Home School Book Choices for Many Grades- a look at my school book choices for many grades. I utilizes old school books along with new online helps!
As a homeschooling mama, I’ve always scoured the internet looking for blog posts on homeschooling families’ schooling book choices and why they chose those books.
I’m ALL about helping other homeschooling families out! Which is one of the reasons I’ve started this blog. (For those who do not know, I have been a food blogger at Mrs. Criddle’s Kitchen since 2015.) We have seven kids and just graduated our 1st. (cue the tears) So we’ve been homeschooling for a total of 14 YEARS! WOW! Seeing that on screen is insane! HOW DID THE TIME FLY SO FAST!? During our oldest daughter’s homeschool years there were tears of frustration and tears of joy… for both of us!
““It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
Now, after these last 14 years and graduating a senior, I feel a tiny bit more confident in sharing and helping my fellow homeschoolers out! Especially now with all the families that are being thrown into homeschooling by the Covid-19 Virus.
So here is what we will be doing for this 2020/2021 school year…
PREK/KINDER:
I’ll start with what I will be doing for our 4 year old (prek/kinder aged kiddo). I am very relaxed with this age group. I don’t force them to write X amount or spend X amount of time doing X. I make it fun and if my child is interested, I let them do as much or as little as they want.
I do a LOT of music memory because that age (really all ages) learn so well with music or a tune. My kids have learned the days of the week, months of the year, seasons, oceans, continents, our address, books of the Bible, phone number, etc, by putting a tune to it.
These are books I’ve used for years and go back to every time…
Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons all of the kiddos that currently know how to read learned from this book. It’s a 15 minute lesson. If your child isn’t quite getting it… put it aside and try again in a few months. I’ve had to do that with three of my kids. Both boys needed extra time. Two of those three didn’t learn to read until late 6 early 7. One is currently 6 and just now is “getting” it. Don’t panic if they can’t read by 6… they will get it eventually! And it’s better if they aren’t stressed over it.
“Don’t panic if they can’t read by 6… they will get it eventually!” Mrs. Criddle
Alpha Phonics I used this to really reinforce the phonics. But this is after working with your child on Teaching Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lesson.
(I want to give my mom-in-love, Lynette Criddle, credit for telling me about both of these books and a few others I will note later and being such a huge inspiration to me. She is finishing up her last year of homeschooling has over 20+ years behind her belt.)
ROD & STAFF ABC SERIES this is such a fun series. It really helps kids get in good fun basics. It integrates a lot of scripture throughout the series and has a bible story book and coloring pages to go along with the book. This is from an Anabaptist point of view (we are not Anabaptist but we ARE Christian).
This would be another book series my mom-in-law told me about.
The Littlest Kindergarten Workbook: All About Animals – My Tiny Fun Schooling Journal I love love these books! They are such a delight to look at and work through! We’ve used them several times with different kids! The Funschooling site has such a variety of books, even funbooks for moms! But this book is very well rounded so this & the Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons could be the only two books you would need to use for your preK/Kinder kiddo.
First Grade Books-
My 6 year old is really half Kinder half 1st grade so I am going to see what works best for him and if any of these books are too much we will back off and just something a little less stressful for him.
For Reading: my six year old we will be finishing up Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons and Alpha Phonics. And we are also doing the simple reading books called BOB BOOKS.
I am adding in Horizons Phonics & Reading the more confident he gets because this is a GREAT series! It really builds a strong phonics foundation. For my two kids that used these books, they really know a lot more of the rules for grammar then the ones who didn’t do this. It is a LOT of works so don’t feel like you have to do EVERY SINGLE PROBLEM! YOU are the teacher… teachers really don’t assign every singe problem on every single page. The go through and create a lesson out of the curriculum. So here is your permission to KEEP IT SIMPLE!
“The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled.” Plutarch
Horizon Math Grade 1 I really do love these Horizon books. The math is so great because of it’s strong foundation that it gives… but if it gets overwhelming… do every other problem. Assign what works best for your kiddo. This is really such a young age and they don’t need a lot of writing! Again, if any of this is stressing you or your child out… BACK OFF! Take a break! Have your child do fun hands on math instead for a while.
Horizon Penmanship Grade 1 my 6 year old loves school work so I believe he can handle this. But his older brother… he wanted to do as LITTLE AS POSSIBLE!
Third Grade Books:
Saxon Math 3 we are finishing up a little more than half of this book from 2nd grade. I chose to do Saxon 3 in 2nd grade for him because the Horizon 1st grade had him at a higher 2nd grade level. So much so the 2nd grade Saxon was too easy. We had to bump him up to 3rd and are just taking it easy through this book. He will complete the second half of it in the beginning of 3rd grade and then we will see where we want to go next. Also, as I mentioned earlier, music was a huge help in him learning his multiplication problems. We’ve used the Classical Conversation (the second session) multiplication playlist and all my kids (even myself) have memorized the multiplication songs! THIS HAS BEEN AWESOME! Oh, the reason I didn’t stay with Horizon… this child does not like to do a lot of work. Saxon has two pages in a lesson. He feels like it’s less work. We are both happy. 😀
Our American History Abeka my four oldest kids have all used this book and LOVE LOVE LOVE it. I won’t do everything it suggests to do because… I’m the teacher. But Abeka really did do a great job with this history book by keeping the attention of this young audience!
Horizon Phonics & Reading 3rd Grade again I love these books! They really reinforce the grammar rules that are needed for higher learning!
Horizon Penmanship 3rd Grade I’m going to try this one out for my 3rd grader but he doesn’t like a lot of writing… if it becomes too much I will back off and do printable handwriting worksheets.
Building Spelling Skills 3 by Christian Liberty Press this is just a really simple spelling workbook that it helps improve spelling by giving a thorough learning experience without too much work.
For Science, my 3rd-7th graders will be taking a science class (called Phun With Physics) with a local homeschool teacher. It’s once a week so not too much for us but will includes fun hands on! My kids are excited about it!
Art- Teach Yourself to Draw – Lizards, Snails and Frogs by Fun-Schooling.
“Study to show yourself approved unto God, a workman who need not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” 2 Tim 2:15
Fifth Grade Books:
Saxon Math Grade 6/5 we’ve tried several different math curriculums throughout the years but keep coming back to Saxon. It well rounded but not everyone likes it. Give it a try, if you don’t like it… move on to another curriculum.
Daily Grams 5/Easy Grammar wow oh wow, I rejoiced when I found these Easy Grammar series! I have always HATED grammar! Like hated with a passion, cried over my children’s grammar books! Then we found Easy Grammar! Thank You Jesus!! It’s ONE PAGE! It’s repetition. They Learn. No tears.
Building Spelling Skills Book 5 once again, it’s simple decent spelling workbook. I gave my daughter a choice and she choose this one.
Penmanship she will be doing a printable online cursive curriculum that a friend gave me (thank you Kelly). There are 33 pages. We will probably print one page, make three copies and have her do those three pages in a week.
Old World History & Geography by Abeka for history my kids adore Abeka history. For this, I usually just make them answer the question boxes throughout the book. There are lots of them. I do not make them do the huge chapter check up because my kids really take in these history books. We read a lot of history throughout the year outside of the Abeka History Curriculum.
For science, this kiddo will be taking the homeschool Phun with Physics class with her younger brother & older sister.
My 5th grader will be taking an online writing course through Time4Writing. My graduate used this online site for writing and it really improved her writing skills. They offer several different courses from basic writing & grammar skills to sentence & paragraph writing and essay writing. From 2nd grade all the way to 12th grade.
Classical Fun-Schooling – Literature and Poetry Collection – Level B: Ages 7 to 10 these Fun-Schooling books are really the cutest! It teaches poetry and literature in a fun way, non-stressful way.
Art- Teach Yourself to Draw – Kittens by Fun-Schooling!
Seventh Grade Books:
Saxon Math 8/7 not much else to say about this other than it’s a tried & true curriculum for us. I do purchase DIVE INTO MATH VIDEOS for Saxon that have been AMAZINGLY helpful for the higher grades.
History of the World by Abeka y’all already know how much we love Abeka history. 😉
Science– My 7th grader is taking the Phun with Physics homeschool class as well.
Daily Grams Grade 7 like I said about… this Easy Grammar curriculum is the BEST THING! Cannot recommend it enough!
Wordly Wise 3000 book 7 for spelling. We’ve never used it but it looked interesting. I’ll let you know what we think.
Patriotic Penmanship another new curriculum we are giving a try. It looked great! But I’ll let you know!
My 7th grader will also be taking a writing course through Time4writing.
Classical Fun-Schooling Poetry Collection – Level C: For ages 10 to 17 my 10 & 12 year old girls are very excited to both be getting a Literature journal!
“If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.” Albert Einstein
HIGHSCHOOL- Tenth Grade Books:
Saxon Math Algebra 2 we have purchased the DIVE INTO MATH VIDEOS to go along with this math curriculum. Those dive videos have been an amazing help!
World History & Cultures by Abeka
Easy Grammar Grade 10 the teacher edition is the cheapest way to go. It offers the workbook with the answer key in the back.
For our high schooler we have opted to have her take several classes with our a local former professor who now teaches homeschool classes (she also homeschooled her kids). We are very blessed to have access to her classes. This would be the same lady who is teaching the science class my younger kids will be taking. She will give her assignments, reports and grades for each class she takes. That does take a little off of my shoulders.
Classes she taking:
Chemistry plus labs
World Literature
Spanish 1
ELECTIVES:
We will be using Schoolhouse Teachers (affiliate link) for electives! Its an online monthly subscription for homeschoolers that offers SO MUCH! From regular classes to high school electives, you need to check them out! Literally you could use this site to teach all your children every course. We’ve subscribed to this for many years now.
Our 10th grader will be taking ART, a keyboard class and any other elective we can easily squeeze in from this site.
That’s all. PHEW. Most of my books I have from previous years of homeschool. I do buy new grammar books, spelling books, and any workbooks.
Also, I wanted to share the Homeschool planners I’ve been using for many many years now… It’s called The Well Planned Day. It has room for 4 students at a time. But it also offers Middle School and teens their own planners. So I get each of my older kids their own planners.
Oh here are a few YouTube people we love to follow for school:
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