As you know, there are many great homeschooling resources out there. So many are free, some are for minimal cost, some are the complete package (like this one we are about to review – Moving Beyond the Page). I love that we have so many options to suit our children and our educational needs.
Like with all school years, you actually have 12 months to complete a school year, so it is really up to you as to how you utilize your time.
For me, I still pick and choose sort of girl when it comes to curriculum. I essentially create my own from what my daughters are interested in. We use a math and German curriculum as that is easier for me and the girls enjoy them, but for everything else I use a bit of this, a bit of that, and a whole lot of tweaking goes on from week to week based on their interest. I also am a firm believer in skills based learning, so I am leaning on teaching the skills, not content.
One thing I like to do is to help families work out what is the best curriculum for their children. There are so many out there! It ultimately comes down to what is best for you as a family, your goals for education, and how you feel you can most effectively homeschool your child.
MOVING BEYOND THE PAGE
This is a curriculum I have used before and really like. It is one that I still have on my radar for my girls if we decide to use a complete curriculum.
It is not faith based, and I know that that is important for some people. But don’t let that stop you looking at it if you are wanting something faith based. I haven’t seen any red flags that would hinder religious families from using them.
I like their ethos – to pull from their website:
Your children will grow in their love of learning through our literature-based curriculum that
- encourages critical and creative thinking,
- provides challenging and engaging projects, and
- supports different learning styles.
With Moving Beyond the Page, each day is different. Every activity is designed to instill a love of learning and creative expression.
And I would agree with this. I love the creative and critical thinking aspects of this curriculum. It was fun to use and easy to teach.
PROS OF MOVING BEYOND THE PAGE
- Complete curriculum for language arts (including literature, grammar, writing and more), Social Studies, Science and Math.
- Unit studies incorporate all the subjects
- Literature based (and it uses a wide variety of quality literature)
- Hands-on: hands-on learning activities, projects and explorations are part of its curriculum, making it multisensory
- Meets State and National standards
- Very little prep work is required of the parent/instructor
- Has a constructivist approach – learning is a process where children build/construct knowledge as they engage with the world around them
- Multi-age – each level has the suggested ages, as it acknowledges the differences in our children. You can therefore use one level for a couple of ages.
- Available as a physical and as an online product
- Placement tests available
- Complete in that you will receive all the books and materials you need to complete the curriculum
CONS
- Cost can be prohibitive. Prices range from $475 for ages 4-5 to about $1100 depending on the level (but remember that you receive all that you need for the entire year. You can also get the literature from the library or 2nd hand for cheaper.)
- Not all of the curriculum is reusable. The literature is, of course, but the workbooks are consumable so you would need to purchase others if you wish to reuse it.
- The online version is only available for 18 months. This gives you more than enough time to complete it, but you can’t reuse it.
- Only goes up to the end of middle school
- It is not designed for special needs (though designed for gifted kids) but that doesn’t mean that it cannot be used – you might have to do more tweaking to make it work for your child
Moving Beyond The Page is a curriculum that I am keeping in mind for my girls if we decide to use a complete curriculum (as we take our approach year by year). I enjoyed teaching it and I know that it would provide a rich educational experience for my girls. I do highly recommend it.
Other curriculum review:
Abeka
Torchlight
The Good and the Beautiful
K12
Math part 1
Math part 2
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