2025 - 2026 Curriculum Review

2025-2026 is wrapping up and I wanted to share what we loved (and didn’t) this year.

In general, I’ve kept most math and language arts the same. Once I find something that works for the two core areas I tend to keep them in place.

Language Arts

If you follow me on social media, you know that I love the tried-and-true Shurley English for grammar and vocabulary.

Pros:

• Thorough - my kids have a solid understanding of parts of speech, verb tense, diagramming

• Focuses on mechanics as well

• Extensively higher-level vocabulary introduced each week

• Predictable schedule

• Sentence booklets make it easier

• Wonderful teacher guide for when you’re unsure (yep- I too- need that sometimes)

• Practice pages for any concepts introduced each week Predicted

• Weekly assessments

Cons:

• The first lesson each week can take around 20-40 minutes depending on how many elements you include

• It is parent intensive, at least the first day or two. Again, this depends on your child. All three of my children become independent by day three each week. I then just check their work.

IEW is what my older children use for writing beginning third grade, through six grade. Then we transition to Lost Tools. Keep in mind I also teach writing classes and my children are enrolled in my classes. Those are not IEW (I know, my poor kids write a lot but they don’t really mind).

This year we used Medieval IEW, as that correlated with our writing.

We also read several books focusing on our history studies, including:

• A Door in the Wall

• Adam of the Road

• King Arthur

• The Adventures of Robinhood

• Joan of Arc

We used Memoria Press for several of our novel studies. We love their book studies! The questions require higher level thinking, strong reading comprehension, and thorough study and understanding of vocabulary used in the text. We use them for at least four books a year and then do other activities for the books in-between.

A few fun reads for my kids, some we all read together and others individually:

• Because of Winn Dixie

• Wizard of Oz

• Mary Poppins

• Wind in the Door

• Wrinkle in Time

• Puppets of Spellhorst

• Toad and Frog

• Little Bear

• Blaze

• Treasure Island

This is a small sampling, but these are the ones we had fun within terms of our movie nights and themed meals! It’s become a tradition here.

My youngest wrapped up Logic of English. It is tried and true and based on the science of reading. We added the online content this last time and used it as independent review, once we completed the lesson together. My son really enjoyed that. We took LOE slower, as he has orthographic dyslexia. Spell Links was a second part of his language arts instruction, but you do need appropriate training to use this program.

My youngest also wrapped up Building Writers and WriteShop Primary. I love these as a gentle approach to writing. They are not time intensive, which I find to be beneficial for boys in particular.

Math

Honestly, if you know me at all you know I love Math Mammoth. It is just such a solid program. All three of my children use it. It has prepared my oldest well for Algebra 1.

Why do I love it?

• Variety of problems

• Colorful diagrams and instructions

• Free online videos and resources

• Puzzles and critical thinking components

• Plethora of word problems and real-life application

• End of unit assessments

My mother-in-law was a math education professor, with her PhD in math and when we searched for a strong mathematics curriculum, we agreed this was a winner.

History

As I write about earlier, we used novels and IEW to enhance history. We also used Tea Time Together Middle Ages and Renaissance as a springboard. We would then dive deeper through books, hands-on projects, and videos.

We also incorporated Take Time for Art kits. We have used these for other history units as well and they are always a hit! They are well thought out and, again, I don’t have to run around figuring out where to buy supplies! Win!

Science

The Science Unlocked kits from Home Science Tools were a huge time saver for me this year. My youngest wanted to explore to many topics, so we bought several in the Wonder category:

• Brrr to Burrow: blubber, burrows, and hibernating

• Amazing Mirrors: periscope, mirror maze, and more

• Sound: vibration, making sounds, noise

• Blast Off rockets and push/pull

• Space: planets, night and day

• Chemical Reactions: cloud dough, “exploding” volcanoes

We formed a little pod with his buddies and completed experiments together every other week. They are practical and engaging. They come with every supply (except for say water). It makes my life so much easier. I love science but I just don’t have time to run around gathering supplies right now.

My older children completed kits I chose to correlate with our focus: Physical Science. The lab books are thorough, and we enjoy doing the experiments together. Toward the end of the year, I began having the complete some experiments without me. They were able to follow the directions and complete the labs quite well! We will definitely use these kits again.

My older children also use Science Shepherd Physical Science. It was a terrific fit! The videos are short but extremely informative. There are two levels of workbooks, so you can choose the best level for your child to have children at two different levels still working together. They never complain about science, instead look forward to it! Disclaimer: This is a Christian curriculum.

Art

We used Tea Time Together Art History. They offer monthly guides, so we just bought the entire bundle and began in July. We have absolutely loved this. Every Monday we study a new piece of part (each month the artist changes), poetry, and a composer. I made a review notebook for each of my children, so they could glue in each picture we stud and write their thoughts and rate the artwork. You can grab that here:

Bible

We focused on two Not Consumed studies and the read a book as a family (yes- it says guys but we read it as a family because we like to keep communication open).

My Thoughts

Honestly, I don’t have complaints about anything we did this year. We loved it all. I was extremely intentional with what I chose. I wanted to make sure I was involved with every subject but there was still some independence. We did switch from Biblioplan History (used this for several years) for the year because I really wanted to focus on the writing component and needed something that was a little less cumbersome for the year. I LOVE Biblioplan but knew I didn't have the bandwidth with other commitments.

Other things we focused on:

We completed a Science Shepherd course on archeology and the Bible. That was such great study as a family! We all loved it!

We watched World Watch News with lunch four days a week. My children love it and it opens up so many conversations at the dinner table each evening.

Speaking of which, we play games at dinner, and they typically align with things we are studying. We did study states, capitals, and geography using my own resources and lots of games! We will also read from our Bible study at dinner.

Each child focused on two meals they wanted to perfect this year. We had our own mini nutrition unit and focused on label reading and making best choices.

My youngest and I also completed a year’s worth of I’m the Chef Too baking kits. It’s most definitely his favorite activity!

*My list does not include co-op and outside courses taken. This focuses on what we did at home.

When choosing curriculum, it is important to ask yourself:

• Do I have the time and bandwidth to implement this?

• Is this a style of curriculum I will enjoy teaching? Will it mesh with my child(ren)’s learning styles?

• What can my children do independently?

• How can I help my children to become more independent?

As always, what works for my family may not work for yours! That’s okay! You have to do what is best for your children.

I'll reveal what we have planned for next year in the coming months! I really take my time when planning and ordering curriculum. If you just purchase curriculum because it is on sale or to ease anxiety about the coming year, you will overbuy and over plan. And, in most cases, change your plan. Don't rush it. Be intentional.