These sites come recommended by Christina, my friend of ...25 years (OUCH!- are we that old???) The great thing about Christina is that she and I met in junior high when her great dad decided to start a homeschool basketball team. He took 7 jr high girls and tried to make us basketball players. 5 years later when we graduated he was coaching 3 or 4 homeschool teams and we were beating lots of unsespecting Christian School teams who thought we were just playing basketball for PE class. They didn't know Coach Estes....basketball was life....not a hobby!
Christina and I have recently reconnected on Facebook. She is a homeschooling mom of two and an exceptional photographer. Her homeschool list is lengthy...but she's been doing this a while so hopefully you'll glean from her experience.
Thanks Christina!
Her List:
I noticed that others mentioned Enchanted Learning. Good things there. I subscribed when my kiddos were younger.
Amen on Donna Young!!
Librivox
Paula's Archives
Ambleside OnlineBook Adventure
TanglewoodPaper Back Swap
Answers in Genesis videos
Dangerous Journey study guide
1000 good book list --- and other things on their site---love their history books.
Discovery Education--this is only free if the Public TV station in your state pays for schools to access it. In GA they do and they allow homeschoolers free access. We have to re-new each year by sending our attendance reports and intent letter to a secretary at our local PBS station and she send us the code. Obviously this is not christian. You may wonder why I keep mentioning that. Because I use lots of things that are not particularly christian in our homeschooling. There is so much good stuff out there and we use lots of things Christan and secular and when needed we add our Christian worldview and political views each step of the way.
Copywork ideas
Book of Centuries
animated atlas
Geography
Jan Brett
Old Fashioned Education
Not used--mathbugsZaner Blouser
NASApaper models
Math Facts
Project Gutenberg and The Baldwin Project are in the links below and are also among our favorites. I do find for us that is is better to not use free workbooks such as math/language, because the printing and paper costs are often more than buying the book. Lower costs programs that I have used or that others I know have used and loved
Explode The Code ---inexpensive workbooks from School Box (our local teacher supply store) The one for younger children is Get Ready for the Code.
First Language Lessons---loved this, but a very gentle approach. The price has gone up on these, but there may be plenty of used ones out there. We also loved the CD.After we taught basic letter formation (with Ian-zaner blouser and handwriting without tears/with Chloe, I just printed out an alphabet and showed her how to make the letters) we did copywork--Handwriting paper and then give them things to copy. Either on a chalkboard/whileboard or write it our for them. This can be Bible verses, spelling words, songs/hymns, etc. This kills two birds with one stone esp. for the reluctant writer. ; )
We have used George Washington's rules of civility, passages from good literature--some fun and some serious. Chloe always loved writing excerpts from Little House on the Prairie books. If you want a book for this instead we at one time or another used the Memoria Press Copywork book and some from lulu.com .Reading great books is a wonderful way to learn to read or after learning to read. I loved this instead of readers---though w/my mom working in an Abeka school, we have our fair share of those too-we just treat them like books. We used Phonics Pathways and just read books.
I did use Rod and Staff English for awhile and may pick it back up. This is a no frills curriculum. You don't write in the books, so they can be used w/multiple children. For now this is why I am not using them---Ian is a very reluctant writer and it was killing him. It is a very thourough program. Compare w/Abeka, though R&S includes more writing instruction then Abeka. Mennonite company therefore very old fashioned and wholesome.
I have used several Math programs, but probably the best value in the lower grades is to get a workbook (Abeka, Horizons,Singapore, etc.) and either teach the concepts yourself or try to find a used cirrculum guide on a swap board or maybe e-bay.
Abeka workbooks can be ordered at the hotel meetings all around the USA for free shipping. If you don't mind using the library, you can do history and science completly with only the library, or get a guide of some sort and pull books to go w/it from the libraray.
Most of our homeschooling years I have loosely gone by The Well Trained Mind. I love her history--The Story of the World. You can buy the book and activity guide and just pull from the library. Some Christians do not like these, so fair warning. I did add Mystery of History and the Vos bible story book side by side w/these (a list helping coorelate those found here), but the author for MOH has not finished her history cycle, so at some point I had to start pulling from other resourses. I am a huge history buff and would love it if we didn't have to do any other subjects ever, so this may not be anything like what you are looking for. Some people I know will do a year of American History with their children and then start w/Story of the World. In the elementary years, I love how she outlines science. Using the library and the computer you can do a fantastic little science program. Fun too!
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