Choosing a Homeschooling Curriculum

Getting the right homeschooling curriculum for your family can make a big difference to your and your children’s happiness and contentment.

One thing every new home educator should know is that curricula always subscribe to an educational method (whether they realize it or not). The most popular homeschooling ones are:

• Traditional
• Charlotte Mason and
• Classical

But, for most Christians, the most important thing about a curriculum is that it adheres to a theology that honours Jesus Christ. For this reason, I’ve investigated several Christian curricula that interest me due to their popularity and the recommendations I’ve had from friends and online sources. These are:

• Switched on Schoolhouse (SOS) – an offline (USB delivered) computer-based package
• Easy Peasy All-in-One – a free online program
• Abeka Academy – a traditional education package
• Bob Jones University – another traditional education package

(I hope to review quite a few more programs in the future.)

I’m particularly interested in Classical and Charlotte Mason (CM) curricula. For this reason, I’ve compiled a couple of articles which list classical and CM programs below:

• 5 Classical programs
• 10 Charlotte Mason programs

Many families also find it difficult to homeschool on one income. For this reason, there are plenty of free home education packages on offer. I’ve looked into Easy Peasy All-in-One which is a Christian program. Other free options are:

• Ambleside Online (highly recommended), Wildwood,  and Higher Up and Further In – all Charlotte Mason-based homeschooling packages,
• The Khan Academy and
• Puritans Homeschool Curriculum – a traditional education package based on puritan materials.

You can see all these free programs and more reviewed on this page.

Pros and Cons of Free Educational Options

The idea of a free curriculum is an appealing one but comes with its share of disadvantages. Sometimes there is little help available for parents from the creators of the curriculum. This is because they don’t usually have a great amount of staff to help with queries. This disadvantage is often negated by extensive online forums and active Facebook support groups.

Another disadvantage of free curricula is the medium in which it is delivered. The homeschool curriculum is usually only given to parents through an online medium. This means children either need to do all the work online or parents need to print everything out themselves which can be tedious.

Some parents also feel a curriculum that’s completely online is perhaps too big a dose of technology and could be deleterious for their children.

With a free curriculum, parents might need to supplement the program if it’s missing a vital area of study or an area of study they value.  However, there are so many free online resources, it’s easy to believe everything can be done online without incurring too many additional expenses.

You can read more about the pros and cons of a free curriculum here.

Choosing a Christian Curriculum

As a Christian mother, I’m always inclined to go with a package that has a Christian foundation over a secular homeschooling curriculum. This is because the most important thing about an education is its ability to promote prayer, Bible reading and a good understanding of the gospel.

A Christian curriculum is also important because every syllabus writer has a religious bias and foundation. So, even if a program claims to be written from a neutral standpoint, it has an ideology the makers will be consciously or unconsciously pushing. Neutrality is (to give the benefit of doubt) a figment of their imagination, as everyone has a philosophical foundation they stand by vigorously.