Curriculum Options

Choosing a curriculum can be an overwhelming task. It can feel impossible to find a quality program that fits with your family’s values, keeps your child’s attention, and also works with your schedule and availability. Some programs require constant parental involvement, while others work towards student independence. In this post, we will cover some of the more popular curriculum programs available today. Some of them are all-in-one programs, covering all major subjects. Other programs cover a few core areas and allow you to choose the math or language program that completes your teachings. It would be an impossible task to cover all areas of study in a single post, so we will return to add articles featuring curriculum options in specific subject areas at a later time. As a reminder, Revolutionary Learning is a secular group, therefore we are far more knowledgeable about those available materials, however we will do our best to cover options from a wider range of viewpoints.

First up is a series of all-in-one, packaged curriculums all made by Sonlight. Their synonymous program is written from a Christian perspective and includes bible studies. Their second offering is Bookshark, which is a neutral program and avoids the topic of evolution and creation all together. Bookshark is a literature-based curriculum, which borrows a lot of ideas from the Charlotte Mason method. In recent years, Timberdoodle has been added to their product offerings as a more hands-on learning approach. Packages include games, logic puzzles, and a fun assortment of activities to accompany the core subjects. Timberdoodle offers “religious” and “non-religious” kits, with non-religious taking a neutral approach. All three of the programs offered by Sonlight are rather expensive, however it is important to remember that everything you need to teach the entire year’s program is included in your order. You will also receive a very thorough schedule with everything you need to cover each day completely spelled out for you. These are great options for families who just want an open and go curriculum without having to pull lessons together from a multitude of sources.

Abeka is one of the most well known Christian curriculum companies, serving homeschooling families since the early 1970’s. This program also offers complete curriculum packages with one price. You may choose to order single-subject packages or individual material if you prefer. All material from Abeka is religious in nature.

Apologia is another religious curriculum offering. While they do not offer complete program packages, you can choose which subjects you wish to teach and order the necessary materials such as student and teacher books.

Our final religious curriculum option is a free one! Easy Peasy All-in-One Homeschool was created by a homeschooling parent who documented all of her children’s assignments online for future use by younger siblings. All required materials and linked websites are free, and if you would rather not print worksheets, you may purchase workbooks from Amazon for an incredible price. This is a great option for families on a budget.

We have two neutral options on our list. The first is a series of workbooks that are great to use as an entire curriculum, or to pick and choose for a particular subject. Carson Dellosa Education has several product lines, but their Spectrum series is very popular with homeschooling families. They have books for a wide variety of subjects and offer specific options for areas you may want to focus on. You could purchase Math or take a deeper study with a book working on only addition or only subtraction. This is great for adding extra practice in areas your child may be struggling in. Evan Moor is a similar company which offers a wide variety of workbooks for homeschool.

Our second neutral program is K12, which as we mentioned in our previous post, is not actually homeschooling, but is public school at home. Students are enrolled in the public school system and have real teachers. The benefit of this program is that you can do it entirely from home and they send you all the materials you need. This program is 100% free and is quite appealing to many families, however keep in mind that most of the freedoms that homeschooling allows will not be available to families who use K12. We encourage you to research and read reviews to see if this program is right for your family.

Oak Meadow is a secular, nature-based curriculum, which offers both a fully accredited distance learning program, and materials available for independent homeschool use. This is a popular options for secular families, and has been around since the 1970’s making it one of the oldest secular homeschool material providers around!

Our final three curriculum reviews are relative newcomers to the market. Build Your Library was the first one to appear and has a complete range from Year 0 (kindergarden) through Year 12. When you make a purchase from BYL, you are sent a download link to a PDF with a book list, program schedule, and printables. You are on your own to acquire each of the required books, whether from the library, purchasing new, or used. You are also free to skip books you cannot locate or choose not to read. This program is heavily literature based and utilizes “living books” instead of dry textbooks. You will need to supplement this program with a math curriculum of your choosing. Single-subject curriculum reviews will be discussed in a future blog post.

Blossom and Root is still actively writing their curriculum, and currently grades kindergarten through third are available for purchase. Grade four should be available by fall 2020. B&R sells its materials via PDF downloads and you will be required to purchase additional materials, however the booklist is significantly smaller than Build Your Library requires. This is a very popular curriculum among families with learners within its current grade offerings and will definitely be a program to watch as it develops! B&R does not cover math, however there are numerous curriculum options available to fill this gap.

Our final curriculum review is for Torchlight, another new program which has completed levels pre-kindergarten through third grade. An expected release date for fourth grade has not been announced. This PDF curriculum offers suggestions on programs to supplement math and writing programs to round out your child’s education.

This is far from an exhaustive list of homeschool curriculum, and is only a sample of the more popular options. If you have any questions about a program that we haven’t mentioned, please let us know and we will cover it in a future post.