Sonlight F or mom designed? Help me decide!

[sdobis]

I've been planning on using Sonlight F/Eastern Hemisphere for a while when my daughter finished her history cycle. She has a love of other cultures, especially Asian cultures, and wants to travel a lot as an adult. She also has a heart for missions. Now that I'm looking at it, I cannot decide if it's worth it. Here is my current pros and cons list:

 

Pros-

Scheduled for me

Know the best order to use the books

Already have discussion questions

Notebooking pages look good

Bible integrated

Mapping and timeline built in

Plenty of activity ideas

 

Cons-

We've read a few of the books already

Cost-I could use more books we have easily available

I'd like to use less read aloud and more audiobooks. I don't know how easily I could find those books. Maybe more of a concern than a con.

Tweaking is inevitable

My daughter is dyslexic. The reading may move too fast for her.

 

Opinions? Have you used it and loved it? Do you have any tools to create something just as good? (Maps or other schedules or whatever)

[TheAttachedMama]

I am having the same internal argument except I am debating between Sonlight American history vs. mom designed.

 

 

To answer YOUR question, though, I would personally recommend that you do a mom designed year.    I really like Sonlight, but I've heard multiple times that their core F is not the best.    I think the idea of the core is really cool (and of course the books are going to be great)---but I've heard that there is a lot of filler this year.    I bet you could come up with something just as cool that would be perfect for your situation.    In other words, what is the point of paying extra to have a schedule laid out for you if you are going to have to majorly tweak it (book swaps, too difficult readers, etc.)   

[sdobis]

I just saw that you can buy the notebooking pages that correlate with the Journey to the Eastern Hemisphere spine. There's also mapping, timelines, and activity ideas included. Yay! This was what I was most nervous about coming up with. I could buy the spine and notebook and do the rest myself.

[SebastianCat]

We are longtime SL users, and I've done a year of a mom-designed curriculum (FL state history) as well as tweaked many SL Cores.   My DD did Core F for her 5th & 6th grade years, stretched over 2 years.   I put together a year of additional Readers and added more missionary biographies, and we ended up ditching the notebooking pages after a while and just doing the reading about each country.  

 

The yearlong study that I put together totally on my own was much more fun, possibly because of the subject matter, and possibly because I had more invested in it.   We were diligent about reading the books I had selected, but it was a much more relaxed year than trying to follow the typical SL schedule.   

 

I would choose whichever option you feel most comfortable with, keeping in mind any state laws about what you must cover or how you must document your studies.    But you really can't go wrong as long as she is learning something.   When your DD gets to high school, you'll have more a prescribed course to follow for history (most colleges want 1 year of World History, 1 year of American History, and 1/2 year each of Government and Economics), but while she's in middle school, I would study what interests you both.

[ByGrace3]

I am having this exact internal debate...I have considered getting the Eastern Hemisphere book and notebook and building my own around that...but I really want the discussion questions so I would end up buying at least a used core F guide so not sure if I would save enough money to make it worth it . . . 

[swellmomma]

Good timing on this one.  I was trying to figure out what we are doing next year, and whether or not I am hsing youngest with ds13 or just him.  I was just looking at both sonlight and bookshark eastern hemisphere sets and debating if one of them would be a good fit or if I should do a mom planned, or something else entirely.

[8Arrows4theLord]

We also use Sonlight. Their book list for F is very good, and we've purchased many of them already. But I'm not sure about spending the $ on a brand new IG.( I have 2 that could go into F or G. We have all of G, but one really wants to do F. :confused1: ) I have not seen the new Eastern Hemisphere spine yet. We love the books, but have not been impressed with Sonlight's discussion questions in the previous cores we've done. I plan to use book guides for better discussion questions ( free ones are available on line for some of the books) and our own narrations for the others, no matter which we do. I like what Sabastiancat did - study the countries more in depth. So part mom made, part Sonlight would be my vote.

 

[sdobis]

We also use Sonlight. Their book list for F is very good, and we've purchased many of them already. But I'm not sure about spending the $ on a brand new IG.( I have 2 that could go into F or G. We have all of G, but one really wants to do F. :confused1: ) I have not seen the new Eastern Hemisphere spine yet. We love the books, but have not been impressed with Sonlight's discussion questions in the previous cores we've done. I plan to use book guides for better discussion questions ( free ones are available on line for some of the books) and our own narrations for the others, no matter which we do. I like what Sabastiancat did - study the countries more in depth. So part mom made, part Sonlight would be my vote.

Yes, the questions don't look that good. I don't want to buy the guide just for those. I keep going back and forth between simplicity and getting what I want. I'm having a hard time finding book guides for the books I've chosen. I need to do more research. Good thing I enjoy research!