Tuesday

Little Known Charlotte Mason Resources You Need to Know

Charlotte Mason’s educational philosophy is all about those books, so it’s no surprise that one of the most frequently asked questions I receive is, “Where do you find the books you want your kids to read, especially living books for various subjects?” Now if you have been around Charlotte Mason homeschooling circles for any amount of time, then you’ve heard of the major players in the Charlotte Mason game, Ambleside Online and Simply Charlotte Mason being the two big ones. I want to share my personal favorite Charlotte Mason Resources that I use for various reasons, but there’s one thing I can promise you. These are not major players on the Charlotte Mason stage yet, but they are ones I turn to when planning out all those delicious books we’ll read and how to fit them all into a week and a year.

           Little Known Charlotte Mason Resources
In no particular order…

1) Wildwood Curriculum: This curriculum is very new and being compiled by homeschool moms who are studying Charlotte Mason’s turn of the century schools for inspiration in book choice and scheduling, but also trying to keep the book choices secular, as modern as possible, and inoffensive to minorities, indigenous people, and women as possible. Usually older books that are commonly used in Charlotte Mason programs definitely need to be edited on the fly when reading to remove disparaging descriptions and word choice about these groups.  Right now (as of this blog post in May 2017) only forms 1B and 1A (ages 6-9) are completed with book choices and curriculum suggestions for each subject.

What I’m Loving about Wildwood Curriculum: Their attempt to bring Charlotte into the 21st Century.

What I’m Using from Wildwood Curriculum: Their list of Tales, History, Geography readers for Levi. This upcoming school year he’ll be in first grade so their book lists are perfect for him. Plus all the readings are already broken down so all I have to do is plug it into my weekly schedule!

2) A Mind in the Light: I first “met” the author of this Charlotte Mason curriculum on the Well-Trained Mind forums. She began putting the curriculum together while giving her own daughters a CM education. Her curriculum is based upon using more modern book choices as well, but with classics thrown in here and there. She’s publishing guides and curriculum schedules to give the world another completely open and go choice for busy CM moms.

What I’m Loving about A Mind in the Light: Her book guides are a HUGE help to the CM homeschool community. As much as I try to pre-read everything for my children, it can be difficult to come up with narration questions, review people and places, and even project ideas based upon the books they are reading. Lisa has done all of that for you!

What I’m Using from A Mind in the Light: This school year I’m using her guide to The Book of the Ancient Greeks with Grace for 7th grade. It’s a fantastic help and includes various questions and assignments, including term exam questions, based upon form/grade level of who is using the book. I’m also using her science book lists for both Sophia (4th grade) and Grace. While these aren’t scheduled out, I take her lists and come up with our own schedule. We’ve all enjoyed her book choices. They are the best!

3) A Gentle Feast: Julie has created a Charlotte Mason curriculum that you can use to teach all the members of the family at the same time, similar to Simply Charlotte Mason, but with a four-year history rotation. There are notes for the parent contained in the parent guide and then each form/grade has their own guide as well, plus a totally planned out Morning Time that corresponds with your school year.

What I’m loving about A Gentle Feast: The focus on family but without dragging out ancient history and a coordinated Morning Time. You know I love me a Morning Time that goes with your year’s studies!

What I’m Using from A Gentle Feast: Probably the biggest inspiration I found was actually in the free scheduling menu found on the main page. I didn’t follow her titles exactly, but seeing how she grouped similar items into blocks of learning really revamped our school year. I created my own learning blocks that we rotate through in our day. It made our time go much more smoothly without feeling tied down. I fully intend to make use of her Morning Time plans for next year even if I use nothing else. It would be so helpful to have someone else do all the work!

4) Wildflowers and Marbles: I hesitated to even include Jennifer’s blog on this list because it is a source of inspiration to many Charlotte Mason homeschool moms. She has been homeschooling for many years including high school so I love to pick her “brain.” I added it to my list because most people I hear talk about her blog talk about her amazing Morning Basket plans and blog posts, however, I find the most benefit elsewhere on her blog.

What I’m loving about Wildflowers and Marbles: Book lists galore, elementary, middle school, and high school! Divided by grade level and some divided by topic, Jennifer always knows what the best books are. In fact, Sophia’s geography reader, Little Stories of a Big Country, was a selection based solely on the fact that Jennifer had it listed in her third grade book list.

What I’m using from Wildflowers and Marbles: Click on any of the term bullet points under the grade level book lists and you’ll find the inspiration for my kids’ weekly assignment sheets. Mine are not as fancy as Jennifer’s with a lot less information, but I did keep the color and the basic concept of printing a reoccurring assignment sheet that they fill in with what was completed. We started using this system last year and it’s perfect. Seriously, perfect.

5) A Delectable Education Podcasts and Sabbath Mood Homeschool blog: So this Charlotte Mason resource is quickly growing a sizeable fan base and for good reason: these podcasts are life-giving to a CM homeschooler. Three homeschool moms, one a veteran, discuss how to implement Charlotte Mason in your home using Charlotte Mason’s own words, her 6 volume original set, as reference. I included Sabbath Mood Homeschool in this entry because one of the Delectable Education ladies, Nicole, writes the blog as well. Her blog focuses on planning out your homeschool day, week, and year using Charlotte Mason’s own school as a model and tons of CM science books.

What I’m loving about A Delectable Education and Sabbath Mood Homeschool: The commitment to only teaching subjects and organizing their weeks in the same fashion as Charlotte Mason. If you are wanting pure, unadulterated CM, these two websites are your new best friends.

What I’m using from A Delectable Education and Sabbath Mood Homeschool: The chronology of history podcast totally changed the way I approached history this year in our homeschool. I was worried it would make things difficult by having various history streams going at once, but they really liked it and we got to make use of our big wall timeline to keep things straight. I made use of Nicole’s Charlotte Mason Scheduling series at Sabbath Mood Homeschool to determine exactly what subjects should be covered for each grade level and for what length of time. Of course I dropped some subjects and changed some things around to fit our family, but it gave me a great place to start as I prepared for this school year. Nicole also has some wonderful science guides that use living books to teach science for grades 4-12. I haven’t used one yet, but it’s on my list to use for high school with Grace.

Obviously there are other Charlotte Mason websites and curriculums out there, but these are the ones I’ve personally used and love. I also never hear them talked about much in most Charlotte Mason circles, so I felt the need to bring their awesomeness to the attention of you guys. Be sure and check them out, and find some great CM nuggets for yourself.

What Charlotte Mason resources have been most helpful to you?

Chelli

8 comments:

  1. I really love this post! Thank you for helping out this Charlotte Mason newbie!

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  2. Thank you for this post! Very helpful information. Also, this is the first time I've seen in print that we have to edit "on the fly" while reading aloud older, recommended books due to the sometimes offensive descriptions of minorities and/or women. I thought I was the only that noticed!

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  3. Chelli, I'm thrilled that you find my blog and the sharing there helpful! Truly! Enjoy those books!

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