi Nicci — thanks for sharing your curriculum choices! If I may be so bold, can I ask what your curriculum budget is each year? I have 4 kids total (8, 6, 4 and 1) and wondering how much to start planning for once they are all in school. Thanks!
I have a video that details exactly what I spent:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUKUGmq7ipk
I spent $1000 this year with 5 kids school age but I had a couple of large (one time) purchases. Normally it is between 500-600. Also I purchase all our readers when I could just check them out from the library. I spend the extra money so that I don’t have to rely on making the 20-30 minute drive to our library and then finding the books with babies and toddlers on my hip… For me the ease of having them handy is worth the $200-300 extra each year. You could essentially homeschool for free if you wanted to it just depends on how much time you have and are willing to spend finding stuff, printing stuff and organizing it.
Is there any way to email you?
afarmhousefull(at)gmail(dot)com
Hi Nicci! Enjoy your posts! I was just wondering about how you use Hooked on Phonics. In your video, I saw you had a couple of books for each grade level, but on their website it’s a whole kit of stuff. Do you use the whole kit? Or is there a way to use it without purchasing the whole kit? Thanks so much!
I utilize most of the kit. The DVD’s are the only non-essential part. Sometimes we use the DVDs, sometimes we don’t.
It is my very first year of doing history and we chose “Story of the World’ as well. I did get the audio CD’s so we could listen to them and then do the workbook with it + the additional reading. I am teaching my youngest sister who is 11 but is doing 4th grade due to development stuff, my daughter is almost 8 and my son is almost 7 and then I have a 3 and 2 year old. I saw your reading list on Youtube and did find a few more books but really had to stop buying stuff. So in your opinion, oh wise one ;), I have G. A. Henty’s Cat of Bubastes, Mara, Daughter of the Nile, Cleopatra, King Tut and his Mummy, The Trojan War (early reader), Pompeii, and I think another one that I am drawing a blank– oh African Myths and Legends and Bulfinche’s Greek Mythology– do I have enough here for this? Is there one or two that would be really good to add?
Hey Nicci! I came to your blog to print off the Bible memory verse cards but the link is dead. We’re starting my oldest in kindergarten this year, and I think we’re going to work on memory verses and Bible stories this year instead of something more formal. Is there anywhere else I can find the cards? Thanks so much!
Sorry, it was down for a few minutes because I was repairing the US/GEO/Grammar ones (See the most current post!) They should be working now, thanks for your patience!
Hey Nicci!!! I love your blog and YouTube videos, up I wanted to give you a heads up that Washington’s capitol is Olympia. Seattle is such a well known city that most people make this mistake. Other than that we are definitely using these flash cards when we head out on our family vacation.
AHHH..I copied and pasted most of them… I didn’t notice that one! I’ll change it!!!
Thank you so much!!!! We love these cards!!
Hi, just curious how you use the memory flashcards. Do you make 1 set for each kid or do they share? We are going to incorporate them this year, just not sure how to make it work.
JUST AND FYI…. There has been a correction made on the US/Geo/Grammar set…. Washington State’s Capital is OLYMPIA NOT SEATTLE!!!
I use them with all of the kids and we go over memory work together at the beginning of the school day.
(Tried to post this once, not sure if it came through)
Yay! I am one of the people waiting on this post! The way that God has lead your family to homeschool your children is very similar to the way we feel lead – lots of reading, lots of loving, some worksheets in between 🙂 I know you love historical fiction – if you haven’t already, you should check out the “Dear America” series. Love those. Looking forward to more homeschool posts as the year goes on! Happy almost school year!
Abby
Hi – yay! I’m one of the ones who was waiting on this post 🙂 I LOVE hearing what other people use, and the way God has lead you to homeschool your children is similar to our homeschool “methods”. I know you love historical fiction, so if you haven’t already, you should check out the “Dear America” series for your girls! Can’t wait to see more homeschool posts as the year goes on!
Abby
Love to see what/how others do things! Thanks so much for sharing! I just did my homeschool curriculum picks for the year too: http://www.catherine0611.blogspot.com/2015/08/back-to-school-back-to-school.html
Hey Nicci, so if you just had a Kindergartner would you be doing all of the together stuff right now too? Just wondering what to do about history/science when your oldest is in K? 🙂 Thanks so much! I was looking at Sonlight but there are so many things I want to try like Math-U-See and Mystery of History that aren’t in there. 🙁 OH yeah wanted to ask what you guys did for Science last year and why you switched this year? And why switch from Math-U-See to Teaching Textbooks from 2nd to 3rd grade? Thanks so much for all your help!
If I had only a Kindergartener I would focus on reading, math, and handwriting. I would check out lots of awesome books from the library about parts of history, cultures and science that interests your child but I would definately NOT do anything formal. Just read A TON to them and get them reading well and start an early math concept book and get them forming letters correctly. In my experience (both personally and through homeschool friends) the easiest way to burn out both yourself and your child is to push too much too early. At that age just let them bask in the wonder of the world and let them ask you all kinds of questions. Answer the ones you know and when you don’t know the answers learn them together with your child. I would keep if very interest based and you can’t really plan or schedule that. Schedule trips to the library and any free community classes to spark your child’s curiosity about all different things.
The switch from MUS to TT had to do with the instant feedback if they got a problem wrong (instead of practicing it wrong over and over before I graded their work at the end of the day) and also because of the automated grading. Both reasons help me and the kids out tremendously.
We used God’s Design for Science through Answers in Genesis and really loved the Life and Heavens and Earth sets but really didn’t like the heat and energy book in the Physical World set (it just didn’t do a great job of explaining things IMO) so we switched because we still wanted to do Chemistry and Physics. Not sure how I will like it but we are trying out this new one this year.
Hey Nicci is it a smooth flew from MUS Beta to TT3?
I think it was. There was a lot of review, but I thought the transition from one program to a different one was as smooth as it could be.
I know I am not Nicci, but I would REALLY recommend Ruth Beechick’s book- The Three R’s and that book focuses on Reading, wRiting, and aRithmatic–kind of like Nicci was talking about.
Hi, Nicci! I noticed you use a lot of curricula that are popular with people who homeschool with the classical method. Just curious if that is the route you prefer and are planning on continuing? It is the method I’ve been the most interested in for our kids – especially learning history chronologically and using a timeline. Wish I’d have been taught that way…I’d probably have a much better grasp on history. Thanks!
I tend to gravitate toward a classical approach. We use a lot of whole books, discussion, debate, etc. We also do chronological history, memorization and we really focus on the 3 R’s. I wouldn’t say we are totally classical though because I don’t stick to it to a tee. We don’t do Latin and have NO desire to. The kids have picked their own Foreign Language (French).
As for whether we will continue that path – as long as it continues to work well for us. I try mailable to where the Lord leads us so I don’t label myself and follow anything other than the Holy Spirit and what works for us at the time if that makes any sense.