What Is The Best Curriculum For Homeschooling?

What Is The Best Curriculum For Homeschooling?

March 16, 2025

The best curriculum for homeschooling is probably different for every family. Part of the appeal of homeschooling is the ability to choose what and how each of us teaches our children. I love all the choices out there, but it can be overwhelming. 

A great place to start is cathyduffyreviews.com. She has a nice summary of what the curriculum is like, how much the parent is involved, the religious perspective, the educational methods, and the approach. It was very helpful to read a little about each curriculum from the same person, which was hopefully objective.

I started homeschooling my three kids in 2020 and we’ve tried a few curriculums for all of the subjects. I like to mix and match for each subject because each company has its strengths and weaknesses. Why not find the best curriculum that each company specializes in? 

Our kids do individual grade-specific work for Math and Language Arts, and we do Science and History together as a family. For the combined subjects I just pick the grade in between my oldest and youngest. For example, last year my kids were in 4th, 6th, and 7th grade so we did 6th grade science and 5th grade History. I gave my oldest more challenging assignments and my younger one got to skip some things. We may not be able to do this as they get into high school, but it has worked well so far.

The Best Curriculum For Homeschooling - Science

I love BJU for Science. We’ve used the textbooks for three years now. They have different topics for every chapter, and different scientific fields every 2-3 chapters, so the kids don’t get bored. If I’m honest, I can’t do a whole year of the same type of science, it gets old for me too. 

They have a colorful worksheet that goes with the reading every day, easy experiments in every chapter, fun ideas for projects throughout, and tests if you like to see if your kids are retaining the information. They incorporate the Bible often and I just can’t recommend it enough. They offer videos, but we like to take turns reading the textbooks together out loud. 

Here’s the table of contents for BJU Science 6:

The Best Curriculum For Homeschooling - History

Since I love BJU for science, this year we tried it for history, and we loved it as well. They call it Heritage Studies and it’s a good mix of history, geography, and social studies. Last year we did the Story of the World, my son especially loved it, but it wasn’t quite as open and go as I like. It really is a story that needed me to do lots of prep to make sure they were learning the things I would like them to know. 

I prefer vocabulary words and concepts throughout, so BJU provides a more traditional style that I’m looking for. They also go back and forth from world history to American history about every other year. 

Here is the table of contents for Heritage Studies 5:

The Best Curriculum For Homeschooling - Math

We love Teaching Textbooks for Math! The kids watch a short video every day that is about 5-10 minutes long. They are cartoon-style videos with a pleasant male voice, the kids enjoy them because they aren’t too cutesy or too grown up. They work through 5-10 practice problems and 22 review problems from all the lessons they’ve done so far. Their work is corrected as they go so if they don’t understand something we can work on it right away. Since I have three kids in three different grades, it was very difficult for me to keep up with correcting their previous math textbooks. I like the immediate feedback of the computer correcting their work.

Teaching Textbooks seems to be a bit on the easy side if your kids do well in math. We took the placement tests and all my kids went up a grade. It starts in 3rd grade and if you follow their sequence, kids will only be in Pre-Calculus by their senior year of high school, which is similar to the “normal path” in public school. My son is planning a career in the STEM field, so we ended up switching to Shormann Math for 7th grade. The videos are more lecture-style and quite a bit longer, closer to 30-40 minutes. The interface is not quite as user-friendly, but he still enjoys it and says he wants to stick with it.

The Best Curriculum For Homeschooling - Language Arts

We used IEW last year and really enjoyed it. They are video-based and Mr. Pudewa is great! He’s funny and you can tell he cares about kids and loves to teach. The videos are 20-30 minutes long on Monday and Tuesday, then they work on writing an essay the rest of the week. It’s quite rigorous, but it’s only 24 weeks, so you can take more time if you need to. He rotates between narrative and informative pieces, so the kids stay engaged with the materials. Last year my kids did the Structure and Style for Students: Year 1 Level A all together and it worked out great, they were in 4th, 6th, and 7th grade. The curriculum also has different levels of Fix It! Grammar where the kids “fix” the grammar in one sentence every day.

Even though we liked IEW, it is a bit repetitive to have to write an essay every week, so this year we tried EIW. Who comes up with these names and could it be more confusing? Sorry, back to the curriculum. There are short 5-minute videos about every other day, and the kids have a workbook they work on every day. We didn’t love it or hate it. It’s a nice mix of grammar and writing, but I supplemented it with Building Spelling Skills. My son who’s in 7th grade is also using the Literature curriculum, and it’s fine. They seem to finish quickly and I’m not sure if it’s quite enough material, so we will be going back to IEW next year.

We belong to an amazing co-op with other local homeschool families, so my kids can do many of their electives there. My house is littered with arts and crafts projects in various stages. My son loves to code in his free time, and there are plenty of opportunities for home ec and gardening around our house so we don’t have any formal elective curriculum. I made a resource with other popular curriculum options, so fill out the contact form with "homeschool curriculum" as the message and I'll send you a free PDF.

What Can I Cook For Dinner Tonight? (with free PDF)

What Can I Cook For Dinner Tonight? (with free PDF)

March 13, 2025

Why does it seem like every single day I’m asking “What can I cook for dinner tonight?” Whatever I choose, one of the kids will inevitably say “Ugh, I hate that!” And if I’m honest, it doesn’t sound that great to me either. So I end up making grilled cheese sandwiches again. Or I get a hot and ready pizza because it’s not any cheaper to make dinner myself. 

I love cooking for my family, it’s deciding what to cook that’s the real challenge. There is a better way. It starts with a guided brainstorming session and a plan. Then you won’t dread the question that we all have to answer every single night: “What’s for dinner?”

Find Some Good Cookbooks

I wanted to make a list of go-to dinners that are easy to make that most of my family won’t complain about. Many people find recipes online, but I hate how long it takes to scroll through all the sites and stories about your grandma and all the variations and I just can’t. When I do find one I like, I can never remember which one I actually ended up using, so I can’t find it when I want to make it again. 

I prefer a cookbook with real pages I can thumb through to get inspired. There’s something about a well-loved page smeared with soy sauce or butter stains because I’ve come back again and again to this tried and true recipe. I found that most of the recipes I love came mainly from two cookbooks.

Real Simple is great because it’s divided by season and the title is not wrong, they’re easy and delicious recipes. It has beautiful pictures, so it's very easy to get inspired. They are a bit on the gourmet side, but nothing too weird.

Betty Crocker is a classic that I grew up with and the recipes have stood the test of time. I use it most often when I'm baking, but there are some good dinner ideas that I use as well.

Natasha’s Kitchen was recommended to me by a friend and I’ve been eyeing it for a while. Her website has a bunch of recipes I’d like to try, so let me know what you think.

Make a Recipe Bank

For my brainstorming session, it helped me to think in terms of protein. I wanted to find five recipes that used four different proteins: beef, chicken, pork, and seafood/other. Then I tried to think of categories like Mexican, Asian, Italian, etc. My family likes to eat flavorful foods from lots of different cultures. But if your family enjoys more traditional all-American recipes, no judgment here. I want you to find something that gets you excited and that you would look forward to eating. 

Having 20 recipes is a great starting point. My recipe bank is always a work in progress. Sometimes I find a new recipe I want to try, so I add to it. Sometimes meals don’t go as well as I hoped they would, so I cross them off. I have my recipe bank printed on my fridge so I can mark it off when I make each dish. Once all the recipes are marked off, I start over.

Leftovers Are Key

The next secret is making a plan to only cook three nights a week. Leftovers are a girl's best friend because you get a delicious home-cooked meal without the work. If your family isn’t into leftovers, just encourage them to give it a try, it’s not going to kill them to eat the same thing two days in a row. It will save you time and money too. 

Some nights are busier than others, so even if you cook two nights in a row, just plan to have leftovers the next two nights. But definitely plan to cook enough food that your whole family can eat the same meal for two nights. For example, I work late on Wednesday nights, so we usually have leftovers that night.

 My Meal Plan For The Week

Make a Plan For The Week

I like to plan on the weekend, so my week starts on Monday. Then I go grocery shopping for the week all at once. If you cook three times a week your 20 recipes will get you through almost 7 weeks. If you only have recipes you love, you’ll always be excited to cook. This has been a game-changer for me. 

Fill out the contact form with "meal plan" as the message and I'll send you a free PDF. You can print the Weekly Meal Plan, laminate or frame it to use it again and again. There's also a Recipe Bank you can print and fill up with all your favorite recipes. I hope these tools will inspire you and help you stay organized. Drop a comment with some of your go-to dinners that your family loves.

Nice to meet you!

Nice to meet you!

February 22, 2025

Hello, my name is Jessica Griffin. I am a mom of three who loves Jesus and saving money. I married my high school sweetheart and we live in northern Utah with our crazy dog, Buster. I work part-time as a pharmacist and I homeschool my younger two kids. My motto would probably be something like, "Work hard now, so you can play later." I love doing all the work of planning all the things, so I've decided to start a blog to share my ideas. 

My life isn't just about saving money; it's more about evaluating if something I spend my money on will really add value to my life. Can I find a way to do what I want to do for free or at least a good deal? This means I'm always looking for ways to have fun with my family and friends, eat delicious food, and go to cool places while spending less money. 

I also try to be intentional with my time and I love to develop systems to make my day-to-day life easier. Come along with me as I share what I've learned about travel hacking, some of my favorite recipes, home organization tips, party planning ideas, homeschooling stuff, gardening, and other random family fun. Griffin, party of 5, your blog is ready.