What curriculums/companies have you used for Kindergarten

[ivkins]

Dd will start K as soon as I can get it together! I just am sooooo confused as to what I need. I'm a little afraid to order an entire curriculum form one company for fear she won't like it.

What have you used with your Kindergartners all around? I mean I need math, phonics, art, bible, you name it! It's just too much!

[RiverSky]

Don't worry so much. You could try out Time4Learning.com for something cheap, if you'd like. ($20/mth) When my son was in public school kindergarten, they barely learned anything all year long. It really won't be hard for you to replicate that, actually, it'd probably be tough for you to limit your child to as little as they teach in kinder in brick and mortar schools. Oh, and go to the library weekly, at least.

[philia]

Have you checked out Abeka?

I am going to use Handwriting Without Tears, Abeka, Reading Eggs, Time4 Learning, and Starfall. I also am doing a lot outdoors, field trip activities, classes, home school groups, library story time, and more time at Church for socialization.
Philia
I also do Berry Best preschool Program. i don't do all of these everyday. I get bored with the same work so I mix it up.

[zjande]

I'm loving the "pathway readers" from Rod & Staff. Although they don't have an official kindergarten curriculum, I've found their 1st grade package to work perfectly for our needs (my kind of advaced [i think] preschooler has started it & I think it will carry us through next yr, kindergarten). You can view images from every book on their website to get an idea it it would be good for you.

For math we just use a variety of workbooks I've picked up here & there, plus games that relate to math. We also love doing arts & crafts. There are plenty of library books full of ideas for those.

Where is your dd at, reading-wise? Like, has she mastered the sounds letters make, or has she begun to read, or ?

We also love songs! We sing a lot of learning songs, like songs that teach the days of the week & what the vowels are & stuff like that. One favorite book of mine is "50 learning songs". I have NO idea why there is a copy available at that link for $1,000!

Besides that, we go to the library weekly & we read a ton.

[sbgrace]

There is a website called Homeschoolreviews.com that I found really helpful when I was searching for a program. I can tell you what we are using for K.
1. Math--RightStart (love this, highly recommended)
2. Handwriting--Handwriting Without Tears (recommended)
3. Phonics--Headsprout (boys love it but I've yet to determine if it's end result is what I hope)
4. Heart of Dakota Little Hearts for His Glory. This is our bible, history, science, literature, art, etc. program. I use my own math/phonics/handwriting instead of her suggestions in those areas. I like this but it's Christian heavy so not right for everyone. You can see samples on their website. Five in a Row is popular for K it seems. You can see reviews on all kinds of stuff at the website above. Have fun! I don't think you "need" anything for Kindergarten really. My boys have Feb birthdays and we didn't start until they turned six. Before that it was pretty much play and lots of reading great books together.

With all this school doesn't take long (prep wise or doing it) so there is still plenty of time to just be a kid and play which I feel is really important.

[dotnetdiva]

Here's what we've been using for Kindergarten:
http://satorismiles.com/curriculum/k...ten-fall-2009/

And this spring, I'm still calling it Kindergarten, but we've progressed so much in just one year, that some of this might be grade 1-2 stuff.
http://satorismiles.com/curriculum/k...n-spring-2010/

I think you really have to take a look at your child's learning style and even your teaching style. My daughter is a Social Sue and a tad Wiggly Willy so I tried to choose fun, interactive stuff. Big hits are RightStart Math (wish we started with that a year ago), Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading, Handwriting Without Tears, and surprisingly, a spelling program - All-About-Spelling.

And last year at this time, I thought we were going to be unschoolers or do unit studies. Hehe.

[philia]

Satori's mom

You rock ! I am always impressed with what you are doing. I am glad I got some new ideas from your post. The Start Write looks great.
Phila

[PGTlatte]

I used the Leapfrog DVDs, Click'n Read Phonics,the Bob Books, School Zone workbooks, and e-books from the Practice Makes Perfect series by Teacher Created Resources.

[ivkins]

Originally Posted by zjande

Where is your dd at, reading-wise? Like, has she mastered the sounds letters make, or has she begun to read, or ?

No, we haven't mastered all the letter sounds yet.

Thank you all for all these great ideas! I'm so excited to start!

[dotnetdiva]

For learning letter sounds, the Leapfrog Letter Factory is amazing! It's already been mentioned a few times on this thread, but I just wanted to say that letter sounds are a cinch to start off with this DVD.

[kgianforti]

For K, we are concentrating on the 3R's, the Bible and science. We are doing K right now even though our official K year begins in the fall.

Here's what we are doing now:

Bible - reading through a devotional
Math- Horizons K
Science - Sonlight K
Reading/LA - dd works on starfall.com, readingeggs.com, we read aloud and she reads to me. She uses BOB books and whatever else is at about a K level in reading.
Writing - she just took an interest so I bought some books from the Dollar Tree to trace and write in - nothing formal yet.

Here is what we are doing when we start "official" K:

Bible - either CLE Bible 1 or Lifepac Bible 1 (from Alpha Omega)
Math - Singapore math 1 with either A beka 1 or Horizons 1 as supplement
Science - continue with Sonlight Science K
Reading/Phonics - not sure the exact plan yet. But I do have Horizons Phonics K. I am also going to introduce her to Progressive Phonics - it's free.
Writing - not sure yet, I want to see how well she progresses between now and then.

Those are the more "formal" things. We will also include crafts, music, PE, real life stuff, etc.

For K, I have state standards to think about and I asked my big girl what she wants to learn about the most (her response: "math, science and arts" - arts meaning craft projects!)

ETA: I will never buy a grade level curriculum again. Usually kiddos are all over the map in skills that it's hard to keep them to "one grade level" in everything. At least that's the case in our home.

[umsami]

For DS1 last year, we used Right Start Level A for math... which I loved, because there was very little writing...and it was mainly games and fun (yet, he learned a lot.)

For reading, we used Click-n-Read phonics. Got it for $29.00....great investment. Learned to read in about a month. (Knew letters/sounds prior).

For handwriting, we used Handwriting Without Tears. O.K. I liked it more than he did. In retrospect, he just wasn't ready for writing. This year, his writing took off.

We read books off of the Sonlight reading list. I also had the Christopherus Kindergarten book which was well worth the money. ($29.00, I think.)

For Science, we found stuff on the net. Same for art projects.

[jewelsJZ]

[Savoir Faire]

I have a 4 and a 5. So I'm teaching both right now...just slightly differently for ability.

I didn't do a packaged curric for K and I'm not buying a complete package for 1st. I'll tell you what we've been doing for K first.

Kindergarten:
*Starfall.com
*Homemade phonics games
*A phonics board game found at a garage sale
* BOB Books
*Homemade and printed worksheets: Matching big and little letters, working on rhyming, working on sight words (my daughter-- the 5-- just doesn't do phonics. Yay.).
*Coloring
*Crafts
*Lots of library time
* Science fairs and homemade "nature journals"-- IE, drawing a picture of a butterfly we see or something similar.
*Homemade countries activity
*Field trips

FIRST GRADE:
Story of the World volume 1
Spell to Read and Write
Right Start Math
A science section I found online-- in a hurry will look for link later

[p31mom]

I'm not coordinated enough to put together my whole curriculum, but for our Kindergarten last year we used My Father's World and added Singapore Earlybird workbooks for math. You can download a sample lesson from their website. Each week follows the same format so you'll get a really good feel for how the curriculum works. We relied heavily on the library, which allowed for a lot of flexibility in picking and choosing my own books to go with the weekly topic. My DS really enjoyed it.