BJ's Homeschool Curriculum Choices for Middle School -




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Note - This post may included affiliate links to products that we love and have used or would use in our  own homeschool if my daughter had not already graduated from BJ's Homeschool. Please see my disclosure policy.

I have lots of great memories of homeschooling middle school. My daughter did irish stepdancing, really loved doing nature photography in middle school and we also did a lot of bird watching for the backyard bird count events!  (45% OFF SALE is at end of post)


In middle school we used a variety of resources, some faith based and some secular.  One of my favorite thing about middle school was that I got to watch my daughter begin to discover that she wanted to be a leader through some volunteering at our co-op.  (SALE is below, end of post)

Here are our favorites for middle school homeschooling curriculum:


1.  MIDDLE SCHOOL ENGLISH CURRICULUM 


We have two favorites for middle school English.  --- Oak Meadow and 7 Sisters ---
Both are high quality and well put together. Let's start with Oak Meadow.

Have you heard of them yet?

---- Oak Meadow Middle School English

We started using Oak Meadow homeschool curricula when my daughter was in 4th grade. Oak Meadow also offers courses for middle school in math and science, which I also would recommend. They offer all subjects, which can be bought as a bundle, or individually. 


Here's why - 

Oak Meadow is a hands-on project oriented curriculum, that "strives to reach the child's head, hands, and heart."  It is written by creative educators, who originally were Waldorf based.  

My daughter loved it!  It was stimulating, creative, and very flexible. I loved how the lessons were written to the child, in a gentle way, but also packed with solid, child oriented, honors level information.  My gifted daughter loved it. 

Each lesson offered a number of creative activities to choose from. My daughter loved their hands-on focus.  All of the social studies curricula was paired with lit, that went right along with the topic of study.  

It was set out in weekly lessons, which gave us a loose structure that we could follow, tweet, or use in anyway that we wanted. At the same time, it saved me so much time in my planning, as it was all put together for me.

Sixth Grade English focused on composition and grammar, with three lit selections.  Click to see a sample lesson.  Each year was full of creative approaches to lit and writing.

In 7th Grade, my daughter's essay writing skills blossomed.  She loved the selection of the novels included in this course. Seventh Grade English

English 8 from Oak Meadow, focuses on reading 7 classic novels and writing about them.  I loved the questions for both comprehension and critical thinking in this course. It includes work in grammar and usage as well.  I have a review of the course here. 

Oak Meadow tends to be quite pricy.  

Want a more frugal option for middle school English, that still offers many of  the benefits of Oak Meadow?

---- 7 Sisters Frugal Middle School English

7 Sisters Homeschool is a popular site that is run by veteran homeschool moms who developed their own curriculum for high schoolers in their own co-op.  So all of their resources and courses are tried and true.



The 7 Sisters approach is based on over 20 years of homeschooling and was developed by moms who were teaching their own teens while running an umbrella school at the same time.

These veteran homeschool authors know how to capture a student's interest and then lead them into a solid study of literature all while avoiding any busywork.

And that they offer English resources for more than 40 literature or fun reading books.

They are perfect for making your own middle school English course!

7 Sisters Literature Guides 

Let's take a look at their frugal Literature Guides.  They offer over 40 of them, for under $5.00 each, including:
  • A Separate Peace
  • A Raisin in the Sun
  • The Scarlet Letter
  • The Hobbit
  • British Poetry Selections
  • Joni
  • Anne of Green Gables
  • Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats
  • The Invisible Man
  • The Three Musketeers
  • Animal Farm
and over 40 more!

Each guide gives your student questions to answer as they read their literature selection.  This is a great way to introduce literary analysis to your middle schooler, without your having to explain what it is.

Just have your student answer the questions provided for each literature selection.  AND many of the lit guides are for FUN and more free reading like books, not just classic literature.

7 Sisters Homeschool Writing Courses 

How about a fun way to get your middle schooler writing?

Middle School Short Story Writing will inspire your young teen to learn to love writing!

It also will help your child learn what literary analysis is, while they are having fun putting together their own story.

My own middle schooler loved trying her hand at story writing, and learned so much from that, while having FUN!

This guide is designed to be used only 4 days a week for 5 weeks.

The lessons are short and set up for success.

The  conversational tone makes the course easy to follow and understand, and helps to eliminate any anxiety about putting words onto the page.

Do you want help teaching your young teens how to write essays?  7 Sisters has a great course for that, too.

Middle School Guide to Essay Writing is a very frugal course that will teach your teen how to write essays

This is great preparation for later writing assignments in high school.

It gentle introduces essay writing to your young teen with an easy to follow, NO busywork approach.'

This guide will teach your studnet how to write a coherent essay, starting with:

- Basic essay format
- Persuasive essays
- Compare and contrast essays
...and more.

It also offers an easy way to grade your kid's essays.  How about that!

It can be such a help in grading your middle schooler's essays.

2.  HOMESCHOOL MIDDLE SCHOOL SOCIAL STUDIES CURRICULUM 

Sixth Grade - Ancient Civilization

Oak Meadow's 6th grade history curricula was stellar, and our very favorite of all of their social studies courses. 

We learned all about world history, one country at a time, with an emphasis on ancient history. It has respect for all cultures in its tone.

This was our ALL TIME FAVORITE history course, full of child-oriented lessons and excellent hands-on activities to go with them.

Then Oak Meadow Social Studies continues into 7th grade with:

Seventh Grade - World Civilization - From Age of Enlightenment to the Present

3.  HOMESCHOOL MIDDLE SCHOOL SCIENCE CURRICULUM 

For science, we made our own middle school courses simply.  These are some of our favorite things for middle school science activities and learning:

Do your kids like rocks?  

Here's an activity resource that we loved, all about rocks, minerals and fossils....

null
Click here for my review of this and other of their Middle School STEM Activity Books.


Carson-Dellosa Publishing, the publisher, offers 68 Middle School Science Activity Books to choose from, including:
  1.   The Periodic Table
  2.   Meteorology
  3.   Chemistry
  4.   Physical Science
  5.   DNA
  6.   Astronomy and 58 more….
Do your kids like science kits?  Have you seen these kits yet?


Science Wiz kits were first started with a grant from the National Science Foundation, and they have continued to win awards ever since.  I feel that they are very well done.


You don’t have to buy a complete science curriculum set for your kids at this age. Science Wiz is another alternative for you.  
They are written by science educators, who are knowledgeable in their fields and have years of teaching experience.

These Science Wiz Kits were also easy to use. 


4.  HOMESCHOOL CURRICULUM MIDDLE SCHOOL MATH
Saxon Math 6/5 3ED Homeschool KIT | Main photo (Cover)

Saxon Math We used and liked Saxon Math for 6th and 7th grade math.  It is a very well established homeschool math curriculum by

John Saxon using a teaching method of incremental learning of math.  It uses lots of review, and is well structured, great for kids who may struggle with math.  It was easy to teach and the review helped my daughter a lot.  
AOP Homeschooling Logo
Then in 8th grade we used Switched on Schoolhouse Pre-Algebra(CDRom) by Alpha Omega Publications, also a well established homeschool publisher.  They also have this course as a subscription online, and it is called Monarch.  This publisher is faith based, but the math is very easy to do in a secular way as well.
  
This course covered Pre-Algebra topics with a multi-media approach.  The explanations were clear and helpful, and that is according to my daughter.  It had the structured and depth that helped my daughter retain what she had learned.  I also liked that it was a self-graded course, a great time saver.  

5.  OTHER WRITING FUN - NaNovWriMo

In November each year, we dropped our regular studies and joined in the fun at the National Novel Writing Month (NaNovWriMo). It is a time to join others who are working on creative writing that month.  We used this book for middle school to help us get started.

1,000's of other great middle school homeschool curriculum finds can be found at the Rainbow Resource Center

This center offers a 3 inch thick printed catalog and website which list really tons of 1,000's of homeschool resources and curricula. They also offer phone and live chat help.

========
Are you thinking about maybe homeschooling your teen through high school?  We are so glad that we did, but were nervous at first.

Does that thought give you pause?

Would you like tips that are easy to follow from a veteran homeschool mama who has been there?

At BJ's Homeschool our always homeschooled daughter just graduated from her top choice U.  (We are so proud of her.)




This book covers how to plan for high school, with 12 exclusive planning forms and my best tips for helping your teen get into college, too.

The kindle is on Amazon  45% OFF through Friday
In print on Amazon too.

More information on it is here.



 High School Planning Printables plus a Homeschool
Transcript Form to just fill in!

Subscribers get the first chapter free! 


Click here this free download and we never do any email marketing. 

Get this free head start on helping your teen get into college!


This post is linked to the "Not Back to School Blog Hop"!



Thanks for stopping by BJ's Homeschool,

Betsy


Betsy is mom to her now college grad, whom she homeschooled from day one.  She blogs at BJ's Homeschool, about the early yearshigh school and wrote the book - Homeschooling High School with College in Mind.   She offers homeschool help through messages at BJ's Consulting


Want to stay in touch?  
This post was shared on my favorite linkups here.

Copyright, 2018, All Rights Reserved

Favorite Homeschool Curriculum for Middle Schoolers



Note - This post may included affiliate links to products that we love and have used or would use in our  own homeschool if my daughter had not already graduated from BJ's Homeschool. Please see my disclosure policy.


I have lots of great memories of homeschooling middle school. My 2e daughter did irish stepdancing, really loved doing nature photography in middle school and we also did a lot of bird watching for the backyard bird count events!


In middle school we used a variety of resources, some faith based and some secular.  One of my favorite thing about middle school was that I got to watch my daughter begin to discover that she wanted to be a leader through some volunteering at our co-op.  

We leaned towards hands-on approaches and project based learning as much as possible.
Here are our favorites for middle school homeschooling curriculum:


1.  HOMESCHOOL MIDDLE SCHOOL ENGLISH CURRICULUM 


We have two favorites for middle school English.  --- Oak Meadow and 7 Sisters ---
Both are high quality and well put together. Let's start with Oak Meadow.

Have you heard of them yet?

---- Oak Meadow Middle School English

We started using Oak Meadow homeschool curricula when my daughter was in 4th grade. Oak Meadow also offers courses for middle school in math and science, which I also would recommend. They offer all subjects, which can be bought as a bundle, or individually. 


Here's why - 

Oak Meadow is a hands-on project oriented curriculum, that "strives to reach the child's head, hands, and heart."  It is written by creative educators, who originally were Waldorf based.  

My daughter loved it!  It was stimulating, creative, and very flexible. I loved how the lessons were written to the child, in a gentle way, but also packed with solid, child oriented, honors level information.  My gifted daughter loved it. 

Each lesson offered a number of creative activities to choose from. My daughter loved their hands-on focus.  All of the social studies curricula was paired with lit, that went right along with the topic of study.  

It was set out in weekly lessons, which gave us a loose structure that we could follow, tweet, or use in anyway that we wanted. At the same time, it saved me so much time in my planning, as it was all put together for me.

Sixth Grade English focused on composition and grammar, with three lit selections.  Click to see a sample lesson.  Each year was full of creative approaches to lit and writing.

In 7th Grade, my daughter's essay writing skills blossomed.  She loved the selection of the novels included in this course. Seventh Grade English

English 8 from Oak Meadow, focuses on reading 7 classic novels and writing about them.  I loved the questions for both comprehension and critical thinking in this course. It includes work in grammar and usage as well.  I have a review of the course here. 

Oak Meadow tends to be quite pricy.  

Want a more frugal option for middle school English, that still offers many of  the benefits of Oak Meadow?

---- 7 Sisters Frugal Homeschool Middle School English

7 Sisters Homeschool is a popular site that is run by veteran homeschool moms who developed their own curriculum for high schoolers in their own co-op.  So all of their resources and courses are tried and true.


7 Sisters Lit Guides
The 7 Sisters approach is based on over 20 years of homeschooling and was developed by moms who were teaching their own teens while running an umbrella school at the same time.

These veteran homeschool authors know how to capture a student's interest and then lead them into a solid study of literature all while avoiding any busywork.

And that they offer English resources for more than 40 literature or fun reading books.

They are perfect for making your own middle school English course!

7 Sisters Literature Guides 

Let's take a look at their frugal Literature Guides.  They offer over 40 of them, for under $5.00 each, including:
  • A Separate Peace
  • A Raisin in the Sun
  • The Scarlet Letter
  • The Hobbit
  • British Poetry Selections
  • Joni
  • Anne of Green Gables
  • Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats
  • The Invisible Man
  • The Three Musketeers
  • Animal Farm
and over 40 more!

Each guide gives your student questions to answer as they read their literature selection.  This is a great way to introduce literary analysis to your middle schooler, without your having to explain what it is.

Just have your student answer the questions provided for each literature selection.  AND many of the lit guides are for FUN and more free reading like books, not just classic literature.


7 Sisters Homeschool Writing Courses 


How about a fun way to get your middle schooler writing?

Middle School Short Story Writing will inspire your young teen to learn to love writing!

It also will help your child learn what literary analysis is, while they are having fun putting together their own story.

My own middle schooler loved trying her hand at story writing, and learned so much from that, while having FUN!

This guide is designed to be used only 4 days a week for 5 weeks.

The lessons are short and set up for success.

The  conversational tone makes the course easy to follow and understand, and helps to eliminate any anxiety about putting words onto the page.

Do you want help teaching your young teens how to write essays?  7 Sisters has a great course for that, too.

Middle School Guide to Essay Writing is a very frugal course that will teach your teen how to write essays

This is great preparation for later writing assignments in high school.

It gentle introduces essay writing to your young teen with an easy to follow, NO busywork approach.'

This guide will teach your studnet how to write a coherent essay, starting with:

- Basic essay format
- Persuasive essays
- Compare and contrast essays
...and more.

It also offers an easy way to grade your kid's essays.  How about that!

It can be such a help in grading your middle schooler's essays.



2.  HOMESCHOOL MIDDLE SCHOOL SOCIAL STUDIES CURRICULUM 



Sixth Grade - Ancient Civilization

Oak Meadow's 6th grade history curricula was stellar, and our very favorite of all of their social studies courses. 

We learned all about world history, one country at a time, with an emphasis on ancient history. It has respect for all cultures in its tone.

This was our ALL TIME FAVORITE history course, full of child-oriented lessons and excellent hands-on activities to go with them.

Then Oak Meadow Social Studies continues into 7th grade with:

Seventh Grade - World Civilization - From Age of Enlightenment to the Present


3.  HOMESCHOOL MIDDLE SCHOOL SCIENCE CURRICULUM 


For science, we made our own middle school courses simply.  These are some of our favorite things for middle school science activities and learning:

Do your kids like rocks?  

Here's an activity resource that we loved, all about rocks, minerals and fossils....


null
Click here for my review of this and other of their Middle School STEM Activity Books.


Carson-Dellosa Publishing, the publisher, offers 68 Middle School Science Activity Books to choose from, including:
  1.   The Periodic Table
  2.   Meteorology
  3.   Chemistry
  4.   Physical Science
  5.   DNA
  6.   Astronomy and 58 more….



Do your kids like science kits?  Have you seen these kits yet?



Science Wiz kits were first started with a grant from the National Science Foundation, and they have continued to win awards ever since.  

I feel that they are very well done.


You don’t have to buy a complete science curriculum set for your kids at this age.
 Science Wiz is another alternative for you.  
They are written by science educators, who are knowledgeable in their fields and have years of teaching experience.

These Science Wiz Kits were also easy to use. 


4.  HOMESCHOOL CURRICULUM MIDDLE SCHOOL MATH

Saxon Math We used and liked Saxon Math for 6th and 7th grade math.  It is a very well established homeschool math curriculum by

John Saxon using a teaching method of incremental learning of math.  It uses lots of review, and is well structured, great for kids who may struggle with math.  It was easy to teach and the review helped my daughter a lot.  
AOP Homeschooling Logo


Then in 8th grade we used
 Switched on Schoolhouse Pre-Algebra(CDRom) by Alpha Omega Publications, also a well established homeschool publisher.  They also have this course as a subscription online, and it is called Monarch.  This publisher is faith based, but the math is very easy to do in a secular way as well.
  
This course covered Pre-Algebra topics with a multi-media approach.  The explanations were clear and helpful, and that is according to my daughter.  

NOTE - It had the structured and depth that helped my daughter retain what she had learned.  I also liked that it was a self-graded course, a great time saver.  


5.  OTHER WRITING FUN - NaNovWriMo


In November each year, we dropped our regular studies and joined in the fun at the National Novel Writing Month (NaNovWriMo). It is a time to join others who are working on creative writing that month.  We used this book for middle school to help us get started.

We really did take off most of November for writing activities, joining in the fun at NaNovWriMo.  Doing that helped my daughter become a middle schooler who LOVED to write!

Are you looking for one more just right resource for your middle schooler?

1,000's of other great middle school homeschool curriculum finds can be found at the Rainbow Resource Center

This center offers a 3 inch thick printed catalog and website which list really tons of 1,000's of homeschool resources and curricula. 
They also offer phone and live chat help for finding what you want there. 



Thanks for stopping by BJ's Homeschool,


Betsy



Betsy is mom to her now college grad daughter, whom she homeschooled since she was in K. 
She blogs at BJ's Homeschool, about

Betsy shares on  Facebookpins at BJ's Homeschool Pinterest.  You can also reach her on BJ's Twitter

Our Favorite Frugal Homeschool Curriculum Choices for Elementary -



Summary:  My favorite homeschool elementary curriculum and resources, frugal and developmentally based.  #homeschoolelementary This post may included affiliate links to products that we love and have used or would use in our own homeschool. Please see my disclosure policy.


Click on the title and that will lead you to lots of information on each of these elementary homeschool resources, that we loved. 


The Art of Simple Book Making - Your Child is an Author



Birdwatching - Nature Study 


 This post is all about birdwatching, with photos of birds in our area, and  resources to help you incoorporate STEM into your day...


Best Amazon Finds for Hands-On Learning


second page for birthday book for betsy's review

Encouraging your Littlest Author  
Helping young ones express themselves in writing or copywork.



  Nature/science studies for your kids-- animals, earth, plants, rocks and fossils, habitats, etc, with easy to do experiments that teach STEM.

You Can Learn Sign Language




Stamp Collecting for Kiddos 
Learn Geography while having fun and practicing organizational skills, too.


Our Favorites for US History




Science FUN in the Garden - with Printables




A curriculum that is creative and full of hands on activities, with lots of art, too.


Oak Meadow is similar to Charlotte Mason in many ways.  It strives to reach the child...head, hands and heart.
Lions, Tigers, and Testing, Oh, My! 

 There are so many ways to approach testing for your child, if that is required in your state. 



My friend from 7 Sisters Homeschool also offers an extensive list of quality Elementary Curriculum Resources here - Favorite Homeschool Curriculum for Elementary Grades.


This is connected to the "Not Back to 
"Not Back to School Blog Hop"!




Thanks for stopping by BJ's Homeschool,


Betsy



Betsy is mom to her now college graduate, whom she homeschooled from pre-K through high school.  She blogs at BJ's Homeschool, about the early yearshigh school & college and wrote - Homeschooling High School with College in Mind. She offers free homeschool help through messages at BJ's Consulting and has had her articles picked up by the Huffington Post.

Want to stay in touch?

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Copyright, 2021, All Rights Reserved

Our Homeschool Curriculum Choices for Preschool/K -




Note - This post may included affiliate links to products that we love and have used or would use in our own homeschool.  Please see my disclosure policy.



While we introduced learning activities in preschool, we took a playful approach.  And we picked resources that helped guide their play and introduced early learning concepts at the same time.

Top Picks for Aiming Towards College -




Summary and Note - Our frugal homeschool high school curriculum choices for science, math, English, social studies and more.  This post may included affiliate links to products that we love and have used or would use in our  own homeschool. Please see my disclosure policy.



Early spring is my favorite time of year.  I especially love how things are still slowed down at this time in our home.  

The Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling High School



Summary:  More than 100 resources for homeschooling high school, to plan to homeschool your teens, assign high school credit, find your homeschool high school curriculum, and more.   Note - This post may included affiliate links to products that we love and have used or would use in our  own homeschool. Please see my disclosure policy.



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