Back to Homeschool Part 5

Randi at I have to say... is hosting Back to Homeschool week. She's put forth one question for each day this week.

Friday, August 10---Curriculum
What curriculum do you use? Where do you buy it? Have you found a "gem" that you must share with others? Was something in particular a complete failure for you and your kids?

We did My Father's World Kindergarten last year. It was fun, but I modified the language arts portion a LOT. The unit study part was wonderful, and we both enjoyed learning about different aspects of Creation. But I learned that it is better for my kiddo to have his basic separate from his unit study. He also did Singapore Early Bird Math 2A and 2B. Our waste-of-money for the year was the purchase of the first unit of Rod and Staff Language Arts for first grade. There was WAY too much workbook work for my kid. Might work for others, but didn't work for use at all.

This year we are using (very loosely) the Advanced Kindergarten Language Arts from Winter Promise with readers from both Winter Promise Adv K LA and Sonlight LA 1. Math is Horizons Math K. Both are working very nicely.

We are currently working on some lapbook units from our backlog of products from In the Hands of a Child. They are much enjoyed.

In two weeks or so we will start our unit study on geography and cultures. I've complied it from Galloping the Globe, Cantering the Country, Five in a Row, HomeschoolShare, and Sonlight Core C. We are using some notebooking products and lapbooking products to create a scrapbook of our journey. It should be fun.

Know what? I have to be up again in 5.5 hours. I need to go to bed!