This post is so spot on. We actually got one of the A Little Spot books to help cope with his anxiety with bad guys. He thinks bad guys are going to break in but we did this pretend investigation. We drove around the neighborhood to see if any bad guys are dancing on top of the roof and trying to break in from the top of the roof (I dont know if Santa has any influence on his imagination since this worry monster started in December). I also show him how we could keep us safe, like locking doors and windows. And as long as the door is locked, we are good. But his imagination gets the best of him because next thing he talks about is bad guys using a wrecking ball to get inside. So, I learned and still learning how to set boundaries on his worrying. I told him his worry monster likes to play what if games, and if he let the worry monster makes him believe in his what if stories, he wins and grows bigger. Only way to shrink the monster is to tell him that he know what the worry monster says is not real. As much as I wish I could shelter him from bad stuff, it is impossible. We live in the city. We see protests regarding current events. He once saw violent images regarding the war in Ukraine. And I have to explain away that sometimes bad things happen in different parts of the world and we have leaders who make very bad decisions that affect peoples' lives. Luckily, he has no memories of the protests and break-ins that happened here because of covid lol. I really like the concept of having a book of sad things and being able to close the book. I might have to try that! It really helps to have input from another parent who has a sensitive 5 year old! Yes, I want to do an alternative history. Skip some of the negativity but not completely sanitize the bad. Just allow a little bit in to discuss in order to grow a little bit in coping with the world. I thought of just getting a history book on artists or inventors. And work through that. My 5 year old is also sensitive with the concept of death and he wants to know how to live a long life. I think if I focus on different peoples' lives, he could learn how some people live long lives and how some people don't live long lives because of disease, famine, etc. And try to steer the conversation to being grateful for living in the time we are living and how we know the importance of eating healthy, getting enough sleep, exercise, and taking care of our mental health. Hopefully this won't be too heavy for him either. But I think maybe what you suggest is simpler. Just focus on learning holidays and celebrations and traditions. It could work great with the calendar we got with Bookshark anyway. Yes, we do have access to museums here. We have a very basic local history museum and we have an anthropological museum that is pretty woke. But he is not ready to understand this wokeness agenda yet because then I am back to discussing how these lands and cultural artefacts were taken again! It is Story of Exploration all over again! But we do have a good art museum, so hence why I am leaning on focusing on art history for kids for the moment.

Thank you everybody for the wonderful responses. It really made me think step back and think. I really like this. I really want my kid to have the coping mechanisms to handle that bad guys/things happened. We have been working on his anxiety about bad guys but we have been losing sleep over this for the last month. I am almost at burned out dealing with this. So yes, I am thinking just to do a quick look ahead and decide whether to read it or skip it. I like to keep the read alouds if he is emotionally mature enough for them. Thank you for bringing up this point. I am sleep deprived and I totally forgot that this is the age that this is the age he is still figuring out what is good and what is bad. My 5 year old is not a fan of Spiderman or any superhero TV shows because he doesn't like watching any fighting. I thought of getting him to do a martial arts class to empower him, but he really doesn't like the idea of fighting or getting hurt. Oh well. I am leaning heavily just to keep with the schedule but skip the "heavy" topics for now since that can wait. It is not like he remembers a lot of what we read for history but somehow the dark parts of history seems to stick. Yes, we have visited many of historical places near our home already. I haven't done things like show him a fire station yet. So, I am going to look into incorporating that kind of field trips. I wouldn't have focus much on history or science this year but since we are a part of a charter school we have to have work samples in these subject areas and show we meet state standards (whatever they are). But so far this school year, my kid discovered he really loves science! And he still enjoys bookshark history (even though there are very scary bits sprinkled here and there). So, if he doesn't hate it yet and still want to do it, I don't see a reason to switch to something yet. I am just going to replace one of the history spines and not focus on explorers this year.

I am in my first year of homeschooling with our charter school. So yes, total newbie. 😁👋 In the last month and a half, my 5 year old boy developed anxiety, partly due to a social situation. But once that situation has resolved, he has this worry bug about bad guys. He constantly talks about how he is scared of bad guys breaking into our home. We managed to calm his worries, so he is not talking about it all the time but he is still sadly preoccupied with it at least six times a day. Today I pulled out a couple of books we are working on with Bookshark A to see what he remembers. But he has these random questions like was King Henry (VIII) a bad guy? Then I remember how he is concerned about the other pictures he has seen in the Bookshark books that made him concern like an illustration of captured Africans chained up or how Magellan was about to get hit in the head in the Philippines in Story of Exploration. And it makes me think, "Wait, is this history curriculum contributing to his anxiety of bad guys?" I look ahead in the main reference books, and it is not like Bookshark will get any gentler. I am not sure what to do. I have studied the Bookshark catalog, it says that it works with students with special needs like anxiety but there is no where I can find in the materials (and their blogs) how I am supposed to adjust for a sensitive, anxious boy, like am I supposed to spend extra time and read his read alouds and books ahead of time and make sure to cover up any violent images with post its and make notes of what to skip. Or is my time better spent taking a break from Bookshark and try something else to meet whatever his standards are for history? I really love that I don't have to spend so much time online shopping for read alouds anymore, thanks to Bookshark. Even my kid loves Bookshark a lot. I am just not sure if it is the right selection of books to read once school restarts after New Years.

Okay, I went to look at Beautiful Feet Books for California History. It is designed to be 3 lessons a day for a school year. Each lesson is 1 hour long. So, if you do try to condense this curriculum to a semester, you have to really look at what you can take out - that is if you planned to still do both California and medieval history. I am not familiar with how SOTW is set up and how long each lessons are. But SOTW is a whole year's curriculum. Maybe you could look into this so you can figure out what to fit in your day. Trimming these two curriculums may be too much of a hassle. So yeah, sorry for the bad advice earlier...They are both great curriculums; it might be a disservice for you and your daughter if you cut too much out. So... If you are not homeschooling through a charter school for fourth grade, and you and your kid rather cover Medieval History, ditch California history. I wish I could be in this boat when my kid is in 4th grade because I do not like following standards but I need help to cover homeschooling costs. If you are homeschooling through a charter school, then do BFB California history or SOTW 2 with CA Studies Weekly (California Studies Weekly should meet state standards.) And if you still want the books from BFB, just get the ones you like and not buy the teacher guide.

I am new to homeschooling too. And I could relate to this. We are doing "independent study" through a charter school, and trying to meet kindergarten standards threw my decision-making off the rails. I wish I could only focus on math, phonics, and handwriting ... but got to meet history and NGSS (science) standards for the year. So I somehow have two history/geography and two science curriculums planned out... for kindergarten. One to meet standards and one to meet the kindergartener's interest in natural science and geography. But I have a kid hungry for knowledge and me reading aloud to him... And I plan to do some trimming and stretching some parts out into the summer as a light fun summer school because I am not going to burn myself. And my mental health matters. So yeah, I totally understand feeling crazy and overwhelmed. I. Still. Feel that way. Because state standards just get to me. But I cope by drawing out what our daily rhythms will be for the week (because as a stay-at-home mom with a baby, there is housework that can't be ignored). I stare at the schedule and ask myself if each item is reasonable to do? When in the day do I get some me time to have a break? I also visualize my year too, just to make sure we are not doing too much. So, when I look at your history, I could see you are trying to meet state standards (learning California history) but you also have this classical/Charlotte Mason thing going on. Does your kid have an interest in medieval history? Because that is a lot of medieval history with the accompanying literature. See, my plan to meet standards is to get them over with first, so I could focus on what the kid really wants to learn. So maybe for you, in your first trimester or semester, focus on only California history with BF and keep it lean (do not get the suggested books for enrichment, unless you need to meet one of standards that the provided books for BF did not cover). That way you and your daughter do not feel overwhelmed with too much history. You do not want your daughter to hate history because then it could be a problem in the future. And after finishing BF, use the CA studies weekly once a week as a review. Or if you haven't bought it yet, don't get it. Then once you finish covering California history, you need to figure out how many weeks you have left to cover Medieval History and here you got to plot things out and be okay to take some units out. Again, you are going to have to go lean since you are not doing a full school year schedule, unless you are planning to continue to homeschool into the summer or pick back up Medieval History in 5th grade. I am also worried how much read alouds you have for Medieval history. 20+ is a lot, especially if you are going by 180 day school year. I don't know what you got but figure out your own criteria list to downsize. For example, I would first scan through them to see if they are really appropriate for a 4th grader and get rid of those that are meant for an older audience. Limit the number of read alouds that is on the same subject so you have variation. And see what you have left. And then look at how many chapters or how long the chapters are. And plan to read a chapter or two each time it is time to cover history. And hey, if your kid doesn't like the read aloud, skip it. That is the beauty of homeschool. We could make learning enjoyable. I am no expert at homeschooling (since I am new to it) but I know how to teach myself in the things I am interested in. I also know my kid because at the end of the day, the kid is the curriculum. And these curriculums we buy, we have to mold them to fit the kid, not the other way around. Do what is best fit for your daughter. I am assuming science is her least favorite subject and history is her favorite? Anyway, mama, please do not stressed out. Try not to have this FOMO because you didn't read this or that to your kid. Aim to figure out what your homeschooling/homelife rhythm will be like with all these curriculums and books you want to do. You chosen very good ones. You just to figure out if you could fit them in your daily, weekly, monthly schedule. I think once you do some planning, it could alleviate the anxiety. Lori gave you some excellent advice what to do.

From what I see from the Level A samples, there is some cutting and gluing to put the readers together. I don't see that for the later levels, unless I missed something for Level B? And I am glad to hear that AAR follows the same flow as LOE, which makes sense since they are both OG based. Thanks for sharing. Good to know there is variation in genres for AAR and it is not all the same. I have not heard of the LOE alphabet books; I will check them out! Edit: Just realize that Doodling Dragons is one of the alphabet books. It is tempting to do both programs but I really don't want to risk burnout. I like the idea of just keeping it simple but heh, I kind of ruined that by getting some Explode the Code primers to have some busy work for the kindergartener. And good to know ahead of time that I will probably will need readers even if I go with both. We are not religious but will be happy to check TGATB to see if it is the right fit for a family. Thank you.

I want to start Level A, but when I look at the B-D sample readers, I was not liking the artwork on these readers. And I am afraid my 5 year old would not be motivated to learn to read with LOE readers. So I was wondering... For anyone who has done LOE Foundations, how did your kid like the readers that come with the program? Did you end up having to supplement with something else?