How Do I Find The Best Homeschool Curriculum?

5 Tips for finding The Best curriculum For Homeschooling To fit your family

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It’s no secret that being a parent is a huge and vital responsibility! You provide your children with loving care for their physical, emotional, and spiritual needs. You are the one they look to for love, assistance, concern, and care. At night, you mend broken toys, tell stories to scare away scary monsters, and play video games far too long.

 best curriculum for homeschooling

Wait! You’ve decided to homeschool your child. As a result, YOU ARE THE TEACHER! But, what do you teach? Many parents who homeschool are on the lookout for the best, shiniest homeschool curriculum.

What is the definition of a homeschool curriculum? It’s a prepared “course” or subject that was designed for you by an outdoor company. They are often instructor’s handbooks, workbooks, exams, tests, and research study materials for you and your child.

You don’t have to use a curriculum in order to homeschool; some families do it to make these much easier on themselves instead of piecing together everything they need for a subject.

You will discover how to find a homeschool curriculum you enjoy, curriculum you despise, and curriculum that is merely OK during your journey. You want to choose best curriculum for homeschooling that will help your child succeed in his or her academic goals while you save time and money (preferable!).

Let’s go through 5 crucial steps for identifying and choosing the best homeschool curriculum.

choosing curriculum

1.) Know what you enjoy and what you don’t (and what your children like and dislike).

This is the most crucial step in finding the ideal homeschool curriculum. You must first figure out what motivates you, as well as your children. For example, my daughter despises dull black and white math worksheets. She’d much rather do pages in bright, inviting colors and, really, I don’t blame her.

When I found out that the workbook or worksheets for math, I looked for the best a math curriculum with colorful and engaging pictures and details for her. It was there! This particular math program has a lot of colors and even pictures – it’s from The Good and the Beautiful and it’s free!

Now I know what motivates her for math. Do this same thing with your kids in all subjects and then as a homeschool in general, and you’ll be on your way to selecting the right curriculum that fits each child.

2.) How involved do you want to be for each subject?

Do you have young kids and babies at home that will take time away while you homeschool the older kids? If so, it won’t help you to get curriculum in every subject area that’s highly teacher/parent intensive.

Perhaps you want your kids to learn more independent learning skills. If so, don’t get curriculum that has you teaching them each step of the way.

There are several online curriculums and media curriculums that provide wonderfull video lessons that teach your kids the concepts. Some curriculums that come to mind are:

  • math – CTCMath
  • math – Teaching Textbooks
  • writing – IEW
  • reading/phonics – Reading Eggs
  • spelling – spelling shed (the app game part)
  • math – math shed

Do a Google search of online curriculum and you’ll find some great curriculums that provide video lessons. There are also some available that teach via DVD too!

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    3.) Do you desire curriculum for a Christian or religious viewpoint or a worldly, secular viewpoint?

    Here’s one thing to think about when choosing the best curriculum for homeschooling. Simply said, you may teach any topic to your kids from either a Christian viewpoint or a strictly secular one. If you only want Christian or religious curriculum, you can filter your search by avoiding all those homeschool companies that only offer a secular curriculum.

    Do a search for “Christian [or religious] homeschool [subject] curriculum” (or program) and this should eliminate any curriculums of only a secular standpoint.

    Saying this, though, be mindful of the religious you do select. Some may offer doctrine that is not part of your beliefs or religion. So if a religious program is important to you, go a step further by getting a few sample pages to see if they include specific religious scripture or simply reference God and Jesus without going into much detail.

    4.) When picking the best curriculum for homeschooling, try to find a good return policy!

    As a general rule, I will not purchase anything for homeschool unless I can return it. When you order curriculum, usually you won’t have these books in your hands when you make your choice. You’re essentially getting a “pitch” for each and every curriculum being offered, whether in brochures, online, in ads, or in homeschool groups.

    There are homeschool resource review groups and Facebook homeschooling pages that you can join. These groups give honest opinions and reviews of various curriculums even if they’re not free for you to participate in.

    They’re all fantastic, right? Most of the time you can envision your kids with that particular program and you see a bright and shiny homeschool day unfold with high engagement and laughter.

    But I can tell you from personal experience that not ALL curriculums are majestic and wonderful. So to save you time in picking the best curriculum for homeschooling, look for a company that will allow you to return items if they aren’t what you expected.

    It can be pricey to educate your kids via homeschool if you’re purchasing programs for each subject for each kid! So don’t forget to check the return policy for each one before buying!

    All of these actions are important when choosing the best homeschool curriculum. However, above all, I would recommend action 5…. Keep reading.

    5.) Pray about it!

    Pray about the programs you select and the path or journey your lifestyle will go due to homeschooling now. God will help you choose the best homeschool resources for your family and give you answers. Trust Him and pray! And don’t lose faith, even on the most difficult days.

    the best homeschool curriculum and choosing the best homeschool curriculum

    5 Tips For Choosing The Best Homeschool Curriculum That Fits Your Family

    Throughout your homeschool journey and through every homeschool season, you’ll discover curriculum you love, curriculum you despise, and even some that are just okay. Several homeschooling parents are almost always on the lookout for the best curriculum. And it’s worth repeating, keep in mind that you can homeschool your kids without using a done-for-you curriculum, though many families choose to do so because of the significant amount of effort, work, and time it would require to create your own curriculum.

    I hope this helps you in choosing best curriculum for homeschooling during your curriculum selection for your homeschool. If you have other ideas or any questions, put them in the comments!

    Choosing homeschool curriculum can be overwhelming. There are so many options and it's important for you know what to look out for when choosing a curriculum before diving in head first. Here are five tips that will help you find your best fit!

    Want to read this later? Download as a PDF!

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