Our top 3 complete homeschool resources

 

Over the years, as a large family with learners with different needs, I have purchased and used a lot of different resources for different ages ranges, and different needs. Not all the resources are Australian, as I have found the selection of Australian-Curriculum-based programmes here quite limited and less comprehensive compared to international syllabi, but ultimately, my goal is to instill a love of learning regardless of where the material comes from.

This article will focus on programmes that combine more than one subject into one learning plan.

 

One of my more recent resources come from The Good and the Beautiful. It is a curriculum that focusses on good values and a love of beauty in nature, with beautiful watercolour illustrations. The curriculum is loosely Christian with mentions of God (company is Mormon but the curriculum content is largely Christian-liberal with a conservative booklist) but it is easily secularised if needed. The books are printed on good quality paper and shipping is quick from USA. They also provide a large proportion of their primary school levelled learning resources completely free!  I started using these when I had my fourth child and it helped me to streamline my homeschool by having part of the lesson parent-led and then finishing off with independent learning, enabling me to simultaneously teach/monitor 3-4 kids at the same time. We use:

Languages Arts (LA a.k.a. English)

Levels used: Old versions of Pre-K, Kindergarten, Levels 1-6, and new versions of K-3. Also parts of High School 1.
I love the newer versions as they are colourful and more achievable than the previous version. The LA programmes incorporate geography, art and cooking alongside reading comprehension, creative writing, grammar, and spelling.

Mathematics (Math)

Levels used: Old version K-4, new version 5-6.
These programmes combine a few styles of teaching Maths into one: Singapore, hands-on Montesorri-style, and Saxon for drills, plus lots of games so that drills don’t feel like a chore.
I prefer the old version for hands on learning for very young learners, and have some copies stashed for when the youngest is old enough to start learning!

 

Prior to using The Good and the Beautiful, we used Sonlight, a literature-based curriculum that incorporates chapterbooks alongside a history ‘spine’, so that students learn history, geography, Bible, culture, language arts, and more, from real books being read aloud instead of from dry text books. I used Sonlight primarily when homeschooling my eldest child, who had difficulty focussing and learnt to read later than most children at school, but who loved listening to audiobooks and storytime, as reading aloud helped her to still gain and retain the information that most children would gain from reading on their own. Although Sonlight is a Christian company, it provides a much more liberal booklist compared to The Good and The Beautiful. I can attribute the love of reading in my eldest children to Sonlight, as well as strengthening the parent-child bond between us. Who can resist snuggling up onto a sofa for a group read aloud session <3

Key things to know about Sonlight

1. It is pricey and shipping is very expensive but fully tracked and suuuuuper quick!
2. You buy an Instructor’s Guide (IG or manual) for the schedule of work for a level (which includes one copy of the student sheets) and then usually purchase the curated book package that comes with it.
3. I have used Complete packages as there is a hefty 20% discount applied to it. You get the HBL (History Bible Literature) manual and book pack, Science manual and book pack, a maths programme (you choose which programme to include in the pack), and a Language arts pack.
4. I have almost every level now: T (toddler), Pre-K, A, B, C, B+C, D, E, D+E, F, G, H, J
5. I really love their Science Programmes, and the surprise bonus is that the content is more or less mapped to the primary school science content in the Australian Curriculum as well.

 

Another Australian Company I love is Simply Homeschool. The company is monthly or annually subscription-based, and provides unit study learning plans around good books called ‘Core Books’ (what they call their spines) covering a wide range of subjects per Core that could be used by different ages at the same time: the courses cover a range from preschool up to year 10, though most of them cover from about 8 years old to teens. Besides the learning plans, they also offer online classes for art, writing, maths and lego, and organise member-only homeschool camps. The bonus is that they write to the Australian Curriculum, so I use mainly their HASS programmes for middle school, though some of the science ones are interesting for upper primary/middle school as well. You could pick out 3-4 Cores and be well-educated for the year!

Cores we have loved/used:

1. A is for Australia: an iconic Core at Simply Homeschool for learning all about Australia, Australian geography, Art and English grammar/writing
2. 100 things to know about… series (my kids have covered “Food” and we’re currently going through “Human Body”): Lots of science experiments, report writing, cooking, safety, Auslan, exercise, so much to learn!
3. Wonder: A great Core to learn literature analysis, character and story development, even drama!
4. Introduction to Australian Parliament: excellent resource especially used to prepare for our PACER trip to Canberra.
5. FLY (Financially Literate Youth) series: These selection of Cores are perfect for teens learning how to manage their finances. I even think adults could benefit from the info in the book itself.