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2022-2023 Homeschool Curriculum (based on Charlotte Mason)

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This is our 4th year of homeschooling with the Charlotte Mason method. And in the past, I haven’t shared what we are using for curriculum or books.

I’ve had some of you reach out and ask what we are using for certain subjects, so I thought it would be fun to share our curriculum for this school year.

stack of books used in the curriculum.

This year we have switched to using The CMEC in our homeschool. I am following nearly all of their suggestions for books, with a few exceptions. And I’ll cover all of that in this post.

In case you missed it, here’s my post explaining about why we moved to The CMEC. I hope that you will consider using them in your homeschool. This has been the BEST resource for using the Charlotte Mason method in our homeschool.

And for reference, I have students in Form 1B (1st grade), 1A lower (2nd grade), and 1A upper (3rd grade) this year.

Some of the books we are using are shared in common as a family and other’s are more grade specific.

Common Subjects

These are the subjects and books that we use together as a family. We do start off our school lessons with common family time or morning time as many refer to it. During this morning block, we are cozy in the living room and snuggled together on the couch.

This is where we begin with our catechism & bible study lessons. We rotate through a variety of these things throughout the week, so please note that we do not do all of these things each day.

For catechism this year, we are using the Our Holy Faith Series from St Augustine Academy Press. We are really enjoying the format of this catechism series and we’ve had a lot of great discussions as a family.

For supplementation that pairs really well with our catechism lessons, we are enjoying Angel Food for Boys and Girls.

We are also using the Child’s Bible History by F.J. Knecht a couple of times a week.

In addition, we have this excellent catechism for family discussion on Sundays, The Catechism in Pictures. The pictures are beautiful and makes for a great picture study as a family alongside our catechism lesson. I highly recommend this book!

And also for a supplement, we like these Catholic Tales for Boys and Girls and More Catholic Tales for Boys and Girls.

We are also using the St Jerome School Songbook for learning new Catholic hymns.

catechism and related religion books stacked for the homeschool

Literature

This year I decided to introduce myths into our homeschool. We had started with a few stories last year, but I didn’t feel like my children were mature enough for those stories then.

And we didn’t finish the school year with them.

Initially when planning out our year, I struggled with mythology in general. And I spent a lot of time in reflection regarding the readiness of my children for these concepts.

So, I had a conversation with our Bishop regarding myths, fables, and fairy tales in our homeschool. After his reassurance, I decided that we were ready for these in our home.

And they really do enjoy the Narnia series from C.S. Lewis, so we are ready to introduce these myths into our school lessons too.

So far, they have been well received!

Here’s what we are using for literature spread over this year.

We are also rotating through several chapter books throughout the year. As there are way too many favorites to list, I may write up a separate post on chapter books in the future.

Poetry

poetry book stacked on tabletop.

History

With our history curriculum, I wanted to make sure that we were including Catholic pieces of history specifically alongside of learning about American History before moving over to World History.

So we pieced together a few things with recommendations from the CMEC along with supplements from St Jerome’s Library.

Here’s what we are using this year:

Geography

We are following the CMEC recommendations for Geography this year and it’s been excellent.

Here’s what we are using for geography:

Math

Oh my goodness, let me just share with you how much I’m loving the math program we are using this year!

This year we have switched over to using the Charlotte Mason Elementary math series. And this is the first year that I’ve found something my children actually enjoy using.

Over the past years, we’ve tried various math books and curriculums, but this is the first that is enjoyable for both the student and mother-teacher!

Book 4 is new this year, and I’ve heard that book 5 is coming soon. We are loving them so far this year, I really hope that they’ll continue to make this series going forward!

We are also using Paper Sloyd as part of our math block once a week.

This is also an excellent resource that I recommend for teacher prep before beginning The Charlotte Mason method of math instruction.

math books stacked on desk in the classroom.

Reading

Charlotte Mason gives great instruction into her method of reading instruction inside of Home Education. We are also using the CMEC’s recommendation of Discover Reading for instruction.

Initially we bought the Treadwell Readers, but have switched to using McGuffey Primer and Readers. My 1B student is thriving with these readers and absolutely enjoys them!

The Beacon Readers are another great recommendation.

For handwriting practice, we are using this Italics workbook.

My older students are using Primary Language Lessons – it is spread over two years.

stack of school books on a desk.

Natural History

More nature study reference books that we are using:

Additional Resources

Here are a few more of the recommendations that were recommended from the CMEC. These books are used as teacher resources for lessons. These are used in artist & composer study, art instruction, and other handicrafts.

I know that this book list can seem like a lot. But really it’s not when we consider spreading the feast and the short lessons that Charlotte Mason recommended.

“We spread an abundant and delicate feast in the programmes and each small guest assimilates what he can”

― Charlotte mason, Philosophy of Education (vol 6)

🖤 Favorite products:

Here are a few of my favorite items as mentioned in this post.

Angel Food for Boys and Girls

Our Holy Faith Series

McGuffey Primer and Readers (Complete Set)

Tanglewood Tales

Handbook of Nature Study


Where would you like to start?

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6 Comments

  1. Hi, Mary,
    It was specifically in researching how to handle the history part of the CMEC curriculum that I found your blog, which has since been proved very helpful. I am transferring to the CMEC this year but, as a Catholic not wanting to utilize Protestant perspectives of history or the Bible, I have struggled in confirming how I’m going to substitute these subjects without deviating greatly from the rest of the curriculum. I’m thinking of sticking with what we started last year – RCHistory, which is Catholic (albeit using the modern Catechism which I will not be using) and Charlotte Mason compatible. Some of the resources you mentioned here look promising, but what recommendations from the CMEC (for History and the Bible) did you actually use and how did you find your personal supplementations integrated with those of the CMEC? Would you do things exactly the same again; if not, what would you do differently?
    Thanks,
    Christina

    1. Hi Christina,

      Thanks for reaching out! 🙂 So yes, some things that I shared in this post have changed and I am making a few changes for this upcoming school year. Mostly, I’m changing our history & some of our catechism books a bit. I’m in the middle of writing up the blog post for what we are using for the new school year and what changes we’ve made. I found a few new resources that I really like & will share them in the post…stay tuned! 😀

  2. I also found this post searching for a Catholic friendly history spine for form 1B. You probably figured this out by now but the America First book is horribly anti-Catholic, at least in its brutal portrayal of Cortez and praise of the Aztecs like they were just the most civilized people ever. And it perpetuates the flat earth non-sense with Columbus. Im sure there’s more but I stopped looking through it after that. Just something that needs to be said. Hoping to find something good for explorer history. Have you found something since then?

    1. Oh my word, yes! I actually threw that book out and we did not use it at all. Thank you for sharing and reminding me… I really need to update this blog post with what we changed!

      I am pretty disappointed in so many of the Charlotte Mason curriculum suggestions being so biased against Catholics and with limited alternatives that aren’t so heavily steeped with Reformation or other bias. We ended up using a text from Seton for Catholic explorer history in 1B and 1A with loads of supplemental literature thrown in. We’ve also finally settled in on The Land of Our Lady series from TAN books

      History is now a common family subject for us with additional resources for each grade level.

      I will share how we do all of this in an upcoming blog post. Hope this info is helpful! 🙂

  3. Hi Mary,
    I am pre reading builders our our country and wanted to know how you utilized this book ? was it a read aloud,guide, any project study ?
    Thank you