Veritas Press: What do you think about their curriculum?

[calledtobehome]

Just got my catalogue today and wanted to know if anyone used any of their material for early elementary(K-2nd)? If so what do you think about it?

[abbeyej]

I love some of the things in their catalog -- and not others. That's helpful, huh? ;) For early grades, I love their "art primers" set (which is really books published by other people that they recommend). When we were in Paris and London recently, my kids recognized works and artists they had first been introduced to from those books.

 

I love the books they use in their "First Favorites" series too! It's a great selection of intelligent, challenging yet entertaining picture books. The workbook for First Favorites? Meh. Over two kids, I ended up using about 1/4 of the material in the two workbooks I'd bought. The illustrations were mediocre, the assignments uninspired. Not terrible, just not great.

 

I loved the *idea* of Phonics Museum, but when I had the chance to look at it (and look past the really fabulously wonderful "museum" set-up -- oooh, I love that!), I felt the readers were incredibly stilted and the workbook again, uninspiring. I wished I could just buy the museum as an art-appreciation set and stick with my simpler phonics programs.

 

Legends and Leagues? Big disappointment. Boring, pedantic picture book (though I did love the backgrounds of the illustrations, that showed a variety of different kinds of maps), and the workbook was cluttered and not particularly well conceived. Nothing I couldn't do as well or better with any old library books.

 

For older kids, I love the history cards. I've raved especially about the Explorers-1815 and 1815-Present American History sets. They really organized our History of US (Hakim) readings and helped the kids get a good overview of American history. The cards are beautiful, full of information, work well with a variety of resources... Really great.

 

And I'm totally intrigued by Omnibus... ;) But we're not there yet...

[Heather in VA]

I have similar feedback as Abbey. I adore the cards. My girls are doing great with memorizing the songs and my middle daughter is doing the full history program. It's great. My oldest will be doing Omnibus III next year. We'd done bits and pieces up until now and finally we both just couldn't figure out why we weren't doing the whole thing. It's really terrific.

 

I am using Phonics Museum with my youngest (5 years old). I know that many don't like the stiltedness of the readers and the amount of writing in the workbook but it's going VERY well for my daughter. She loves it. She also went from barely reading a 3 letter word having to sound out every letter and still not flowing it together to reading chapter books on her own in the past 6 months of PM. We do no other phonics instuction. (well we read lots of other books but actual instruction is what I mean). I know my signature says we use All About Spelling too but I stopped because PM is working so much better.

 

I have used their First Favorites books and loved them but next year will be the first time I'll use the workbooks along with it. Since my dd loves the PM workbook I think it will be fine.

 

VP has a more 'schooly' feel than many curriculum. That doesn't bother me. As much as I'd love them to be, my kids aren't ones to all cuddle around and listen to me read for hours and then go and build a zigguart while voluntarily researching their history. For me memory work is very important and VP provides a nice framework for the memory work and reading without making history the be and end all subject of our homeschool.

 

Heather

[Shelly in the Country]

I've taught two of my kids how to read with VP's Phonics Museum. I've read the complaints about the readers, too. My dd and ds have both liked and understood the readers though. My dd especially loved the art projects scattered through the workbooks. I forgot to use the song CD that came with PM with my son and we only have a few lessons left so I don't see the need. My dd, who is an auditory learner, really got a lot out of the CD though and she used to take it up to her room to listen to after school was over. My dd also LOVED the cardboard museum and pictures. We have really enjoyed Phonics Museum. I didn't need to do any additional phonics instruction. Between the teacher-directed practice in the manual, the worksheets, and the readers, Phonics Museum is very thorough. I have one set of VP History cards that I haven't really utilized. I was also unimpressed with Legends and Leagues, but my dd thought it was funny. I used the list of books for First Favorites as a book list and we loved the selections, but I never bought the teacher materials. HTH

[KLA]

Phonics Museum and First Favorites around here. My children did great with Phonics Museum - loved it all. We had no trouble at all with the books. My kids read them for years after we were done. I felt like it was a bit of history woven in there. They finished with beautiful handwriting and reading very well. I really liked the look of the workbook and the art projects were fun and easy.

My daughter absolutely loved First favorites.

 

KLA

[FloridaLisa]

I used VP for the first 5 years we homeschooled. I've kept the cards and used them over and again. They are gorgeous and make a wonderful timeline, game cards, memory tool. I love how VP merges Biblical and secular history through the cards.

 

Though I used the workbooks for many years, I never really liked them. The workbook readings are vacuum dust dry and the questions call for rote recall. The cards ended up forming the events around which we hinged our history studies, but we used living books, hands-on projects and other spines to liven it up.

 

I also love VP's living book recommendations, though the age level recommendations are at times a stretch. VP produces beautiful, quality materials. The sort of books you want lying around when grandparents are visiting. ;) Jk.

 

HTH,

Lisa

[kids&me]

:lurk5:

[greenmamato3]

We are just finishing up PM grade 1, having completed K as well, and have REALLY enjoyed it for our oldest DS. DD will begin casually in 2010 with it. we didn't use the CD much b/c i found the bass line to be quite bothersome; and my DS isn't much of an auditory learner. thought i found the readers to be a bit contrived at times, esp at the beginning, i felt they made for a GREAT way to pique the interest of DS in historical fact and stories that likely wouldn't have come up in our conversations otherwise. the art/museum part i feel was ingenious, even though we didn't set up the physical museum like we were "supposed" to. i felt the workbook was a bit repetitive at times, but i used various different activities to mix it up, or just skipped certain pages. :) that's the beauty of homeschooling! ;)

 

we've done ETC and Phonics Pathways in conjunction with the PM just b/c i'm terrible at keeping things simple and DS is HIGHLY linguistic anyway, so he loves those. for fear of hijacking this thread, can i ask those of you who are a step or two ahead of me where you went after finishing PM? i was planning FLL and WWE; should i keep going with ETC through level 8 and not start a spelling curriculum proper, or should i involve a spelling curriculum with it? or should i just drop the ETC all together and switch to a spelling curriculum? which spelling and what level?

[bess1676]

thank you all...this really helped!