Jump to content

Menu

Secular Homeschoolers


Recommended Posts

Here's a big secular curriculum list I made. As for favorites, keeping in mind that what we like may not work for others, you can check my sig or blog.

 

Editing to be more helpful without all the acronyms.

 

 

  • Singapore Primary Mathematics
  • RightStart for the earlier years
  • All About Spelling
  • Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading
  • Explode the Code
  • Growing with Grammar
  • MCT Island (just getting into this)
  • Handwriting Without Tears and Getty-Dubay Italics
  • SOTW with Activity Guide (yes, we think it's secular enough for us)
  • R.E.A.L. Science Odyssey
  • Starting Singapore My Pals Are Here this week, looks promising
  • Meet the Masters
  • Prufrock Press logic books
  • Discovery Education Streaming videos

 

Edited by Satori
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Daughter:

 

Singapore Discovering Mathematics - love, love, love. Picture me hugging the books with hearts all circling around my head.

 

Singapore Interactive Science for Inquiring Minds - Good and solid and pushes my daughter to think. Not simply the best secular science I've seen but one of the best science programs period.

 

Jensen's Punctuation and Vocabulary - Dry as dust but wonderfully effective.

 

Grammar Voyage - Yay! I get grammar, I get it. Oh, works for my daughter too.;)

 

Getting Started With Latin - Great introduction.

 

L'art de Lire 3 - A little too much drawing for my daughter but it's a few grade levels below her I think. We started French late. I'm sticking with it.

 

Lingua Mater, Language Lessons from Literature - Haven't got it yet but looking forward to it. It's actually a Catholic program with lots of writings from Catholic sources but I like that. A way to introduce some ideas that have been very influential to Western thought perhaps?

 

My First History of Canada by Donalda Dickie - start it tommorrow

 

A Little History of the World by E. H. Gombrich - recall the picture with me hugging and lots of hearts.

 

Son:

 

Singapore Primary Mathematics - Passionate love

 

Singapore My Pals Are Here - He can't WAIT to do science

 

Apples and Pears and Dancing Bears - Not just secular but with characters drinking beer and a goat named Groin, just naughty enough for a 9 year old boy.

 

Peterson Directed Handwriting - Another favourite of my mine and my son's.

 

Lingua Mater is the only thing that's not secular. L'art de Lire has a story featuring the Bible a character's favourite book in the first book but it's not religious at all.

Edited by WishboneDawn
Link to comment
Share on other sites

All my curricula is in my sig line.

 

My favorites are Singapore Math, FLL and SOTW. We also enjoyed WWE for the first two years -- now I incorporate narration, dictation and copywork across the curriculum. I am trying out WWW for next year, so can't really give a review yet.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Apples and Pears and Dancing Bears - Not just secular but with characters drinking beer and a goat named Groin, just naughty enough for a 9 year old boy.

 

What?! I wish I had known that before buying McRuffy. Wow. I'll be looking at Dancing Bears samples after posting.

 

My personal favorites are not necessarily the same as the things that work best for my children, and add to that that my children have needed very different things at times.

 

But, off the top of my head, things I have loved:

 

MCT Island level (even though the linguist in me has seizures of disapproval from time to time)

 

Oak Meadow K

 

Noeo Biology 1 - minus the experiments

 

History Odyssey level 1 Ancients and Middle Ages

 

Key to Decimals

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Many of the programs I like or have planned for later have already been mentioned on this thread.

 

I'll just add a few more that we use(d) and like(d).

 

- KISS Grammar

- CSMP math

- Miquon math

- Blend Phonics

- Word Mastery

- Webster's Speller version for public schools

 

ETA: Forum member "ondreeuh" has a huge list of secular materials in her signature. Do a Tag Search for "secular".

Edited by nansk
Link to comment
Share on other sites

We've used and really enjoyed (my boys are 6 and 8 years old)

 

All About Spelling

Evan Moor Word Family workbooks (A, B, C, D)

 

The above two programs have been key in helping my 6 year old learn to read.

 

We've used lots of things from the Critical Thinking Company. Faves are/were:

Dr. Dooriddles

Can You Find Me? (pre-K)

Math Analogies

Balance Math and More

Balance Benders

 

We use Math U See as our math spine (the instructor is Christian and there is the odd reference to a Bible story sometimes), but have also used:

 

Jump Math

 

My logic- and riddle-loving 8 year old has also really enjoyed Mindware's "Analogy Challenges' and "Perplexors" books.

 

For science and history we do a lot of reading, watching DVDs, and real world exploration.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

These are curricula we have used and liked:

Math: Right Start, Math Mammoth, MEP

Phonics: Jolly Phonics/Jolly Grammar, Dancing Bears

Handwriting: Handwriting Without Tears, Zaner-Bloser

Spelling: Apples & Pears

Science: Great Explorations in Math and Science

History: Story of the World

Art: Atelier

Multi-Subject: Oak Meadow, Moving Beyond the Page, Five in Row

 

We haven't started the Galore Park stuff I ordered, but it looks good.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'll just list the stuff we're keeping, not what all we've tried...

 

 

  • Singapore Math (with Chris McCullen's workbooks and thatquiz for drills)
  • Getty Dubay Italics
  • Growing with Grammar (and Winning with Writing is on its way!)
  • Power Spelling (with spellingcity for review)
  • Story of the World (with tons of supplemental library books)
  • Real Science 4 Kids (with tons of supplemental library books)
  • Homemade literature list
  • Now this is going to sound silly, but our middle daughter LOVES Little Einsteins, so most of our formal art/music memorization is built around the work featured in the show (we made flashcards/soundcards in Anki)
  • Various Critical Thinking Co workbooks for logic

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We're just starting out but so far we really like:

 

All About Spelling

Explode the Code

Ordinary Parents Guide to Teaching Reading

Scholastic Grammar, Usage and Mechanics

Math Mammoth

MEP

REAL Science Odyssey

History Pockets

Intellego Unit Studies

a lot of games and activities from Scholastic books (usually bought during dollar deals)

Magic Tree House books

Magic School Bus books, videos, activity guides

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We're up to 5th grade, so the age ranges will vary:

 

Saxon Math

SOTW

k12 Human Odyssey

R.E.A.L. Homeschool Spanish

Key to... math series

Writing with Ease

Explode the Code

Spelling Power

History Pockets

Mark Kistler online art program

electronic field trips to Colonial Williamsburg through Homsechool Buyer's Co-op

Brainpop (getting ready to start Discovery Education Streaming)

Editor in Chief

Horrible Histories and Horrible Science

Dick and Jane books, various leveled readers from the library

Five in a Row

Caesar's English I

 

A few we tried that were horrible fits:

powerspeak French---fun, but she had zero retention

Growing with Grammar--she liked, but zero retention (this could be just her---nothing is really seeming to make grammar stick!:confused:)

Phonics Pathways

Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons

Singapore Math (US and Standards)--I liked it, didn't fit well for my daughter

Miquon Math--couldn't wrap my brain around this one

Vocabulary Vine--I let her try to do this independently too early, I think--again, poor retention. CE is working better for us.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What I use is in my siggy. I'm courting:

 

Exploration Education Physical Science

 

which another boardie assures me is completely secular.

 

You can always ask here. Some websites are "coy" in their FAQ, and some don't address it at all, which, if you are marketing to homeschoolers, really hacks me off. Surely they must KNOW that some people want their egg salted and some people don't.

 

Anyway, I've asked here many times and have never gotten rolled eyes or heavy sighs. HTH.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

We've used

 

OPGTTR

Saxon Math

Spelling Power

Wordly Wise

Easy Grammar

Shurley Grammar

National Geographic's Map Essentials

Runkle's World Physical Geography

Science in a Nutshell Kits

 

and lots of materials from Critical Thinking Press and Study Skills materials intended as work books for schools.

 

Several history programs are easily editable to be secular or make have a secular focus if you are Christian but not the same denomination as the authors.

 

SOTW is (IMHO) the most secular

Biblioplan

TOG

Vertias Press (as a reading list)

 

I think of Real Science 4 Kids as a secular program as written despite many claims to the contrary on the boards.

 

IEW Writing is another program that is either secular or easily editable depending on your perspective.

Edited by JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Favorite secular resources:

 

Story of the World Volume 1 and 2 and AG

Math Mammoth 1A-2A

Serl's Primary Language Lessons

Getty Dubay Italics Books A-C

Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding K-2

Getting To Know The World's Greatest Artists Series

GTKTWG Composers series

Edited by sagira
Added things
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, I'm brand-new to homeschooling so I can't say for sure which of these programs we'll stick with for the long haul, but here's what we've decided to use for our first year:

 

-Classical House of Learning Literature (CHOLLA) that I'll be supplementing with Mosaic's Bringing Up Learners for a more in-depth look at prehistory

-Writing with Ease/First Language Lessons/All About Spelling

-Real Science Odyssey (Life)

-Combination of Miquon and Singapore for math

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Excellent questions!

 

I'm sure I won't be able to remember them all, but I will try...

 

 

Math

Singapore Math - liked it, but wasn't a good fit at the time

Teaching Textbooks - like it and DragonGirl is still using it after a year

Math U See - liked it, but MonkeyBoy got too distracted with the blocks and just wanted to play with them

MEP for math - like it for MonkeyBoy and still using it

 

Social Studies / History

Story of the World - didn't care for it

History Odyssey - didn't care for it

Beautiful Feet Early American History - liked it

 

 

Science

R.E.A.L Science by Pandia Press - didn't care for it

Building Foundations of Scientific Understanding - liked it, but we decided to go the unit study route with science

Dr. Dave's Science - flipped thru it, didn't like it's approach to science, sold it

 

 

Language Arts

Michael Clay Thompson's Language Arts - liked it

Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading - didn't care for it

First Language Lessons - like it and still use it

Growing With Grammar - like it and still use it

Writing Strands - like it and still use it

Explode the Code - wasn't a good fit for MonkeyBoy... too much writing for him

Plaid Phonics - didn't like it

Latin for Children Primer: A - liked it, but wasn't a good fit for DragonGirl

Song School Latin - like it and still use it

Latin Prep - like it and still use it

Handwriting Without Tears - like it and still use it with MonkeyBoy

Getty Dubay Italic Handwriting - like it and still use it with DragonGirl

 

 

Unit Studies

Five In a Row and Beyond Five in a Row - liked it

 

We recently started a unit study by Intellego and I reviewed our first week on my blog. I'll definitely be buying more of these! :)

Edited by MangoMama
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...