So you’ve decided you want yours to be a Classical model homeschool, and you’ve read The Well-Trained Mind. What now?
Enters Easy Classical! From their website:
For purposes of this review, we will talk about their Early Modern History: Explorers to 1820 schedule.
You can purchase Easy Classical schedules in either a downloadable .pdf form or as a Notebook. I received the downloadable schedule.
Upon opening the file, right away you are given very clear instructions for how to use this daily schedule, along with a nice book list. On their website, you’ll find the booklist, linked up with www.christanbook.com and www.alibris.com.
The daily schedule plugs in all of the books–core texts, read-alouds, books for free reading and picture books–along with projects from Evan Moor’s History Pockets.
There’s a nice general materials list as well as a shopping list each week, so you won’t find yourself in the middle of project and discover you needed twine and don’t have any. There are also comprehension questions, with a written quiz about those, to be completed at the end of each week.
Probably the coolest thing about this curriculum help, from a unit study perspection (because that’s how we roll in our homeschool), is that there are go-along studies that integrate geography and writing for this history cycle, and the schedules for those studies are built in to this one. I said, the schedules are built-in. The actual material that needs to be added to the history cycle in order to do this are separate purchases, with their own guides, booklists and projects.
It appears at this time that the only history cycle that has the added geography and writing guides is this one, though they do offer geography and writing “resources” to help, and there are plans to write geography and writing guides for the other history cycles in the future.
I am not a classical homeschool teacher, nor do I play one on T.V. However, if I were to ever go that route, I believe Easy Classical would be a great help at pulling all of those resources together in a way that is easy to use, organized, and thorough. At a cost of $29.95 for the downloadable ebook and $35.95 for the Notebook, their pricing seems competitive as well. The most expensive part would be the books. The booklist is exhaustive. However, I believe many of these titles will be available at your library, if you have a decent library. If you’re in a rural area, with a poor library system, and a budget that is limited, you’ll have to pick and choose which resources to use to make this product affordable for you.
See what other members of the TOS Crew are saying about this product.
Disclaimer: As a member of the TOS Crew, I received this product, at no cost to me, in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are those of myself and/or my son.