Even now in reading these boards and all the great curriculum suggestions, I am looking up curriculum’s. My main curriculum is Sonlight and I absolutely love it. On top of doing the Sonlight, I add in other curriculum. I add extra bible, extra reading, extra language arts (I don’t use Sonlight’s LA-it didn’t seem like a good fit for my son). I just organized what I have last night and realized that I am trying to do 4 different English Grammar/Language Arts curriculum’s with one of my sons. Yikes!
This was a wake up call for me that I am definitely overdoing it and I need to be comfortable with just one and go with it.
How do you stop yourself from wanting to do everything? And even more so, how do you stop yourself from buying a lot of curriculum and trying to make your kids fit it all in?
You have articulated this question perfectly! This has been on my mind a lot lately and I have posted a few questions similar to this. I also have curriculum excitement and buy waaaaay to much😋 yesterday, I did something AMAZING, I threw away all my hs catalogs!!! I can find the info on each publishers website if I need it. My husband and I will be sitting together this weekend and writing out our goals and what we like: example-- how to teach math, spiral or mastery…unit study/hands on approach submersion for science like Apologia science or skim numerous topics per year like BJU or A Beka…chronological for history or alternate ancient/American histroy… Once we know the direction we want to teach in, it will narrow down our curriculum choices (we hope😉)
It is so hard! I plan out a main curriculum with one for each subject and then add maybe a few small things in and STICK TO THE LIST AT ALL COSTS!!toherwise we would have lots of stuff we never get to do and spend a ton of money.
I agree with you! I just keep finding so many good resources that I want the kids to see and use! I should just avoid all catalogs and the internet to protect our savings!
Had the same problem especially as we are making a lot of changes this year. I went through a list of all the things I was interested in and wrote the names of the subjects I was changing Science, Language etc…
Then I listed all the curriculum I was interested in for those subjects and the prices.
I left it for a few days and went back to list the pros and cons of each curriculum (even if the price was a con I wrote that) I crossed out all the ones that had a big NO beside them and left it for a few days again! Finally I went back and took the plunge picking the ones for each subject that would work for our family and I refuse to change my mind again! lol Here’s to an interesting year.
What helped me was to go over my list with DH. I tend to dream and plan big and he was very good at helping me develop and plan while not overloading the kids. I also let the kids go over things I was considering, when they were part of the decision it made teaching much easier.
Yes having the children as part of the decision is a big help. I tell them what the program is all about and see their reaction and ask what they prefer. I usually do this when I am down to 2 options though otherwise there is too much to pick from.
It can be so hard with all of the options out there. For me what has helped has been to take a look at the program/curriculum I am interested in again after a few weeks, and then once more a couple of weeks later. I usually find that I was attracted to the idea because it was new to me, but then I remember why I chose to use what we use and I thank the Lord for keeping me straight. Self-control is important.
I’m totally feeling this way right now! I’ve been researching all sorts of curriculum (first time homeschooler here) and I want to buy it all!!! I’ve heard so many good things about many different curricula and trying to narrow it down is tough! Especially since I’m not entirely sure what’ll work and what won’t
