This year has certainly been an exciting year for everybody, both in good and negative ways. As we moved through our first year as a member of The Old Schoolhouse Review Crew, we found delicious new curriculums and fabulously creative ways to learn new things in our homeschool. I’ll share with you my favorite homeschool curriculums along with my homeschool curriculum reviews, plus access to the 2020 Crew Blue Ribbon Awards!
The Old Schoolhouse (TOS) is a Christ-centered company with wonderful intentions for the vendors of curriculums as well as for the homeschool families. As they pursued new curriculums to use and review for these companies, families like mine were able to use these curriculums in their homes for a few weeks. After that, we wrote original, honest homeschool curriculum reviews of the curriculums which we used for those few weeks.
There were quite a number of times when the kids and I continued using the curriculum even after the review date had come and gone. Some of these curriculums seemed to personally speak to us and understand our homeschool philosophies and goals. And some curriculums straight up replaced the curriculum we had been using in our homeschool!
It’s been such a joy and treat for me to access such incredible homeschool resources, many of which I didn’t even know existed until they were up for review! So it is 100% credited to my involvement and participation with TOS Review Crew that I became so knowledgable and aware of all the different types of curriculums out there.
Even after reviewing roughly 50 curriculums this year, I know I probably hardly made a dent in all of the homeschool curriculum and resources available out there right now!
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2020 Crew Blue Ribbon Awards
Each year the Crew members take a moment to vote for their favorite curriculums in many different areas. And only vote for the curriculum that they personally used and review, not the curriculum that they did not experience.
Even though there were a ton of curriculum my kids and I used this year, here I share a few of my top favorites! Now, again, all reviewers cast their votes according to what they personally used, and there were also a number of categories to vote in. For instance, the categories included: all-around number one favorite out of all the curriculums I used, a favorite specifically for reading, a favorite for preschool learning, a favorite subject like history/science/etc., a favorite for an all-in-one curriculum, and so on.
My Personal Favorite Homeschool Curriculums We Used and Reviewed
Here are the top fave curriculums of the Crew for 2020 of Homeschool and Humor:
#1 – The Curriculum I Chose That Was My Absolute Favorite of all!
Coming in at the #1 spot for me, that really wowed and impressed me and created such a wonderful blessing in our homeschool is My Teaching Library. I found hundreds – no, thousands – of teaching resources at My Teaching Library (MTL) that I was able to implement into my homeschool right away. In fact, I created my first interactive notebook with MTL resources! My kids devoured every single resource I pulled from MTL, so I’m going to continue using My Teaching Library for, well, for forever! It has so many creative resources for sooo many subjects for all grades! Again, this is my absolute favorite curriculum of all the curriculums I used this year! And it’s not even a ‘curriculum’ , per say, but it provides resources for many areas your kids study and learn. You could even create your own homeschool curriculum using just MTL resources!
#2 – My Favorite Homeschool Curriculums That Made the Biggest Impact on my Kids
This might not be “fair” – and it was definitely hard to pick just one – but I’m going with TWO equally impactful curriculums that made the biggest impression on my kids this year. Of all the subjects we tried and used (and reviewed), Home School in the Woods and EdShed’s Spelling Shed won this category for me. Home School in the Woods’ New World Explorers is a hands-on history curriculum that really made my kids learn and retain the history information! And Spelling Shed is a complete spelling curriculum that not only has spelling lessons via PowerPoint (or downloadable PDF) but also a matching app where my kids played fun-filled spelling games with the words they were learning for the week! In fact, we continued using both even after the reviews were completed and intend to continue using them for next year! That’s how awesome they are!
#3 – My Favorite Homeschool Curriculum That Taught My Toddler!
Yes, there is a curriculum we used that actually taught, or helped teach alongside me, my toddler, such as shapes, numbers, his own name, letters, colors, and much more! Reading Eggs is a family favorite in this house, and my older kids (age 8 and 9) loved Reading Eggs just as well. Reading Eggs even has a new development in the curriculum called Fast Phonics. Maybe because Reading Eggs is an interactive game-like curriculum the kids play on a screen, but it’s still the go-to curriculum my kids literally ask me to do. It also keeps track of everything they worked on and scores their learning! I can visually see the progress and improvement that all three kiddos made with their reading skills, phonics skills, and reading comprehension skills. I cannot recommend Reading Eggs enough! And just wow – my toddler is their #1 fan…and so am I!
#4 – My Favorite Christian-Focused Homeschool Curriculum
There is this one particular curriculum that heavily focuses on living for the Lord and that is Preborn Prodigy. They give positive messages through downloadable audio files or physical CDs, so we listened to their audio tracks everywhere we went, not just at home. They have three albums: (1) Prayers and Blessings for the Unborn Child, (2) Prayers and Blessings for the Newborn to 99, and (3) Math Prodigy. Through the tracks, she speaks to the kids about how beautiful and special they are, how perfectly God created them, and so many other wonderful messages. I fell in love immediately!
#5 – Favorite Involved or Hands-On Homeschool Curriculum
What I mean by “involved” is that my kids were actively involved in the curriculum – happily so. The curriculum has an element of a hands-on approach, which involves kids in the lessons. Because I already listed Home School in the Woods as one of the most impactful curriculums, and it did come close to winning this category as well, but the winner of the curriculum that got my kids involved with it is Let’s Go Geography!
We used Let’s Go Geography Year 2 which covered parts of the U.S. and other countries, with lessons that meet every learning style. A visual learner, an auditory learner, and a kinesthetic learner all would greatly benefit from Let’s Go Geography’s geography curriculum! In fact, we are still using Year 2! And I even purchased Year 1 to do after Year 2! And when Year 3 comes out, which it will soon at the time of this writing, we’ll grab Year 3 as well!
My Favorite Homeschool Curriculums By Subject
And lastly, I wanted to share my favorite curriculums for each subject. And if the curriculum wasn’t a favorite, it does not mean that it stinks! In fact, there were several that nearly tied. At the same time, if a subject is blank it is because I didn’t have an absolute *favorite* curriculum for that subject. I’m not going to list a curriculum just to fill a blank, and I did review curriculums in every subject listed, so just think of it as a Skip. These are my honest and real opinions.
- All-In-One Curriculum: Homeschool Easy
- Reading: Reading Eggs
- History: Home School in the Woods
- Science: none
- Writing: none
- Math: Page A Day Math
- though CTCMath is a close second
- Foreign Language: Latin – Memoria Press’s Prima Latina – love this!!!
- Teaching Resources: Super Teacher Worksheets
- (since My Teaching Library is my absolute fave of all, I didn’t want to include/count it. But if I did, it would win this category!)
Favorite Homeschool Curriculums: Kids Choice
And finally, here are the curriculums that my kids chose as their favorites for this year. Just bear in mind that they don’t remember all the curriculums that they used this year (as some were not continued beyond the review’s publish date); However, their choices obviously made the most impression on them! Here they are:
- Daniel, at age 9 (just turned 10 on 8/3): Math is his favorite, but the curriculum he chose wasn’t one we reviewed! He didn’t remember many of them and I tried to remind him, but he liked the most:
- Everyday Education’s Perfect Reading, Beautiful Handwriting curriculum.
- Journey Homeschool Academy’s Elementary Biology is in second place.
- Zoey, at age 8 (just turned 9 on 8/16): She liked many of them. It was difficult to narrow down, but ultimately she chose:
- Spelling Shed as her most favorite of all
- Beyond the Stick Figure art school and Let’s Go Geography tied
- Scout, age 2: Though he did use a few curriculums specifically for toddlers and PreK, I know without a doubt that his favorite one is Reading Eggs! Though he did have a lot of fun with Wisdom Wonder Project.
Join the Review Crew!
If it sounds charming to get to learn and use a ton of curriculum throughout your homeschool year, that’s because it is! I absolutely 100% love, love, LOVE being a part of TOS Review Crew! These ladies (and maybe a couple of men, I’m not sure) are now like family to me. Each Crew Leader I found super friendly, helpful, respectful, real, honest, and Christianity-aligned.
I appreciated the honest feedback I received as well as the vote of confidence. I always received quick replies to my questions. Plus, there’s a forum we all can ask questions on, chat on, and learn more about homeschooling on. On top of that, homeschool bloggers receive additional assistance to further their blogging ventures!
If you’re interested in joining the crew, click here click on the testimonials by Crew below!
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Our favorites included many of the same companies. Home School In The Woods and Let’s Go Geography were definitely stand outs for our family, too.