Home School Curriculum

Midnight LJR

In search of Rubicon flares.
Supporting Member
Ride of the Month Winner
Joined
May 30, 2019
Messages
1,679
Location
Southern Utah
Anyone else home school their kids? We home school our 4 year old and I was looking for good curriculums to follow to help keep her on track and provide some more organization.
 
  • Like
Reactions: matkal
Anyone else home school their kids? We home school our 4 year old and I was looking for good curriculums to follow to help keep her on track and provide some more organization.
Hey Mike,

Early on we tried pairing various maths like Singapore or Saxon with other parts of curriculum's. It got too complicated. We eventually settled in on Heart of Dakota as the overall curriculum. The curriculum is laid out every day so you know what to do for History, Math, Science, et. al. I can take a pic of a day's curriculum to give you an idea, or they may have pics on the Heart of Dakota website. At any rate, now our kids are 18, 16, 16, 13, and 11. They are all self-learners which will transfer to being lifetime learners. The oldest has been taking college courses since she was 17 and has been getting all A's. For some reason she keeps choosing classes that aren't so easy. Right now it's Geology, Archaeology, et. al. She graduates from High School the end of this month. One of the 16 year old twins is looking toward Mechanical Engineering. He should do well with his study ethic.

I should add that when they turned 16 we decided to put them in a semi-Charter school for some higher level math and computer courses. So, right now they are splitting home school courses with the charter courses. I also added a foreign language (that I already knew, though it was taught by someone else and I could facilitate) and Logic.

It is an arduous task, but the benefits are so great we would never do it any other way. It's good for the whole family, and I work from home so I can help where needed. We feel our kids are our greatest life-work, and I hope the results speak for themselves.

Blessings,
Jeremy
 
Last edited:
We are home schooling all three of our kids once this school year ends on May 27th. Our neighborhood is a huge home school neighbor and thus the parents here know the good programs. I’ll ask my wife what program we are using and get back to you. It’s a good one that many of our friends use that is free from any of the garbage they currently teach in schools such as CRT, the notion that this country was founded on racism and is “inherently racist”, and free or LGBTQ grooming and propaganda as well.

I commend you for removing your kids from the government run indoctrination centers. More parents are moving this way and I’m happy about this. It took us longer than it should have but fortunately our oldest is only in 3rd grade.
 
Wish I could. I think it's the way to go if you don't have a good rural school to go to like I had as a kid. Several of my high school teachers had PhD's.

Can't comment on curriculum but what I will say is get in to home school groups near you so that your kids can do activities with other home schooled children.
 
  • Like
Reactions: matkal and JMT
Probably the hardest part of homeschooling is finding the right curriculum for your kid. Keep in mind, you may need to mix match different curriculums for different subjects.
We used Abeka for kindergarten. It’s basically a classroom full of kids on video with the teacher “including” the homeschooled child. Doesn’t sound impressive but at the end my kid could read and write in cursive along with doing simple math. She’s in Sixth grade now and using Christian Light for language arts and math and IEW for writing.
It can be exhausting and frustrating trying to find what works best for your kid but that’s the advantage. Look for a homeschool conference to attend. Those are super informative.
The benefits are through the roof. You won’t regret it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Chris
Probably the hardest part of homeschooling is finding the right curriculum for your kid. Keep in mind, you may need to mix match different curriculums for different subjects.
We used Abeka for kindergarten. It’s basically a classroom full of kids on video with the teacher “including” the homeschooled child. Doesn’t sound impressive but at the end my kid could read and write in cursive along with doing simple math. She’s in Sixth grade now and using Christian Light for language arts and math and IEW for writing.
It can be exhausting and frustrating trying to find what works best for your kid but that’s the advantage. Look for a homeschool conference to attend. Those are super informative.
The benefits are through the roof. You won’t regret it.
Yeah, and it's mostly at the very beginning when you are going to homeschool fairs and trying to find out what will work for your children and family. After you find something that is working you don't have to spend all that time every year, unless that's just what you want to do. Whether you get involved in homeschool coops or not is really a matter of how much time you have and where you live (we lived out in the country on land) and what your wife wants to do. For my wife homeschool coops didn't work. No time to drive all over the county. Of course, we have 5 kids, so that's a lot of homeschooling. With one or two she would have had more time. We had other means of extra-curricular activities and so that aspect was resolved other ways. You just have to find what works. Most of this not directed at you Jack, but at Mike. LOL
 
  • Like
Reactions: Jack72
I’ll also add that no child needs to be in school for 7-8 hours a day doing “busy work”. That’s time YOU could be spending with them.
So true!

In the early years our kids were in homeschool from 8:30-12:30. As they got older it went to 1:30, then 2:30, then 3:30, but they were pretty much done by then and no homework at night. They could spend their time doing chores on the ranch, building forts, riding mountain bikes, and spending time with the family in the evening. Now they actually work jobs and make money.

There's also the huge advantage of being able to take off and go on a family vacation when you want and not when every Tom Dick and Harry will be there because it's spring break or summer.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Jack72
We may be doing this with our graddaughter - but we need a curriculum that is NOT based on anybody's religion. Any ideas?
 
So true!

In the early years our kids were in homeschool from 8:30-12:30. As they got older it went to 1:30, then 2:30, then 3:30, but they were pretty much done by then and no homework at night. They could spend their time doing chores on the ranch, building forts, riding mountain bikes, and spending time with the family in the evening. Now they actually work jobs and make money.

There's also the huge advantage of being able to take off and go on a family vacation when you want and not when every Tom Dick and Harry will be there because it's spring break or summer.

All of our local friends here who homeschool typically do around 3 hours a day. Of course their kids are in 3rd and 4th grade, so there is that. She said that she really likes the freedom though because some days they'll learn, but other days they'll go some place to learn such as the zoo, a children's museum, etc.

What finally did it for us (aside from the COVID lockdowns, LGBTQ indoctrination, and CRT bullshit) was when we realized our kids are getting older and we are basically not seeing them 7-8 hours a day (they go to school from 8 AM until 3 PM). I said to my wife, "Wouldn't you rather spend as much time with them as possible when they are young because it's time we will never get back?". She agreed with me and we decided once school is over (in 15 days) we are going to start them on homeschooling. We've done so much research and have so many friends who home school (there's even a large homeschool group in our neighborhood) that it just seemed like the right thing to do.

Lately I've been praying about it non-stop and I have told my wife that I feel like part of what God wants me to do on this earth is exactly that, homeschool our kids. Why else would I have ended up in situation where I work from home and have all this extra time I could devote to them. I told her that perhaps this is a calling from the Lord himself.

And like you said, we can take off whenever we want and go on a vacation, effectively bypassing all the crowds.

If you have the ability to homeschool your kids, I think that it's one of the best decisions you'll ever make. I haven't talked to a single person who homeschools that hasn't told us that they absolutely love it. Everyone I talk to as well has said that after removing their kids from public school that ager 2 weeks of homeschooling they become so much better behaved and mannered.
 
  • Love
  • USA Proud
Reactions: JMT and ColoJeep
We may be doing this with our graddaughter - but we need a curriculum that is NOT based on anybody's religion. Any ideas?

Try something based in Scientology. It's not a religion, it's science fiction ;)
 
All of our local friends here who homeschool typically do around 3 hours a day. Of course their kids are in 3rd and 4th grade, so there is that. She said that she really likes the freedom though because some days they'll learn, but other days they'll go some place to learn such as the zoo, a children's museum, etc.

What finally did it for us (aside from the COVID lockdowns, LGBTQ indoctrination, and CRT bullshit) was when we realized our kids are getting older and we are basically not seeing them 7-8 hours a day (they go to school from 8 AM until 3 PM). I said to my wife, "Wouldn't you rather spend as much time with them as possible when they are young because it's time we will never get back?". She agreed with me and we decided once school is over (in 15 days) we are going to start them on homeschooling. We've done so much research and have so many friends who home school (there's even a large homeschool group in our neighborhood) that it just seemed like the right thing to do.

Lately I've been praying about it non-stop and I have told my wife that I feel like part of what God wants me to do on this earth is exactly that, homeschool our kids. Why else would I have ended up in situation where I work from home and have all this extra time I could devote to them. I told her that perhaps this is a calling from the Lord himself.

And like you said, we can take off whenever we want and go on a vacation, effectively bypassing all the crowds.

If you have the ability to homeschool your kids, I think that it's one of the best decisions you'll ever make. I haven't talked to a single person who homeschools that hasn't told us that they absolutely love it. Everyone I talk to as well has said that after removing their kids from public school that ager 2 weeks of homeschooling they become so much better behaved and mannered.
Spot on.

Sometimes I’m jealous of my wife since she’s the primary homeschooler while I go out and work. 😆
 
  • Like
Reactions: Chris
:LOL: :LOL: :LOL:

b261a2c113051a2e.jpg
 
And for what it’s worth, keep in mind that you’re going to have rough days too. There will be days your kid will test you. There will be days you’re just not feeling it and you’ll question if you’re screwing up or not. Trust me, as long as you have some kind of structure and schedule, you’ll be just fine.

Check out any video by Andrew Pudewa speaking on education. He offers some great insight. I saw him speak at a conference last year and it was very inspiring.
 
  • Like
Reactions: ColoJeep and Chris
We may be doing this with our graddaughter - but we need a curriculum that is NOT based on anybody's religion. Any ideas?
there's no such thing as religious neutrality, so just pick your -ism of choice and move on. most homeschool curriculum's are going to be Christian slanted because they're the ones who reject the religious system of the public schools
 
  • Like
Reactions: Midnight LJR
How about teaching math, reading and writing...
That's the idea. Many/most of the pre-canned programs are religion based, Christian mostly, but I've seen a few for Jewish kids. Kudos to the Christians for homeschooling, but that's not what I'm looking for...
 
Hey Mike,

Early on we tried pairing various maths like Singapore or Saxon with other parts of curriculum's. It got too complicated. We eventually settled in on Heart of Dakota as the overall curriculum. The curriculum is laid out every day so you know what to do for History, Math, Science, et. al. I can take a pic of a day's curriculum to give you an idea, or they may have pics on the Heart of Dakota website. At any rate, now our kids are 18, 16, 16, 13, and 11. They are all self-learners which will transfer to being lifetime learners. The oldest has been taking college courses since she was 17 and has been getting all A's. For some reason she keeps choosing classes that aren't so easy. Right now it's Geology, Archaeology, et. al. She graduates from High School the end of this month. One of the 16 year old twins is looking toward Mechanical Engineering. He should do well with his study ethic.

I should add that when they turned 16 we decided to put them in a semi-Charter school for some higher level math and computer courses. So, right now they are splitting home school courses with the charter courses. I also added a foreign language (that I already knew, though it was taught by someone else and I could facilitate) and Logic.

It is an arduous task, but the benefits are so great we would never do it any other way. It's good for the whole family, and I work from home so I can help where needed. We feel our kids are our greatest life-work, and I hope the results speak for themselves.

Blessings,
Jeremy

Does this have outlines for kids as young as 4?

Edit: Found it.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: JMT
All of our local friends here who homeschool typically do around 3 hours a day. Of course their kids are in 3rd and 4th grade, so there is that. She said that she really likes the freedom though because some days they'll learn, but other days they'll go some place to learn such as the zoo, a children's museum, etc.

What finally did it for us (aside from the COVID lockdowns, LGBTQ indoctrination, and CRT bullshit) was when we realized our kids are getting older and we are basically not seeing them 7-8 hours a day (they go to school from 8 AM until 3 PM). I said to my wife, "Wouldn't you rather spend as much time with them as possible when they are young because it's time we will never get back?". She agreed with me and we decided once school is over (in 15 days) we are going to start them on homeschooling. We've done so much research and have so many friends who home school (there's even a large homeschool group in our neighborhood) that it just seemed like the right thing to do.

Lately I've been praying about it non-stop and I have told my wife that I feel like part of what God wants me to do on this earth is exactly that, homeschool our kids. Why else would I have ended up in situation where I work from home and have all this extra time I could devote to them. I told her that perhaps this is a calling from the Lord himself.

And like you said, we can take off whenever we want and go on a vacation, effectively bypassing all the crowds.

If you have the ability to homeschool your kids, I think that it's one of the best decisions you'll ever make. I haven't talked to a single person who homeschools that hasn't told us that they absolutely love it. Everyone I talk to as well has said that after removing their kids from public school that ager 2 weeks of homeschooling they become so much better behaved and mannered.

All of our local friends here who homeschool typically do around 3 hours a day. Of course their kids are in 3rd and 4th grade, so there is that. She said that she really likes the freedom though because some days they'll learn, but other days they'll go some place to learn such as the zoo, a children's museum, etc.

What finally did it for us (aside from the COVID lockdowns, LGBTQ indoctrination, and CRT bullshit) was when we realized our kids are getting older and we are basically not seeing them 7-8 hours a day (they go to school from 8 AM until 3 PM). I said to my wife, "Wouldn't you rather spend as much time with them as possible when they are young because it's time we will never get back?". She agreed with me and we decided once school is over (in 15 days) we are going to start them on homeschooling. We've done so much research and have so many friends who home school (there's even a large homeschool group in our neighborhood) that it just seemed like the right thing to do.

Lately I've been praying about it non-stop and I have told my wife that I feel like part of what God wants me to do on this earth is exactly that, homeschool our kids. Why else would I have ended up in situation where I work from home and have all this extra time I could devote to them. I told her that perhaps this is a calling from the Lord himself.

And like you said, we can take off whenever we want and go on a vacation, effectively bypassing all the crowds.

If you have the ability to homeschool your kids, I think that it's one of the best decisions you'll ever make. I haven't talked to a single person who homeschools that hasn't told us that they absolutely love it. Everyone I talk to as well has said that after removing their kids from public school that ager 2 weeks of homeschooling they become so much better behaved and mannered.
This is one of those moments in life you will look back on and smile. My wife and I decided to home school our girls 29 years ago, it certainly wasn't easy
but the pluses are monumental. Chris, you and you wife must be have the same opinion and outlook for the family to be happy doing this right thing.
The amazing thing is you guy's and the kids will love learning together! The kids will learn far more effectively than public school because you actually love them, and want the best for them !, ( Also your're not a teachers union slug pushing a communist agenda that actively goes against every Christian principle ). We believe the true result of home education is teaching your kids HOW TO THINK AND SOLVE ISSUES FOR THEMSELVES ! I am confident you guys are
are the right type of parents to successfully give your kiddos the BEST start in life. God has providentially directed you to be in a great place for your kids.
GO FOR IT !!
Your family is in our prayers , but far more important is our GOD is GOOD
 
  • Like
Reactions: JMT and Chris