Latter-day Learning

**This is an affiliate post.  I was offered this curriculum to use for free in exchange for an honest review and feedback.  I was not required to give a positive review.  All opinions expressed are my own.  If you decide to purchase this curriculum by clicking on any links within the post, I will be paid a small amount which would be greatly appreciated.**

Coming up with a curriculum for each school year can seem like a daunting task.  There are so many choices for each subject and there are always going to be those that just don’t work for your family, which is a bummer when you spend the money for something you won’t use.  It’s my least favorite part of the year. 

This year we started with a new curriculum called Latter-day Learning (this first link will take you to the main page for Latter-day Learning… no affiliate link).  Before I tell you how much we love it what we think of it, let me tell you a little bit about it.  This is a curriculum designed to be used for ages 4-12 as a group (family) setting.  That is why they refer to it as The Family School!  You can get the printed version or the digital version and print it all out yourself (that’s the way I do it.)

It’s a 6 year rotation and I believe they have 2 years available for purchase right now.  Latter-day Learning encompasses ALL subjects except math and language arts.  When I say ‘ALL’ I mean:  history, literature, science, geography, art, and music.  That is amazing!  Also, each lesson is tied to a gospel principle to help them understand it in a way that Heavenly Father would want them to understand it with an eternal perspective. 

Most homeschoolers that I know, including myself, try to have all their kids learning together as much as possible.  It’s not hard to have them all learning the same things in the subjects covered with Latter-day Learning.  The trick is getting each child to learn on their own level while in the group setting and it can be done!  Math and language arts, however, would be difficult.  You can’t teach a 12 year old and a 4-year-old the same language arts or math concepts.  If said 12 year old is learning pre-algebra for instance, the 4-year-old may get left behind.  Unless you have a genius 4-year-old.  In that case… have a ball!  ;)

Now I’m getting anxious to just say this:

We LOVE it! 

When I first started homeschooling I didn’t think I wanted it to be about religion at all.  School was school… secular only.  That was my mindset because that’s what I knew.  My mind quickly changed when I realized I wanted my kids to have spiritual growth as well.  And not only in addition to the secular but the spiritual became MORE important!

 

Since starting school again myself last month I’ve come to realize how much I depend on my spiritual knowledge to gain a clearer understanding of the secular knowledge. 

Age wise, I have to say that my 5 year old is not quite ready for this.  He has a learning style unique to him that I haven’t quite figured out yet.  He’s an interesting case, that C.  So, he will participate in the parts that look and sound fun to him but that happens probably less than 10% of the time.  All of my girls are actively engaged in this curriculum always!  They absolutely adore the lessons and I am so impressed at how much I am learning myself.  The lessons are very thorough and even though they say up to age 12, I find that they are easily adaptable for older kids as well. 

Miss K has been able to choose from several different types of essays to write.  I love that they give examples of each type of essay and a run down of how it would be graded.  K did a Five Senses essay about her dance studio.  That was fun!  In fact, reading over the different types of papers and essays has helped ME in my writing for my own classes. 

I think the favorite overall subject so far has been Literature.  Fairy Tales are up first in Year 1.  Who doesn’t love a good old fashioned fairy tale? 

If you are wondering if this curriculum might be a good fit for your homeschool you can take a gander at their sample lessons. 

There will be follow up posts in the coming weeks and months just to update you on our progress of this curriculum and how we are doing with it. 

This has truly been a blessing to my family.  Everything is laid out for me.  I don’t have to do much prep work at all other than making sure I have everything ready and reading each lesson ahead of time to make sure I understand what is being taught.  I don’t think I can ever go back… this program is everything I have ever wanted for my family and more.  And it is so easy to adapt it for different ages and comprehensions.  My two oldest girls take notes during the lesson while my youngest daughter is just present, listening.  Sometimes she will draw a picture of what is being talked about.  The application activities are geared toward both younger and older children.  I usually assign my oldest the activity for ‘older children’ and my youngest the one for ‘younger children’.  Miss A is stuck somewhere in the middle so I often let her choose whichever one sounds more appealing to her.  About 50% of the time she chooses the older activity. 

So, now that you know how much we love Latter-day Learning, what questions do you have?  Is there anything you want to know?  Anything I didn’t cover?