One of the things I love most about homeschooling is that there’s not one right way to do it. There are so many different philosophies and approaches, and every family gets to choose what works for them. My biggest recommendation for anyone who’s just starting out is to read a few books on different methods, spend time talking with homeschooling families, and ask them why they chose what they did. Often you’ll find yourself drawn to something that really resonates with your values and lifestyle.
For me, that’s been the Charlotte Mason philosophy. I don’t follow it 100% strictly, but I keep coming back to it year after year because it feels so rich and beautiful. I love the focus on living books, the emphasis on good habits, the exposure to nature and art and music, and the idea that education is more about forming a whole person than just checking boxes. I always get asked about my curriculum choices, and they are ever-evolving, but I want to share this year’s picks with you here.
This year, my daughter is in Year 3 with Ambleside Online as our core curriculum. It’s a free Charlotte Mason-based program that covers literature, history, geography, poetry, artist and composer study. You supplement it with your own choices for math, reading, language arts, foreign language, and so on. I’ve found that it gives us a strong framework but still leaves a lot of room for flexibility.
Literature & Living Books
A huge part of Charlotte Mason’s philosophy is using living books, books written by authors who are passionate about the subject, filled with rich language and ideas that stay with you. Living books engage the heart and mind.
Ambleside Online’s book selections are full of these kinds of stories, and they’ve helped my daughter fall in love with reading. She’s currently reading at a fourth or fifth grade level, so her reading “curriculum” at this point is simply reading lots of good books. I focus on providing her with wholesome, well-written chapter books that reflect strong values and rich storytelling.
Math
We started our homeschool journey using Life of Fred, which is a quirky and engaging math series. While it was fun and offered a different approach, I found that I needed more support as the teacher. So we switched to The Good and the Beautiful, which offered more structure and guidance.
That worked for a while, but as we got into more advanced concepts, the teaching style wasn’t quite clicking for my daughter. This year, we’re trying Math with Confidence, which is another Charlotte Mason-friendly option that uses a mastery-based approach with hands-on manipulatives. I’m hopeful it will be a better fit for where she’s at. We also love to play lots of math games to make learning super fun and reinforce concepts. Here are some of our favorites for the elementary age.
Reading & Spelling
For early reading, we used How to Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. I plan to use it again with my son when he’s ready. It’s straightforward and worked really well for us. We then moved on to Bob Books early readers, and had great success with those. We also love these early readers.
Now that my daughter is a confident reader, our focus has shifted to spelling. We’ve recently started using All About Spelling, which is hands-on and multi-sensory. It’s been helpful for reinforcing phonics and spelling rules in a gentle, engaging way.
Language (Spanish)
For Spanish, we use a curriculum called Homeschool Languages. It’s play-based and very gentle, which I love. It’s been a great fit for our homeschool because it’s developmentally appropriate and easy to incorporate into our day without feeling overwhelming.
Music
For piano lessons, we use Busy Kids Do Piano, an online virtual piano lesson program. It’s flexible, affordable, and my daughter really enjoys it. I love that it allows us to include music education without needing to leave the house or rearrange our schedule.
Nature Study
For nature study, we occasionally use resources from Treehouse Schoolhouse. Their materials are beautiful and well-structured, and I love how they help us slow down and connect more intentionally with the natural world around us.
Kindergarten (Year 0)
Charlotte Mason didn’t recommend starting formal academics until around age six or seven. That’s something I’ve really taken to heart. When my daughter was younger, we did a gentle Charlotte Mason-inspired kindergarten through A Gentle Feast.
My son is technically entering kindergarten this year, but he’s not quite ready for a formal curriculum, and that’s perfectly okay. We’ll be reading lots of beautiful picture books (I reference Ambleside’s Year 0 booklist for ideas), playing outside, exploring, and helping around the house. All of that is real learning. Helping in the kitchen, digging in the dirt, building forts are all things that are forming the foundation for future academics.
There’s also a lot of research that supports this approach. Countries that delay formal schooling until age seven tend to have better long-term outcomes in reading, emotional development, and even math. Children learn best when they’re ready. We will be doing lots of play based math. Here are some of our favorite preschool/kindergarten level math games.
If you have a preschooler who you need to keep busy and entertained while you school the big kids, I’ve got you covered! Here are our favorite preschool activities. The key though is that these only come out during school time, so they stay new and fun and exciting.
Faith-Based Supplements: Orthodox Christian Resources
One area where I’ve chosen to make adjustments to our curriculum is in how we approach spiritual education. While Ambleside Online includes Christian elements, we are an Orthodox Christian family, and I’ve found that some of the suggested content doesn’t align with our tradition.
So we’ve started supplementing and sometimes replacing readings with resources from Nourishing Souls, a beautiful, thoughtfully curated Orthodox Charlotte Mason site. It offers booklists, liturgical study ideas, saints’ lives, and other Orthodox-specific resources that help us keep Christ at the center of our homeschool in a way that’s consistent with our faith and rhythms of the Church year.
It’s been a gift to have resources that reflect our beliefs and traditions more closely, and I highly recommend it to other Orthodox families looking to weave the faith more fully into their homeschool.
