Sonlight Curriculum: Great Books, But Is It Right For Your Family?

Sonlight Home School Curriculum might be a great fit for you if you would like a well-planned out, complete home school curriculum with great books and a Christian focus. Do you want to…

• make great literature the core of your home school curriculum?
• curl up on the couch or outside on the porch and read aloud to your kids to do school?
• have someone else plan the lessons, schedule the books and even assemble all the science materials?
• have a thoroughly Christian home school curriculum that isn't afraid to challenge your assumptions by raising controversial issues?
• learn about cultures and history from places all over the world, not just North America?

Hi, my name's Hilary, a home schooling mom of four kids who has used Sonlight for several years. I love Sonlight Curriculum for many reasons, but I also know firsthand that, despite all its great features, and ardent supporters, it isn't right for everyone. Keep reading to find out if it might be the right home schooling curriculum for your family - so you can save money and frustration if it isn't right for you!

Sonlight Christian Home School Curriculum: Basic Information

Sonlight Curriculum is a complete Christian home school curriculum based on great literature with a worldwide focus. As their catalog says, Sonlight Curriculum was started to gather the very best-of-the-best homeschool materials in one place to provide a one-stop opportunity for Americans living overseas to meet all their homeschooling needs.

Now, on to the specifics of our Sonlight Home School Curriculum Review:

Level: K-12, grade-based (called “Cores”), although their “Core” programs can be adapted to use with children who are somewhat older or younger.

Format: Literature-based, with lots of Newberry award winners, classic literature, and other historical fiction scheduled around various themes. A sample of yearly “Core” themes include:

• Introduction to World History
• Introduction to American History
• Eastern Hemisphere
• History of God's Kingdom
• Survey of British Literature

Method: Core programs include History, Read-Alouds, Readers, and Bible, with Science, Math, and Electives available too, making Sonlight Curriculum definitely a complete home school curriculum package.

The Language Arts assignments tie into the history readings starting from Core 3 (roughly third grade) and up. Writing assignments from various genres are included so that your child will learn all sorts of writing styles.

The Instructor's Guides give a day-by-day structured lesson plan. There are abundant explanatory background notes, narration questions, comprehension questions (with answers!), vocabulary helps, extra creative extracurricular suggestions, and learning objectives so you know what your child should be mastering. Sonlight Curriculum has put in countless hours with their guides, and they continue to update them in response to user's comments.

Read-alouds are definitely an integral part of the learning process with Sonlight Curriculum. Up until 7th grade, you, the parent, read aloud to your child and interact with the ideas you read together.

There are no tests or quizzes, but activity sheets are included in both the Language Arts and Science programs. Language Arts activity pages are tied to the Readers so there is added exposure to what they are learning in history and literature. The Science worksheets have pictures and diagrams and a variety of activities to make them both interesting and helpful for reinforcing concepts they are learning.

Focus: By reading great literature from around the world, and discussing them, parents and children learn together about God's work in the world. Sonlight purposefully seeks to present, as fairly as possible, the arguments for “all sides” of a case, including non-Christian ideas.

Worldview: Evangelical Christian, although there are non-Christians, Catholics and Orthodox Christians who adapt the curriculum.

Teacher time: 1 1/2 hours to 3 1/2 hours per day. For example, this would be the time for Read-Alouds, direct teaching of concepts, interacting on issues raised through the readings, and correcting activity sheets.

Price: $500-$800, depending on what type of Curriculum Package you buy (if it includes Math and Science or other Electives), what level you are teaching, and if you have used this “Core” before. Since most of the materials are non-consumable, if you have other children who will be home schooled, you can re-use the materials and thus save money.

Ease of Use: If you find their Instructor's Guides helpful, Sonlight Curriculum can be a very easy, complete home school curriculum to use since it has the main subjects arranged day by day. You can also order all the books and other supplies you need in one-stop shopping. Click here for online shopping made easy with Sonlight's online catalog.

Sonlight Christian Home School Curriculum: Potential Advantages

There are many, but here are a few highlights:

• Thorough Instructor's Guides. These offer complete 180-day schedules, giving you a detailed outline of what your child should do, notes to help answer his or her questions on the material, and other helps to make sure your child (and you!) get the most out of the reading materials.
• Literature that makes learning come alive. Literature selections range from ones you'll want to curl up on the couch with, to those that will challenge your assumptions:
  • Newberry award-winners (All Sail Set, Journey to Jo'Burg and too many more to list!), to
  • Classics, or literature with sometimes difficult subject matter, such as Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, To Kill A Mockingbird, or Farewell to Manzanar (about Japanese internment camps in WW II),
  • Inspiring biographies (William Carey: Obliged to Go, Teresa of Calcutta), to
  • Glimpses into other cultures (such as Daughter of the Mountains about Tibet or The Land I Lost about life in Vietnamese village)
  • Books you may not find in other complete home school curriculums (such as What if Jesus Had Never Been Born? or From Jerusalem to Irian Jaya, about the church's worldwide missions movement)
• A worldwide focus. A good percentage of the curriculum focuses on cultures outside of North America.
• A well-rounded education. Sonlight includes various literary genres, reading levels and writing projects.
• Helpful forums. Sonlight's forums are an incredible resource in so many areas. For issues related to Sonlight Curriculum specific questions, or more general home schooling concerns, or even other areas. You can find answers to virtually any question you may have on the Sonlight Curriculum forums.Sign up for their Beam of Sonlight issue to see highlights of the forum posts to see for yourself.
• Sonlight Curriculum College Scholarship. See their website for information about Sonlight's college scholarship program.
• Success stories. Whether you read the many posts on their forums or in their catalog, or look at the remarkable winners of their scholarships, the real-life success stories from real people actually using Sonlight reminds me that Sonlight is doing something right for a lot of people in helping them home school well.
• A money-back guarantee. See their website for information about Sonlight's “Love to Learn” and 6-month guarantees..This is a nice bit of security - just in case you need it!
• If you still want to know more, look at the articles on Sonlight Curriculum's website for lots of articles about Sonlight's vision, curriculum, costs, and more.

If you are ready to order, click here for online shopping made easy with Sonlight's online catalog.

Sonlight Christian Home School Curriculum: Potential Disadvantages

Although Sonlight Curriculum has many potential advantages (and ardent supporters!), Sonlight is well aware that Sonlight isn't right for everyone. In fact, their website is upfront with . You can read 29 Reasons Why NOT to Buy Sonlight here.

But I have found there are other reasons Sonlight might not work for you that either aren't on the website or need a bit more explaining. Not everyone agrees that the following characteristics are “problems” (they could be just what you are looking for!), but they are at least factors you need to be aware of before you buy.

• The Instructor's Guides. Since the Instructor Guides are a key component to Sonlight Curriculum's strengths as a complete home school curriculum, it is good to think seriously if it will work for you:
• Daily schedules don't work for everyone. Personally, I found that I was always getting off schedule for one reason or another and then I had to adjust so much that I found I wasn't really using the schedules anyway. I prefer more of a weekly schedule with a theme and assignments for the week. I find I can stay on track better this way, and see the big picture, although this is a personal opinion that many don't share.
• Daily schedules may not give much opportunity to help your children learn how to schedule themselves and learn time management. Having the schedule is already completely mapped out can be a help to the parent, but some people find it doesn't do much to help their older elementary students and junior highers learn to work independently.
• Lack of activity sheets or evaluations for literature and history. You may prefer some sort of written, more objective evaluation instead of relying only on oral answers to the comprehension questions. Some people find it difficult to evaluate how much their child is really retaining without some kind of objective measure, such as a quiz or worksheet or similar activity. Other people feel using some worksheets or quizzes can help their child internalize and retain information better. Others want to help their child learn to take essay or multiple-choice tests on what they have learned. If you are one of these people, you may find that the lack of objective evaluations in Sonlight Curriculum is a disadvantage for you.
• The Language Arts Program. While many people like Sonlight Curriculum's Language Arts program, others find their child doesn't do well with the type of activities include (copywork, worksheets, and other activities). I also had trouble using their materials to teach the process of writing.

  But Sonlight is very responsive to users' suggestions, and they recently redid all of their Lanaguage Arts Instructor's Guides to address concerns like these. I can say I personally found their revised Language Arts Program much easier to use and more enjoyable for my children than the first editions. They also now have a resource that will walk you through all of the grammar instruction you need. Check out their Grammar Ace Package with DVD . Obviously, as with choosing any home school curriculum, you need to know your own needs and goals or style. You may wish to look at Sonlight Curriculum's new Language Arts Program and see how it fits with what you want. I would also encourage you to sign up for our free eCourse on how to choose home school curriculum based on find out your own needs andvalues.

• Adjusting for Large Families. Although Sonlight Curriculum's forums have information on adjusting Core Levels for various ages, it may still be difficult for some people with large families to find a satisfactory solution to home schooling multiple children of different ages. Some drawbacks of Sonlight Curriculum are:
• For example, adjusting a Core 4 Level (for example) to fit your 5th grader and your 3rd grader can be done, but it takes time and a certain amount of creativity. You need to find additional books for the older, take some books out for the younger, and probably scale back the related Language Arts assignments as well. You also need to decide if you will teach to the level of your older child, or younger child, or the one in the middle, and make sure that each child is challenged but not pushed too much.
• If you can't adjust to using a single Core Level, doing two or more Core Levels can be time-consuming. You'll have at least some of the Read-Alouds for both Cores to keep up with, in addition to the other assignments to teach.
• If you use two Cores that have two different themes (such as World History for one and American History for another), trying to keep up with what each child is learning can be a challenge.
• Desire to Learn History Chronologically. Many home schoolers are attracted to the Classical method of home schooling, which, among other things, advocates studying history chronologically, usually in a 4-year cycle. While some people certainly do use Sonlight Curriculum's book recommendations in a 4-year cycle, Sonlight as a complete home school curriculum package is not set up for that method of study. If you decide to use Sonlight Curriculum as is, you'll find yourself spending time and energy adjusting their curriculum to fit your desires. You may want to check out Tapestry of Grace's free Go To Egypt 3-week sample instead.
• Choice of Books. Literature selections are not always chosen as a way to provide virtuous examples, either of individuals or of countries, including the United States. While Sonlight offers plenty of wholesome books, there are also books that raise questions about morality, about people's motives, and which may have a certain level of violence (such as a book listed for high school, Fallen Angels, which is according to their catalog, “hard-hitting, stomach-churning reality. Violence. Language. Not for younger readers nor for the squeamish.”)
  Naturally, you can eliminate books you don't feel are appropriate for your child. However, unless you have the time to preview all the books, you need to have a certain level of trust in Sonlight as your home school curriculum provider.
  You need to agree to some extent with the value that introducing some books and themes that may include violence or somewhat disturbing subject-matter will enrich your children and help them to deal with the world around them in a more mature way. If you don't agree, or don't agree with the ages at which Sonlight introduces such material, you will likely be frustrated and disappointed with Sonlight Curriculum.

Sonlight Christian Home School Curriculum: Dealing with Potential Disadvantages

• If the Instructor's Guides don't work for you, use what you do like and ignore or adjust the rest. You have that freedom!
• Add your own quizzes, activity sheets or other projects if you want additional means of evaluating what your child is retaining.
• Supplement with another language arts program if Sonlight's doesn't work for you.

Sonlight Curriculum has a long history of being one of the most well respected, literature-rich, complete home school curriculums available. Great books. Easy-to-follow lesson plans and schedules. Worldwide focus. Christian worldview. One-stop shopping. Success stories abound. If this is right for you, you can order online quickly by clicking here for Online Catalog - Go Shopping at Sonlight.

I hope that you have found the home school curriculum review of Sonlight Christian Homeschooling Curriculum here at www.Home-School-Curriculum-Advisor.com helpful. My prayer truly is that the information you find here will help both you and your child find joy and success in your home schooling.