We are halfway through the homeschool year and kicking off our Christmas school season! I can’t believe we are already this far and that it’s almost 2025! Today I’m sharing with you an update on how the last few months of school have gone for us. We’ve had some curriculum changes, added some simple things, and finished some unit studies. Plus a quick update/review on some new curriculum we have been using this year.
For a recap on all the curriculum we are using for each grade, check out these posts:
• Family Studies: Bible, History, Science
Math
Our biggest change these first few months is with math and it was a super hard decision I battled with. My daughter (5th) has used The Good and the Beautiful Simply Math since Kindergarten and it has always been one of her favorite subjects. Last year that started to change with their Level 4 and only got worse with Level 5 this year. Once we got toward the second half of Level 4 & into Level 5, I believe it moves very quickly and does not have enough review or time between concepts to let things stick. She got all the concepts just fine, but without enough review and jumping around to other things often, she forgot things easily and we would have to repeat it. This was very frustrating for the both of us. I’ve heard that Level 5 only gets more challenging, so I was reluctant to continue and started some heavy research into other math curriculums.
I’ve seen many friends of mine use & talk about their love for Teaching Textbooks, so decided to look into it more. When I did, I discovered you could try the first 15 lessons for free. We paused TGATB, tried the free lessons, and she LOVED it! It is completely independent, on the computer, has tons of review (and even more to add if you want), and a slower approach between concepts. Everyday I get an email notifying me of her work and how she did. I love that there are small quizzes often to check her understanding and we can pause it for more review if needed.
Now, TGATB Math is advanced (almost a full grade level) in some areas, so I knew Teaching Textbooks was probably going to be easy for her. I looked into the table of contents and some concepts they started teaching in TGATB Level 5, they don’t start to cover until late 6th grade-7th in Teaching Textbooks! I came to the conclusion that I didn’t want to push her too fast and wanted to help build her confidence.
Plus, Teaching Textbooks goes all the way to 12th grade, whereas TGATB only has up to Level 7 at this time. (Level 8 is coming next year.) So in my mind, she was going to eventually have to switch to another curriculum at some point anyway.
After much debate, and taking her opinion into consideration, we decided to fully switch to Teaching Textbooks and she is doing so well! She is starting with Grade 5 so we can make sure to review and continue to cover many of the concepts she was learning. She is loving math again and that’s what matters most to me! It has also given me so much more time to work with my younger ones, since it is independent and she doesn’t often need my help anymore. This now has me thinking about possibly switching my son when he begins 4th grade next year, but we will get to that later.
I’ve spoken to many of you struggling with the same concerns and although it’s hard, just know it’s ok to try something new! I love TGATB and didn’t want to switch to something else, but knew it wasn’t working for her any longer. It is a great curriculum, but it doesn’t work for everyone and that’s ok! I believe covering and understanding concepts fully before moving on and building their confidence in math is the most important and will benefit them in future years.
Creative Writing
Spelling and sentence structure is still something we are always working on with a few of my kids. What helped my oldest when she was younger was just writing more and writing often, so I decided to add some quick creative writing in the mornings before we start our studies and my kids have been loving it!
I grabbed them each a small journal to write in and printed a few Discovery Decks from The Waldock Way. Each morning we randomly select a card. They write down their own answer in their journal (I ask that they try to put it in a complete sentence) and then we read/share them with each other. I don’t correct their writing or spelling, just allow them to practice writing freely without critiques. Usually when they are reading it back out loud to us they catch their own mistakes! Then we scan the QR code and watch the short video to find out the real answer. These videos are so fun and fascinating! We have learned a lot!
There are tons of different discovery decks to choose from! They include fun questions like: Who are the best animal Dad’s? What’s the biggest tree in the world? Why do we have allergies? How is bubblegum made? How does a jellyfish sting? Why do mosquitoes bite? How are magnets made? and more!
Some days we also like to switch it up and write an answer to a question from these Would You Rather books! I love hearing their answers! We are starting the Christmas book this month!
Write Shop
Speaking of writing, I know many of you are very curious on how we are enjoying our new writing curriculum, Write Shop. We are using Level D with my 3rd and 5th grader together and have been really enjoying it!
This curriculum covers grammar and writing, but we are only using the writing portion. It has a very thorough teacher guide, that almost feels like too much sometimes, but once we figured out our groove and adapted how we wanted to use it, it has been working out great!
There are only 10 lessons total, so we are just doing one lesson each month. It has different schedule options available if you want to use them, but we just fit it into our schedule and typically take about two weeks to finish one lesson. (It has been nice having a week or two off between lessons for a good break.)
Each lesson always begins with a pre-writing activity we do the first day (usually hands-on or a game,) then we do the skill builder one day (more hands-on,) a simple journal prompt another day, brainstorming day for their story, story writing day, editing day, final draft day. Seems like a lot, but we space it out nicely and the activities are fun.
It took a while for us to get into, but my kids have really been enjoying the hands-on activities that help them understand so much more, plus the writing projects are really creative and fun! So far they have learned how to write invitations, a humor story, adventure story, and a science fiction story. I’m impressed with how much they are writing (with only a little complaining- it will never go away completely let’s be honest haha) and am excited to watch them grow. Next they get to write a mystery!
I’ll do a full review, tips that worked for us, and more at the end of our school year when we have completed all the lessons. I’m also sharing a reel soon following us on completing one full lesson!
History
We have been studying California History from Beautiful Feet Books so far this year, and honestly, we are pretty bored. 😬 The books have been ok so far, but I feel like we have to add so much just to make it fun and engaging. We will still continue on in the new year and are getting to more fun topics like the missions, pioneer era, etc. so I feel like it will pick up and be more enjoyable. We have lots of exciting field trips planned that I hope will bring it to life.
For my 1st grader, we have been doing something different for history. Read more about it HERE. We finished the first book we have been reading together, Kid President’s, and he loved it!! These are great stories that are funny, interesting, or full of adventure about some of the presidents when they were kids and how it shaped them for the future.
We would read about two presidents together each week. After reading, he would draw a simple picture in his notebook based on the story and tell me about it. We would form a sentence together that he would copy. At the very end of the book, he chose his favorite president (Abraham Lincoln) and we studied him more. We read a few picture books, watched videos, and then he completed a “living” poster that he presented to our family telling them all he learned. This was perfect for his age and great for interest-led learning! He chose the next book we will start in the new year: Kid Athletes. Here are more books to choose from: Kid Legends series.
Science
For science we finished the Marine Biology unit from The Good and the Beautiful. Their science units are great for simple, open & go, with very little prep. We only did a lesson once a week. I’m not sure how much they really retained from it, but we enjoyed it and had a lot of fun with the simple experiments. We are starting Geology in the new year!
Spelling
Spelling has been going well! My 3rd grader still loved Evan Moore Building Spelling Skills and my 5th grade daughter is enjoying 180 Days of Spelling and Word Study. She is typically really good with spelling already, so I’m really loving that 180 Days is giving her more of a challenge to learn the meanings of the words and use their antonyms/synonyms and more.
My 1st grader has been doing really well reading, so I think he is ready to add more spelling starting in the new year. He will be using the Dash Into Spelling program, Book 1. (Code: SMITH20 for 20% off)
Co-op
I run our small co-op that meets every other week and this fall we learned all about the election with The Presidential Election unit from A Living Learning Co. (Code LSOS for 10% off!) We enjoyed this unit and I think the kids learned a lot (I know I did!) It is not made for a co-op setting, so I had to do a lot of tweaking and provide different projects at times to make it work for us, but the text provided that I would read to the kids was perfect!
Each meeting I would teach them about the topic (reading from the guide or any other research I found,) we would read one of the picture books (if not too long haha,) then do a simple activity together. I have everything we did and activities linked in my Election Unit highlight. We had a mock election, learned about past presidents, and finished it off with a big field trip to our state capitol.
We are excited to get back to more science in the spring with this fun unit: Edible Science!
I think that is everything we have been up to! Overall we have been enjoying our studies and most of our curriculum has been working out great! We are taking a break from our extra subjects and starting Christmas School this week. Read all about it HERE! Over Christmas break I’ll take some time to reflect on our schedule, prep new units, and plan for the new year. Of course I’ll be sharing when we get there!
I hope your school year has been great so far and that you have a lovely Christmas break coming up!
– Lindsay
Thank you for sharing!
Your blog posts are so informative and helpful! Thank you for taking the time to share your journey. My homeschool days are recently behind me but I still do summer school and supplemental study. We have loved your Christmas school idea so we do that as well!
You’re welcome! I’m so happy they are helpful! 🙂
I have seen ads where you advertise zookeeper, I don’t see it mentioned in your curriculum picks?
We use Night Zookeeper as a supplemental program for extra practice on spelling, vocabulary, and creative writing. It isn’t part of our daily routine or curriculum. We mostly enjoy using it during the summer months.
Hi! I love your posts so much and, as I’m sitting here trying to figure out what our plan is from now until senior year of high school (kidding/ not kidding lol) I am wondering what you thought of DART and if you will keep going with it for the foreseeable future or if you’ll use something else. We used them this year and, while my kiddo loves the books themselves, seems to be retaining very few of the concepts that were supposed to be taught. I am really struggling to pick a longterm scope and sequence but decision fatigue is real and it’s burning me out. We use Fix It for grammar and LOVE it, so I don’t want to leave that. But as for the writing and reading I really wish I had a cohesive scope and sequence. Also, do you try to tie your books into your family studies or do you let your LA be totally separate for each kid? I’d love to know what you’re thinking.
It depends on each child. Darts worked so well with my daughter! We loved it and used them for three years. My son started using them this year and they didn’t work as well for him. He needed more review and repetition. Next year we are going to be trying EIW (Excellence in Writing) for both of my kids. It covers parts of speech and writing, but we will still be able to keep Fix It Grammar for daily grammar practice. We keep LA separate for the most part and they will still each read a chapter book each month on their own. 🙂
Thanks for the reply! Will the EIW be for both writing and literature, or just one or the other?
EIW is just for grammar/parts of speech and writing. We will still read literature separately and complete book reports on them.
We did your Adventures through America 1 & 2 this year and loved them! I was also planning on doing CA history next year, but noticed you mentioned the Beautiful Feet was boring. Do you have any recommendations or something you would have done differently based on your experience? I am hoping you will do a CA unit study! I would love to purchase from you for next year!!!!
The Beautiful Feet Books California History curriculum is great as a rough guide, but I wouldn’t follow it lesson by lesson! It has been helpful to follow the timeline of events and topics covered, but then I would just look for books in our library on those topics and fun projects on Pinterest. I’ll be doing a blog post reviewing the curriculum at the end of our school year (May) and will share which books we enjoyed and which are good to skip, plus any project ideas we added. 🙂
I will be doing CA history this year with my 4th and 2nd grader! But here I am almost about to begin our new school year and I am still overthinking it. I really wanted to give Beautiful Feet a try, but my kids don’t like a literature approach. So I feel so stuck on what to do. They love hands on, crafts, very little reading. What made BF boring for you guys? Books too dry? Not enough activities to do? I am wondering if I should just follow the timeline of events like you mentioned and find crafts / activities for them to do on Pintrest. We are driving up to Yosemite next month so I hope to stop at some fun places on the way up there from SOCal.
Many of the books were very boring and dry. There are no activities other than a few recipes (that my kids wouldn’t eat) and the notebooking. I have a highlight on my Instagram that shares fun projects and resources we added to it for different topics.