Making homeschool decisions easy
For years we did not use a handwriting program. Miss 18 learned cursive from Richard Scarry’s big picture books and the handwritten examples I made up for her in a little scribbler. She was enthusiastic and learned quickly. My son, on the other hand, was not enthusiastic. He even had trouble printing. When I tried to teach him cursive using my own examples, I soon concluded
Here’s one book no homeschooling family should miss: A Pioneer Story: The Daily Life of a Canadian Family in 1840. It combines heartwarming stories of a busy pioneer family with the background information and hands-on activities of a unit study. Truly, it is a winning combination. Beautifully illustrated, this story of the Robertsons fills our hearts and minds with the life of a pioneer family
Homeschooling parents used to send their teens to school, feeling they couldn’t provide quality high school science instruction at home. That hasn’t been necessary since Dr. Jay L. Wile wrote and revised his Apologia high school texts. These excellent, Creation-based courses are clear enough to be essentially self-teaching, even though they cover difficult material. In fact, as a scientist, I am impressed by the breadth
Our family uses the Bible itself as our main Bible curriculum. Every few years, however, we pull out the Illustrated Family Bible. With its stunning, historically accurate illustrations and informative side panels, it always gives us a fresh view of all those familiar stories. Currently we are going through this Bible for the third or fourth time as a family. (We’ve had it for almost
In grade 7, after years of low-key, informal French, our children start French is Fun 1. This inexpensive textbook from AMSCO works well for us, helping the children consolidate all their earlier knowledge and extending it dramatically. French is Fun, Book 1: Lively Lessons for Beginners, Third Edition by Gail Stein and Heywood Wald brings beginners to a reasonable level of proficiency. Students learn listening,
We have many, many Dover coloring books, and they have changed the life of at least one of our children. Miss 12 spends hours carefully coloring fashions of the past. She has learned so much history simply from studying the pictures and reading the captions. In fact, when she looks at paintings she can date them accurately, just by what the people are wearing! She’s
My kids can easily locate many countries, cities, and landforms on the map. Part of this is because we like atlases and we look places up when we read about them. The main reason, however, is that we like to play Seterra. Seterra is an addicting and highly educational geography program. What’s more, it is free. Here is how it works. You open the program
When I was a child, my younger sisters studied grammar differently than I did. They learned something mysterious called ‘diagramming’ and had very interesting textbooks. Many years later a friend of mine was selling some books, and in the pile I found Rod and Staff grammar texts. Exactly what my sisters had studied! Of course I bought them. We were ready for a formal grammar
