Anyone use Rod & Staff?

[yippityskippity]

For those of you who have tried R&S, what do you think of it? Pros and cons?

I'm looking at Rod & Staff 2nd grade Language Arts and 1st grade Math and possibly using their 2nd grade Science.

I'm a Christian, so as long as the religious aspects are non-denominational, I don't imagine it will be a problem.

I'm attracted to how R&S uses a very traditional approach. I don't mind tweaking and supplementing as needed. I probably wouldn't do ANY curriculum exactly as written. I'm just looking for something will help explain things properly, thoroughly and in a logical order.

Thanks for your help with this

[elizawill]

we have used grade 1 math. it was very good imo. it's only 2 pages a day, very affordable, and it was painless for my dd. she liked it. you could easily add in manipulatives if desired. the teacher's book is actually useful as well. i can't speak to any of the other subjects though. ...although, i have heard that R&S english is excellent! but i have no experience with it myself hth.

[saintmom]

I use it as a base text for math ,english and spelling. Because they don't believe you can be a christian until you're almost grown,they don't evangelize much in the younger grades although there is a definite us them tone in the upper grades.

I have used learning language arts through literature (LLL) for grades 1 & 2,the R & S uses a textbook approach which was too much for us in the early grades.That said; their english grammar rocks IMO.The first eight grades teach what it takes standard curriculum 12 years, plus there's enough Old and New Testament history thrown in the kids have a decent start on western civ and then some.

The math texts have lots of down to earth word problems,which is why I chose them,I've supplemented over the years with miquon,math games from right start,and manipulatives.

The spelling is affordable and gets the job done.You could just as easily have your child make weekly lists from their own writing,but when I started I had 3 in 3 different grades and a new baby so I took the path of least resistance.

One other point worth mentioning.R & S books except for the spelling and math workbooks are hard cover.They hold up well over the years.

[A Mom's Love]

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[theretohere]

I've used the preschool stuff with DD1 and will use it with subsequant children. I've also heard that the Language arts stuff is very good and may use that soon.
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[Smithie]

"Because they don't believe you can be a christian until you're almost grown,they don't evangelize much in the younger grades..."

That's good to hear. I really want my kids to have an old-fashioned, rock-solid education in English grammar, but I don't want them to think they are going to hell because they are Jews and their grammar book hates Jews.

[yippityskippity]

Thanks for your feedback (please keep it coming!). I read 13 (!!) pages of reviews of the R&S English on homeschoolreviews.com and only saw one negative review. That's pretty impressive... still thinking about the math and science. From what I've seen, the grade 2 science seems very gentle and focused on nature, which the DDs really enjoy. The textbooks are very reasonably priced, too. That's a definite plus for me, since we can't use the charter's Ed Funds to pay for non-secular curriculum.

The closer I get to actually beginning to do some sort of formal instruction (and I still have about 5 mos until then) I find myself wanting the safety net of a traditional approach.