2024-2025 Homeschool Curriculum (Traditional Catholic + Classical)

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In this post, I’m sharing our Traditional Catholic + Classical homeschool curriculum choices for 2024 – 2025.

After several months of detailed researching and planning (and a whole lot of coffee!), I finally put together our plans for the upcoming school year.

But also, this is the earliest, I’ve ever been this far ahead! And while it was a little stressful to plan for the upcoming year while simultaneously teaching the current school year, I’m so glad that I did it this way.

Now I can just focus on organization and lesson planning this summer. Without the pressure of ordering and planning before our start date!

In case you missed it, we made some pivoting from Charlotte Mason to more Classical & more Catholic. I found a lot of great resources and many of you were interested to hear about them too.

The things that I want to continue using from Charlotte Mason are narrations, nature study & observations, habit & virtue formation, and use of good books. However, we are making them work within our Classical curriculum and not stressing over it too much.

Our 2024-2025 Curriculum Choices

I put together our plans with a variety of sources that are both Traditional Catholic & Classical too.

This year, I have students going in to Kindergarten, 3rd grade, 5th grade, and one that is special needs.

For the most part, I put together our resources from Memoria Press and TAN Books with many other additions included.

✨ Btw, I have a discount code for you from TAN Books at the end of this post!

For art instruction for my 3rd grade child and my special needs child, we are going to use Drawing Textbook this year.

For Kindergarten art instruction, we have a variety of crafts and activities included in her program.

Additional Catechism and Catholic Faith Resources

In addition to our Catechism lessons, I do have a 10 minute independent spiritual reading time on their daily schedules. This has been working out really well for the children.

During this time, they are free to choose a lives of the saints or other spiritual book from our library.

Some favorite resources for the younger students are these lives of the saints.

Angel Food for Boys & Girls and Catholic Stories for Boys & Girls are also tied to specific lessons throughout the school year.

I also have shared about additional catechism resources and recommendations for the Catholic homeschool.

Catholic History

Currently we are doing a general history as a common family subject with additional focus based on grade level. I’ll share more about individual history lessons when I talk about Classical Studies below.

Last year, we began using the Land of Our Lady Series with “Founders of Freedom” and really loved it. We are continuing this series with “Bearers of Freedom”.

I have been enjoying using this series as a common subject. We are also reading through A History of England for Catholic Children: From the Earliest Times to 1850 — which we started last year. We only read a few chapters per term, but they are wonderful Catholic Stories.

I have been so disappointed in the past with so many anti-catholic bias & pro-reformation history books in many of the recommendations from popular Charlotte Mason programs. So, I have taken a lot of time to research and find good Catholic history books for our family.

I also did not like the sources available from most Catholic curriculum programs. But we are very happy with the Land of Our Lady series!

History Supplemental Reading

In addition to our history, we have a lot of history supplemental chapter books that the children can enjoy in leisure reading time.

Some of my children are ferocious readers so I may have to add to this list over the course of the year.

Since we are studying early American History this year, I have pulled these books as supplements based on the time period.

• Priest on Horseback: Father Farmer
• Blackrobe Peacemaker: Pierre De Smet
• Cross Among the Tomahawks
• Padre Kino and the Trail to the Pacific
• Colonial Governor Thomas Dongan
• Adventurous Lady: Margaret Brent of Maryland
• De Tonti of the Iron Hand and the Exploration of the Mississippi
• Chuiraquimba and Black Robes
• Blessed Marie of New France

Music Study

Music Appreciation – This is the core of our music study this year. It is new to us, so it is to be determined how we feel about it yet.

Lingua Angelica – This is for my 5th grader this year. I wanted to start using this program last year. However, I decided to focus on Latin grammar first which has worked really well for all of the students, even my special needs student has picked up some knowledge here.

I also put together playlists of Catholic hymns and clean folk songs to include in our morning time throughout the year.

In addition, we are listening to one composer per term. This isn’t something that I make super complicated. We just focus on a composer and enjoy his works over a term. We don’t study their lives too in depth either.

I also love to play some quiet or softer classical music from the term’s composer during quiet study time or while the children are taking tests.

My oldest child will begin this intro to Music Theory program from Memoria Press this year.

The children have also been taking piano lessons in the afternoons. Since we live very rural, we use Hoffman Academy online and it has been a great & fun resource for the children.

Classical Studies

In addition to the general history that we cover together, my 5th grader is also studying The Famous Men of Rome. Last year she studied Greek Myths and loved it.

My children are working through this Time Line program based off of the lessons in history & Christian Studies that we cover.

Geography

We are following the geography programs through Memoria Press again this year.

Kindergarten – we will be using a variety of picture books.

3rd grade geography: studying the United States & Capitals.

5th grade geography: Geography I – the Middle East, North Africa, and Europe. And with additional review of the United States.

Special Needs: we are working on map work and land forms for her skill level.

Language Arts

Since this covers such a wide area of subjects with the English language, I’m going to break this down by grade level.

Kindergarten Language Arts

My daughter will be using the Kindergarten Morning Work, Kindergarten Enrichment, and Alphabet Books.

In addition I will be using the Little Angel Readers for teaching her phonics and reading. I’ve used this in the past and it worked well so I will continue to use it with my newest reader. I also love that they are Catholic.

She will begin with these alphabet books and then move on to use this copy work book later in the year.

3rd Grade Language Arts

This year, we are using a couple of options from IEW for grammar and writing lessons. These are Adventures in Writing and Fix It! Grammar – level one Nose Tree.

For spelling work & practice, we are using the All About Spelling program.

5th Grade Language Arts

We are also using IEW and All About Spelling for my 5th grader. She will be using Fables, Myths, and Fairy Tales Writing Lessons and Fix it Grammar – Town Mouse and Country Mouse.

And for my little Narnians, I found this fun writing book to practice their cursive and penmanship. For K & special needs, they are using this print version.

Also for extra reading practice, we like these Catholic Cardinal Readers.

Math

We moved to Rod & Staff & Memoria Math last year when we switched to the Classical method and I just love it! The children are all really doing well with it. We are following the math plans as recommended by Memoria Press.

Rod & Staff & Memoria really focuses on memorization of math facts which is something that I think is missing from the CM method.

For my special needs student, we are using Simply Classical from Memoria Press.

Science

This is a subject that I struggled with finding a good solid Catholic based science program that wasn’t too dry, free of modernism, and the children would find interesting. I’ve purchased many options and did not like most of them – even those from some popular Traditional Catholic programs.

I settled on options from TAN Books for my students. I have just skimmed through them, and so far the texts and workbooks seem to be free of any error – I will have to dive in to them more fully over the summer.

The pictures are absolutely stunning too.

3rd grade: he will be using Earth – Exploring Our Home, and also Oceans – Mysteries of the Deep.

5th grade: she will be using Cells & Systems – Living Machines, and also Space – A Tour of the Cosmos.

We are not using the video series, just the textbook & workbook.

Kindergarten & Special Needs: both girls will be using the Fields and Flowers science from The Good and the Beautiful. Generally, I don’t like their other curriculum options, but this is perfect for our needs in a gentle science program for the younger years.

In addition, we are taking time for regular nature study observations. We are fortunate that we live in the middle of nowhere on a cattle ranch. There are plenty of opportunities for nature walks & observations!

I have shared some of our favorite nature study resources here.

Literature & Read-Alouds

I try to provide a variety of options for independent reading as well as family read-aloud options through the year. We also dropped Shakespeare this year and it is undetermined if we will pick it back up in the future. At this point, I’m leaning towards not.

And as I’ve mentioned before, my children basically devour books. So, I’m sure that I will add to this list throughout the year.

• City of the Golden House
• The Chronicles of Narnia set (must be read in the original publisher’s order! 😉 The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe > Prince Caspian > The Voyage of the Dawn Treader > The Silver Chair > The Horse and His Boy > The Magician’s Nephew > The Last Battle )
• The Little House on the Prairie Series
• Winnie the Pooh
• Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of Nihm
• The Tale of Despereaux
• Heidi
• Black Beauty
• Fr. Finn Series
• Lassie Come Home
• Justin Morgan Had a Horse
• Little Britches: Father and I Were Ranchers
• By the Great Horn Spoon!
• Mother Cabrini: Missionary to the World
• Saint Isaac and the Indians
• Mother Seton
• Kateri Tekawitha: Mohawk Maiden
• The Moffat’s
• Mary Fabyan Windeatt Series
• The Tale of Three Trees
• The Tale of the Firebird
• King Midas and the Golden Touch
• A House is a House for Me
• Mr. Popper’s Penguins
• The Green Fairy Book
• The Violet Fairy Book
• The Brown Fairy Book
• Just So Stories
• Pinocchio
• Aesop’s Fables

+ plenty of picture books too! I shared some of our favorite pictures books here.

Poetry

Selections from poetry are used for mom to read-aloud and for student’s recitations, dictations, and copywork.

• Harp & Laurel Wreath
• Poetry Every Child Should Know
• Poetry Every Catholic Should Know 
• A Child’s Garden of Verses 

Handicrafts & Extras

For handicrafts, my children will be working on embroidery and wool felting – I just picked up basic supplies at Hobby Lobby.

In addition, my 5th grade child and my special needs child will be using this learning Sewing with Saint Anne during their free time.

My 5th grader will also begin typing lessons this year too. We are using The Good and Beautiful Typing 1 this year.

Special Needs

I wanted to finish with a brief note on special needs. I have included some of the things that we are using whenever possible. Other times, we are using a variety of items from Simply Classical Special Needs Program from Memoria Press.

Since each special needs or those on the spectrum are so wildly different, it is hard to box it in to one set of books or program. At least that is how it works for my daughter. Her needs vary greatly and I’ve had to piece together her program for what I think will work well for her.

Whatever doesn’t work, I make adjustments whenever necessary. I would also like to mention that Memoria Press has worked really well for her and we struggled with so many other programs in the past.

If you’re struggling with a special needs student, I would highly recommend looking into Simply Classical. And also check out this book – it was super helpful for me!