April 5, 2025 • 18 mins
Ever wonder how to navigate the sea of Kindergarten curriculums to find the treasure that will captivate your little one's love for learning? Let Justine and I be your guides on this voyage, as we share our hands-on experiences with "The Good and the Beautiful Level K" program. Our latest conversation delves into how this curriculum masterfully weaves fundamental math skills with practical knowledge, and how our children—each unique in their learning journey—responded to its challenges and charms.
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 Join us as we unpack the joys and adaptability of homeschooling with this comprehensive curriculum, from the engaging games that make math fun, to handwriting activities tailored perfectly for tiny hands. We discuss the value of "practice if not mastered" sections and how this thoughtful approach ensures no child is left behind on the path to understanding the beautiful complexities of the world. Whether you're elbow-deep in lesson plans or just dipping your toes into the homeschooling waters, this episode is packed with insights to help you choose wisely for your family's educational adventure.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to the Homeschool How-To Find my
Curriculum, a series where wetalk all about curriculum.
I've been interviewinghomeschooling families for over
a year now on my main podcast,the Homeschool How-To, but I
really wanted to zero in oncurriculum.
There's so much out there.
How do I know what would workbest for me and my child?
How do I know what works forone child would work for the
other?
I might like the curriculum I'musing now, but how do I know
(00:25):
there's not a better one outthere, especially if I don't
know all the curriculums?
And what about supplementalcurriculum?
Should I be using that too?
This series is to help youdecide just that.
I'm going to interview parentswho are using all the
curriculums so that you candecide the absolute best way to
(00:47):
unfold your homeschoolingjourney.
Welcome With us today isJustine, and she is here to talk
to us about the good and thebeautiful Kindergarten level.
Is that right, justine?
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Kindergarten level yep.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
All right, I use this as well, so we both started at
the same time.
Justine is completed with it.
I am like lapping around thelast lap like panting as we go.
No, I'm just kidding.
So the good and the beautiful.
This is a popular one, and didyou enjoy doing this?
(01:20):
Did your son enjoy it?
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Yeah, you know, I think it was really great.
I did enjoy it.
I just, you know, I think itwas really great.
Um, I, I did, I did enjoy it.
I just have a few mixedfeelings about it.
He I feel like he kind ofalready knew everything that we
went over.
I don't know if that's.
I think he learned most of itin preschool.
So sometimes I had wondered ifyou know, maybe we should have
moved on to level one or were wewasting our time?
(01:44):
But I think it was definitely agood foundation because we
actually have started math levelone and there is a lot of
handwriting, I'd have to say,and he does not like handwriting
, so I don't think that wouldhave went over well, so I think
(02:05):
it's's definitely goodcurriculum to start with.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
And how old was your son when you started this
curriculum?
Speaker 2 (02:09):
He was just over five and a half when we started.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
Okay, yeah, and I started around the same time, my
son's about six months younger,so, yeah, he was five when we
started.
The good and the beautifulkindergarten, or level K, I
think, is how how it's called.
And so what did it cover?
And I, cause I'm like right init now too, I can kind of pick
up, you know some of the stuff,cause it's fresh in my mind what
(02:32):
did this cover for, uh, youguys, for the kindergarten year,
yeah, so I wrote down a bunchof things.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
I went through the lessons and looked at it Awesome
, um.
So I'll just kind of, you know,go down the list of what I
wrote.
Awesome.
So I'll just kind of, you know,go down the list of what I
wrote.
So we're identifying numbers 1through 20 and being able to,
you know, write them out.
We're counting to 100.
We're skip counting by 2, 5sand 10s.
We're doing addition.
(02:58):
It got into a little bit ofsubtraction, but I feel like not
very much.
We did shapes and colors.
How to kind of read a calendar,so say you know March 5th 2024,
.
Getting into the what are thedays of the week, what are the
months of the year, how to telltime on the hour, so two o'clock
(03:21):
, three o'clock, four o'clock.
Learning left and right,measuring in centimeters and
inches, being able to identify apenny, a nickel, a dime and
what each of them are worth, andit got into a little bit of
counting them.
You know, say I have two dimes,how much does that equal?
(03:43):
Getting into patterns, numberbonding so say we have the
number 10, you know whatdifferent numbers can make up 10
?
So five and five, eight and two, one and nine, and then even in
odd numbers.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
Yeah, you covered that.
I'll add tally marks.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yes, tally marks yes.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Yep, yeah, but yeah, that was a great summary.
Thank you for that Um, which isit's a lot actually.
I mean, your kid did that inpreschool, or did you don't know
really where he learned it.
He just like learned this.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
No, you know, I think he did because he knew.
When we got to the tally marks,he knew what a tally mark was.
And I was like, where did youlearn this?
And then I went back and askedhis preschool teacher, because
my younger son goes there nowand she's like, yeah, we learned
tally marks.
I was like, oh OK.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
I guess she learned that in preschool.
Wow, and my son went to apreschool as well, but he didn't
learn any.
I don't know what he did there.
It was only like three days aweek for two and a half hours.
So by the time they got in andall sat down, it was probably
time to get up and leave again.
But um, yeah, so, so that'scool.
Uh, cause I remember you sayingto me a while back like oh,
(04:56):
isn't this level like reallyeasy, like you know my son's
kind of bored with it and I waslike um, no, I think I think for
my son it was the perfectamount of difficulty, but not so
difficult that he wasfrustrated, but it was
introducing new concepts that hehad not been like, things that
(05:20):
I just assume that you know,like for instance right and left
.
I mean it's kind of funny thatthat's even in a math curriculum
, but how wonderful that it is,because what other curriculum
would it be in?
I mean, it could be in reading,I guess, but like what you know
, maybe reading to say likewriting, say right hand, but um,
I do love that they put that inthere, and especially with the
(05:42):
telling the time it teaches themon analog clock and digital.
And you know, we happen to havea couple analog clocks in our
house, but more more asdecoration.
But it's cool that, like youknow, I could say, oh, this is.
I don't think if I wasn't usinga curriculum, I don't know that
I would think to tell him like,hey, let's learn, let's learn
(06:03):
how to use the clock.
So I did like it for that.
Okay.
So you kind of talked aboutlike what the day-to-day was.
Because you talked about all ofthat, how long did each lesson
take to complete with your child?
Speaker 2 (06:16):
I think it took my son a max of 10 minutes a day,
If, if he actually sat down and,you know, did it through.
I think a max of 10 minutes.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Yeah, and I would say probably 15 or 20 for a
probably closer to 20, if it wassomething more difficult, like
one of the more difficultlessons, um, you know, and
that's given.
Yeah, if they're actuallysitting, because you know
they're active boys sit down andthen get up, and oh, I just
thought I have to do this andthat you know, so but yeah, I
(06:49):
would say for me around.
So probably between 10, 20minutes, for me, maybe closer to
20.
And how many lessons did thishave?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
So they technically say 120, but I about six of
those lessons are the unitassessments.
So I think you're you'regetting close to the end, so I
think the last lesson is one 118, 118.
Um, and then 119 would be thefinal unit assessment and then
(07:17):
if your child got anything wrongthen the final final assessment
would be less final unitassessment, and then if your
child got anything wrong thenthe final final assessment would
be less than technically 120.
So again, there's six unitstudy, six unit assessments, but
there's two for each unit.
So if your child doesn't getanything wrong, at least for me,
I kind of just went on.
(07:38):
I didn't make him do the secondone because he got it correct.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Okay, all right.
So yeah, just to give people anidea about 118, 120 lessons
which, like we don't do it everyday, like I aim to do it five
days a week.
It's probably three on average,four on a good week, you know.
So do you remember how muchthis curriculum cost you?
Speaker 2 (08:02):
I believe to get the book and the math box is a total
of $60.
You can also print thecurriculum for free, and then
you'd of course maybe have tobuy a math box.
Maybe you can find it usedsomewhere, I know, specifically
for Math K.
(08:22):
You could probably just makethe box yourself by things
around the house or even goingto the dollar store.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Well, you know you're right, because I'm thinking
about what's in the math boxright now.
It has little sticks and youcould definitely find something
it doesn't have to.
Well you do want them to besticks, because they do that
kind of like where it shows thedesign, oh, the spatial
recognition yeah.
Yes, and so they're supposed torecreate the design using the
(08:49):
sticks, but you could still usesomething else.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Yeah, you could Like from the dollar store.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Yeah, like popsicle sticks or yeah, there you go,
that's perfect.
Then there's some dice and someof them have plus minus signs
and some of them have like go upto like the numbers 12, so you
would have to have somethinglike that.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
And then there's which I think, yeah, I think for
.
From going back to the dice, um, you know you could get them
out of one of your games thatyou have, you know, upstairs in
a closet.
Um, or I know I have this dice.
I think I got it from thedollar store years ago.
It's a six-sided dice with adry erase kind of like dry erase
(09:29):
board on each side so you canwrite anything you want.
You know you might not be ableto find a plus minus dice in the
store, but you could write plusminus on this, on, you know, a
dry erase one.
And you know, get it for muchcheaper if.
If that's what you were looking, if that's what you needed to
do.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Oh, that's a good point.
And then the other two things Ithink were like little game
pawns and it's easy enough youcould use anything for that
Right.
Yep, oh, all right.
Well, it does not look like thegood and the beautiful will be
sponsoring this podcast anytimesoon.
It does not look like the goodand the beautiful will be
sponsoring this podcast anytimesoon.
We're trying to findworkarounds, but that's okay.
Okay, could you do this withmore than one kid at a time?
Speaker 2 (10:09):
I think you could.
I think it might be helpful,though, if they had their own
booklets, just because you know,after you learn the time you're
kind of going in and drawingthe little hand and the big hand
, so we can tell if you know howan analog clock works, you know
writing the numbers 1 through20, or even tracing those
(10:30):
numbers.
There's a lot of tracing in thebook, so I think there's maybe
bits and pieces that you wouldwant your own, so I mean, you
could also I don't know if Imentioned this, but you can also
print off the curriculum ratherthan buying it.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Well, you did mention that and I didn't realize.
You can take that to your locallibrary and just pay, like you
know.
If you don't want to use up allyour printer ink, you can take
it to the local library and theycan print it right for you for
a few cents, you know.
So that's a good idea too.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Right, and I also for this specific curriculum.
This is kind of what I boughtit for, but I bought the the I
don't know one of those printersthat everyone talks about, the
EcoTanks, and that's what I'mdoing.
I'm actually printing the Math1 curriculum because I did find
a Math 1 box on a Facebook pagegroup for, you know, a
(11:20):
discounted rate.
So I was like, oh well, I canget math one for less than 20
bucks rather than spending 60.
So I am printing math one.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Oh, that's a good idea.
Okay, so no, I never heard ofthat printer, eco printer, but
that's cool too.
But then also, yeah, I'm prettysure I don't know how if you
were to download it, maybe youemail it to yourself or put it.
Do people use USB drivesanymore?
I don't know, but I think youcould and take that to the
library and they could print itfor you as well.
Yep definitely All right.
(11:49):
Or if you have one of themgovernment jobs you just print
it.
No, I'm kidding, All right.
So now that you're in the mathlevel one, you're doing a lot of
writing, and so we'll do adifferent episode on that as you
kind of round out your year onthat.
But for the level K was therelike games or a lot of writing
(12:12):
or crafts or anything like that.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
Yeah, so there are definitely games.
I wouldn't say a whole lot, butthey were in there and I was
very surprised.
You know, we would go throughthe game and my son would say,
oh, can we play again?
And we'd play, like you know,five times, which kind of made
me feel good, because there'ssome days where he doesn't want
to do schooling at all.
But when you get to a game it'slike, oh, can we do it again?
So that, you know, again mademe feel good.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
So there there's a few games, no real crafts.
They got like the, the, thespatial recognition things,
where you kind of have to, youknow, take the blocks and the
sticks from your box and kind ofbuild what they have built.
There's as much handwriting, Ifeel like, as math should be.
I guess I would call ithandwriting because you're
(13:04):
tracing numbers, you're drawing,you know the hands on the clock
, you're doing your additionproblems.
It's not a whole lot, butthere's definitely way more.
In level one, you know we'relearning how to spell the
numbers and writing actual datesnow.
So there's definitely a lot morein level one.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Okay, so that gives people a good idea if they don't
know which one to start with,what level their kid is at.
Yeah, all right, and so this isa religious curriculum, correct
?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
It is correct.
Yeah, I wouldn't say there's awhole lot in it, and even if
there is, I feel like you knowthere's a sentence or two that
you could probably just skipover if you, you know, don't
practice religion or you know,don't want to introduce that to
your child, which is fine.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yeah, I, it's definitely not heavily baked
into every lesson, it's like alittle something here or there.
Um, and I agree, you like Ichanged the name.
When it says read to your child, I say okay, read to Colin.
You know, so that it's justeasy enough to change a word as
you're reading it Um so wouldyou use this again on your
younger son?
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Yeah, I will definitely use this for for my
younger son.
Speaker 1 (14:19):
Yep, don't you sometimes just think like, oh,
I'm through that curriculum andthen I got to redo it all over
again?
I know people that have likenine kids.
All right, so did.
Did your son enjoy thiscurriculum?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
You know, I think in the very beginning, when we
first started, you know, I wasnew to homeschooling so I was
like, okay, let's do this overthe summer, see if we can
actually homeschool.
So when I was doing that,taking my trial run before
actual school started in thefall, you know he was sometimes
wanting to do three lessons at atime, and I think he really
(14:52):
enjoyed it.
And you know, I think he didenjoy it.
I just think maybe I pushed alittle too hard so there were
some days he didn't want to doit.
So it's kind of something thatI'm learning for myself Try not
to push so hard.
But I think he did enjoy it.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Yeah, I think my son too.
Yeah, like I said, it was agood balance of being hard
enough to where he was learning,but not so.
It was not that easy for him.
He wasn't getting frustrated,you know, not too frustrated,
but he was learning, so it Idon't even know if I'm making
sense.
Um, oh, justine, thank you somuch.
(15:28):
So this is the good and thebeautiful level K.
I hope this was helpful toanyone listening, and do you
have anything else you want toadd about it?
Speaker 2 (15:36):
I do just want to add one thing that we maybe didn't
really cover.
So it is an open and gocurriculum.
So it's, you know, literallyyou open it, it tells you
specifically what to read toyour child, which I think it
makes life so much easier.
There's nothing for you toprepare.
You know, there's bluelettering which you kind of read
to yourself, and then there'sthe black lettering which is
(15:57):
what you read specifically tothe child.
So I just think that makes itso much easier.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
That's it.
I am going to put that as oneof my questions now on.
That I ask people for thisseries is is this open and go?
That's great, that's a goodpoint.
Yeah, because there's nothingthat you need to prep beforehand
, so that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Thanks.
Just one other thing Also.
Before you start each lesson,there's like a little, a little
box at the top of the first pageand it's called practice if not
mastered.
So you know of the first pageand it's called practice if not
mastered.
So you know, I did it with mychild.
I think he kind of knew mosteverything we went over, but I
always did it.
It's just, you know, practicecounting from 60 to 80.
(16:40):
If you don't know it, it'ssomething that you should
obviously work on.
You know, have him raise hisright hand, have him raise his
left hand, have him, you know,take out a whiteboard and have
him draw or write the number 20on the whiteboard.
Does he know what number 20looks like?
So it just kind of goes intothose things that you should
have mastered.
And if not, did the uh did itwith him the other night.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
He came home from work I'm like, can you do his
math with him?
And he goes through the thinghe goes.
Oh my God, that was just thereview.
Now you've got to do whatyou're actually learning.
Oh, I'm glad that you came on.
You had a lot of great pointsthat I'm going to now put in our
list of questions for for myother uh episodes.
Thank you so much, justine.
(17:34):
We'll have you back on and, um,if you want to hear more about
Justine's story and how herhomeschooling in general, what
got her into it and all of that,I will have her on the main
podcast where we can chat aboutthat as well.
Sounds good, thanks, cheryl.
Thank you so much for listening.
Please consider sharing thispodcast or my main podcast, the
(17:55):
Homeschool how To with friends,family, on Instagram or in your
favorite homeschool groupFacebook page.
The more this podcast is shared, the longer we can keep it
going and the more hope we havefor the future.
Thank you for your love of thenext generation.
Welcome to the Homeschool How-To Find my
Curriculum, a series where wetalk all about curriculum.
I've been interviewinghomeschooling families for over
a year now on my main podcast,the Homeschool How-To, but I
really wanted to zero in oncurriculum.
There's so much out there.
How do I know what would workbest for me and my child?
How do I know what works forone child would work for the
other?
I might like the curriculum I'musing now, but how do I know
(00:25):
there's not a better one outthere, especially if I don't
know all the curriculums?
And what about supplementalcurriculum?
Should I be using that too?
This series is to help youdecide just that.
I'm going to interview parentswho are using all the
curriculums so that you candecide the absolute best way to
(00:47):
unfold your homeschoolingjourney.
Welcome With us today isJustine, and she is here to talk
to us about the good and thebeautiful Kindergarten level.
Is that right, justine?
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Kindergarten level yep.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
All right, I use this as well, so we both started at
the same time.
Justine is completed with it.
I am like lapping around thelast lap like panting as we go.
No, I'm just kidding.
So the good and the beautiful.
This is a popular one, and didyou enjoy doing this?
(01:20):
Did your son enjoy it?
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Yeah, you know, I think it was really great.
I did enjoy it.
I just, you know, I think itwas really great.
Um, I, I did, I did enjoy it.
I just have a few mixedfeelings about it.
He I feel like he kind ofalready knew everything that we
went over.
I don't know if that's.
I think he learned most of itin preschool.
So sometimes I had wondered ifyou know, maybe we should have
moved on to level one or were wewasting our time?
(01:44):
But I think it was definitely agood foundation because we
actually have started math levelone and there is a lot of
handwriting, I'd have to say,and he does not like handwriting
, so I don't think that wouldhave went over well, so I think
(02:05):
it's's definitely goodcurriculum to start with.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
And how old was your son when you started this
curriculum?
Speaker 2 (02:09):
He was just over five and a half when we started.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
Okay, yeah, and I started around the same time, my
son's about six months younger,so, yeah, he was five when we
started.
The good and the beautifulkindergarten, or level K, I
think, is how how it's called.
And so what did it cover?
And I, cause I'm like right init now too, I can kind of pick
up, you know some of the stuff,cause it's fresh in my mind what
(02:32):
did this cover for, uh, youguys, for the kindergarten year,
yeah, so I wrote down a bunchof things.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
I went through the lessons and looked at it Awesome
, um.
So I'll just kind of, you know,go down the list of what I
wrote.
Awesome.
So I'll just kind of, you know,go down the list of what I
wrote.
So we're identifying numbers 1through 20 and being able to,
you know, write them out.
We're counting to 100.
We're skip counting by 2, 5sand 10s.
We're doing addition.
(02:58):
It got into a little bit ofsubtraction, but I feel like not
very much.
We did shapes and colors.
How to kind of read a calendar,so say you know March 5th 2024,
.
Getting into the what are thedays of the week, what are the
months of the year, how to telltime on the hour, so two o'clock
(03:21):
, three o'clock, four o'clock.
Learning left and right,measuring in centimeters and
inches, being able to identify apenny, a nickel, a dime and
what each of them are worth, andit got into a little bit of
counting them.
You know, say I have two dimes,how much does that equal?
(03:43):
Getting into patterns, numberbonding so say we have the
number 10, you know whatdifferent numbers can make up 10
?
So five and five, eight and two, one and nine, and then even in
odd numbers.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
Yeah, you covered that.
I'll add tally marks.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
Yes, tally marks yes.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
Yep, yeah, but yeah, that was a great summary.
Thank you for that Um, which isit's a lot actually.
I mean, your kid did that inpreschool, or did you don't know
really where he learned it.
He just like learned this.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
No, you know, I think he did because he knew.
When we got to the tally marks,he knew what a tally mark was.
And I was like, where did youlearn this?
And then I went back and askedhis preschool teacher, because
my younger son goes there nowand she's like, yeah, we learned
tally marks.
I was like, oh OK.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
I guess she learned that in preschool.
Wow, and my son went to apreschool as well, but he didn't
learn any.
I don't know what he did there.
It was only like three days aweek for two and a half hours.
So by the time they got in andall sat down, it was probably
time to get up and leave again.
But um, yeah, so, so that'scool.
Uh, cause I remember you sayingto me a while back like oh,
(04:56):
isn't this level like reallyeasy, like you know my son's
kind of bored with it and I waslike um, no, I think I think for
my son it was the perfectamount of difficulty, but not so
difficult that he wasfrustrated, but it was
introducing new concepts that hehad not been like, things that
(05:20):
I just assume that you know,like for instance right and left
.
I mean it's kind of funny thatthat's even in a math curriculum
, but how wonderful that it is,because what other curriculum
would it be in?
I mean, it could be in reading,I guess, but like what you know
, maybe reading to say likewriting, say right hand, but um,
I do love that they put that inthere, and especially with the
(05:42):
telling the time it teaches themon analog clock and digital.
And you know, we happen to havea couple analog clocks in our
house, but more more asdecoration.
But it's cool that, like youknow, I could say, oh, this is.
I don't think if I wasn't usinga curriculum, I don't know that
I would think to tell him like,hey, let's learn, let's learn
(06:03):
how to use the clock.
So I did like it for that.
Okay.
So you kind of talked aboutlike what the day-to-day was.
Because you talked about all ofthat, how long did each lesson
take to complete with your child?
Speaker 2 (06:16):
I think it took my son a max of 10 minutes a day,
If, if he actually sat down and,you know, did it through.
I think a max of 10 minutes.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
Yeah, and I would say probably 15 or 20 for a
probably closer to 20, if it wassomething more difficult, like
one of the more difficultlessons, um, you know, and
that's given.
Yeah, if they're actuallysitting, because you know
they're active boys sit down andthen get up, and oh, I just
thought I have to do this andthat you know, so but yeah, I
(06:49):
would say for me around.
So probably between 10, 20minutes, for me, maybe closer to
20.
And how many lessons did thishave?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
So they technically say 120, but I about six of
those lessons are the unitassessments.
So I think you're you'regetting close to the end, so I
think the last lesson is one 118, 118.
Um, and then 119 would be thefinal unit assessment and then
(07:17):
if your child got anything wrongthen the final final assessment
would be less final unitassessment, and then if your
child got anything wrong thenthe final final assessment would
be less than technically 120.
So again, there's six unitstudy, six unit assessments, but
there's two for each unit.
So if your child doesn't getanything wrong, at least for me,
I kind of just went on.
(07:38):
I didn't make him do the secondone because he got it correct.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Okay, all right.
So yeah, just to give people anidea about 118, 120 lessons
which, like we don't do it everyday, like I aim to do it five
days a week.
It's probably three on average,four on a good week, you know.
So do you remember how muchthis curriculum cost you?
Speaker 2 (08:02):
I believe to get the book and the math box is a total
of $60.
You can also print thecurriculum for free, and then
you'd of course maybe have tobuy a math box.
Maybe you can find it usedsomewhere, I know, specifically
for Math K.
(08:22):
You could probably just makethe box yourself by things
around the house or even goingto the dollar store.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
Well, you know you're right, because I'm thinking
about what's in the math boxright now.
It has little sticks and youcould definitely find something
it doesn't have to.
Well you do want them to besticks, because they do that
kind of like where it shows thedesign, oh, the spatial
recognition yeah.
Yes, and so they're supposed torecreate the design using the
(08:49):
sticks, but you could still usesomething else.
Speaker 2 (08:52):
Yeah, you could Like from the dollar store.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
Yeah, like popsicle sticks or yeah, there you go,
that's perfect.
Then there's some dice and someof them have plus minus signs
and some of them have like go upto like the numbers 12, so you
would have to have somethinglike that.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
And then there's which I think, yeah, I think for
.
From going back to the dice, um, you know you could get them
out of one of your games thatyou have, you know, upstairs in
a closet.
Um, or I know I have this dice.
I think I got it from thedollar store years ago.
It's a six-sided dice with adry erase kind of like dry erase
(09:29):
board on each side so you canwrite anything you want.
You know you might not be ableto find a plus minus dice in the
store, but you could write plusminus on this, on, you know, a
dry erase one.
And you know, get it for muchcheaper if.
If that's what you were looking, if that's what you needed to
do.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Oh, that's a good point.
And then the other two things Ithink were like little game
pawns and it's easy enough youcould use anything for that
Right.
Yep, oh, all right.
Well, it does not look like thegood and the beautiful will be
sponsoring this podcast anytimesoon.
It does not look like the goodand the beautiful will be
sponsoring this podcast anytimesoon.
We're trying to findworkarounds, but that's okay.
Okay, could you do this withmore than one kid at a time?
Speaker 2 (10:09):
I think you could.
I think it might be helpful,though, if they had their own
booklets, just because you know,after you learn the time you're
kind of going in and drawingthe little hand and the big hand
, so we can tell if you know howan analog clock works, you know
writing the numbers 1 through20, or even tracing those
(10:30):
numbers.
There's a lot of tracing in thebook, so I think there's maybe
bits and pieces that you wouldwant your own, so I mean, you
could also I don't know if Imentioned this, but you can also
print off the curriculum ratherthan buying it.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
Well, you did mention that and I didn't realize.
You can take that to your locallibrary and just pay, like you
know.
If you don't want to use up allyour printer ink, you can take
it to the local library and theycan print it right for you for
a few cents, you know.
So that's a good idea too.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
Right, and I also for this specific curriculum.
This is kind of what I boughtit for, but I bought the the I
don't know one of those printersthat everyone talks about, the
EcoTanks, and that's what I'mdoing.
I'm actually printing the Math1 curriculum because I did find
a Math 1 box on a Facebook pagegroup for, you know, a
(11:20):
discounted rate.
So I was like, oh well, I canget math one for less than 20
bucks rather than spending 60.
So I am printing math one.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Oh, that's a good idea.
Okay, so no, I never heard ofthat printer, eco printer, but
that's cool too.
But then also, yeah, I'm prettysure I don't know how if you
were to download it, maybe youemail it to yourself or put it.
Do people use USB drivesanymore?
I don't know, but I think youcould and take that to the
library and they could print itfor you as well.
Yep definitely All right.
(11:49):
Or if you have one of themgovernment jobs you just print
it.
No, I'm kidding, All right.
So now that you're in the mathlevel one, you're doing a lot of
writing, and so we'll do adifferent episode on that as you
kind of round out your year onthat.
But for the level K was therelike games or a lot of writing
(12:12):
or crafts or anything like that.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
Yeah, so there are definitely games.
I wouldn't say a whole lot, butthey were in there and I was
very surprised.
You know, we would go throughthe game and my son would say,
oh, can we play again?
And we'd play, like you know,five times, which kind of made
me feel good, because there'ssome days where he doesn't want
to do schooling at all.
But when you get to a game it'slike, oh, can we do it again?
So that, you know, again mademe feel good.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
So there there's a few games, no real crafts.
They got like the, the, thespatial recognition things,
where you kind of have to, youknow, take the blocks and the
sticks from your box and kind ofbuild what they have built.
There's as much handwriting, Ifeel like, as math should be.
I guess I would call ithandwriting because you're
(13:04):
tracing numbers, you're drawing,you know the hands on the clock
, you're doing your additionproblems.
It's not a whole lot, butthere's definitely way more.
In level one, you know we'relearning how to spell the
numbers and writing actual datesnow.
So there's definitely a lot morein level one.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
Okay, so that gives people a good idea if they don't
know which one to start with,what level their kid is at.
Yeah, all right, and so this isa religious curriculum, correct
?
Speaker 2 (13:37):
It is correct.
Yeah, I wouldn't say there's awhole lot in it, and even if
there is, I feel like you knowthere's a sentence or two that
you could probably just skipover if you, you know, don't
practice religion or you know,don't want to introduce that to
your child, which is fine.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yeah, I, it's definitely not heavily baked
into every lesson, it's like alittle something here or there.
Um, and I agree, you like Ichanged the name.
When it says read to your child, I say okay, read to Colin.
You know, so that it's justeasy enough to change a word as
you're reading it Um so wouldyou use this again on your
younger son?
Speaker 2 (14:15):
Yeah, I will definitely use this for for my
younger son.
Speaker 1 (14:19):
Yep, don't you sometimes just think like, oh,
I'm through that curriculum andthen I got to redo it all over
again?
I know people that have likenine kids.
All right, so did.
Did your son enjoy thiscurriculum?
Speaker 2 (14:32):
You know, I think in the very beginning, when we
first started, you know, I wasnew to homeschooling so I was
like, okay, let's do this overthe summer, see if we can
actually homeschool.
So when I was doing that,taking my trial run before
actual school started in thefall, you know he was sometimes
wanting to do three lessons at atime, and I think he really
(14:52):
enjoyed it.
And you know, I think he didenjoy it.
I just think maybe I pushed alittle too hard so there were
some days he didn't want to doit.
So it's kind of something thatI'm learning for myself Try not
to push so hard.
But I think he did enjoy it.
Speaker 1 (15:07):
Yeah, I think my son too.
Yeah, like I said, it was agood balance of being hard
enough to where he was learning,but not so.
It was not that easy for him.
He wasn't getting frustrated,you know, not too frustrated,
but he was learning, so it Idon't even know if I'm making
sense.
Um, oh, justine, thank you somuch.
(15:28):
So this is the good and thebeautiful level K.
I hope this was helpful toanyone listening, and do you
have anything else you want toadd about it?
Speaker 2 (15:36):
I do just want to add one thing that we maybe didn't
really cover.
So it is an open and gocurriculum.
So it's, you know, literallyyou open it, it tells you
specifically what to read toyour child, which I think it
makes life so much easier.
There's nothing for you toprepare.
You know, there's bluelettering which you kind of read
to yourself, and then there'sthe black lettering which is
(15:57):
what you read specifically tothe child.
So I just think that makes itso much easier.
Speaker 1 (16:03):
That's it.
I am going to put that as oneof my questions now on.
That I ask people for thisseries is is this open and go?
That's great, that's a goodpoint.
Yeah, because there's nothingthat you need to prep beforehand
, so that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Thanks.
Just one other thing Also.
Before you start each lesson,there's like a little, a little
box at the top of the first pageand it's called practice if not
mastered.
So you know of the first pageand it's called practice if not
mastered.
So you know, I did it with mychild.
I think he kind of knew mosteverything we went over, but I
always did it.
It's just, you know, practicecounting from 60 to 80.
(16:40):
If you don't know it, it'ssomething that you should
obviously work on.
You know, have him raise hisright hand, have him raise his
left hand, have him, you know,take out a whiteboard and have
him draw or write the number 20on the whiteboard.
Does he know what number 20looks like?
So it just kind of goes intothose things that you should
have mastered.
And if not, did the uh did itwith him the other night.
Speaker 1 (17:13):
He came home from work I'm like, can you do his
math with him?
And he goes through the thinghe goes.
Oh my God, that was just thereview.
Now you've got to do whatyou're actually learning.
Oh, I'm glad that you came on.
You had a lot of great pointsthat I'm going to now put in our
list of questions for for myother uh episodes.
Thank you so much, justine.
(17:34):
We'll have you back on and, um,if you want to hear more about
Justine's story and how herhomeschooling in general, what
got her into it and all of that,I will have her on the main
podcast where we can chat aboutthat as well.
Sounds good, thanks, cheryl.
Thank you so much for listening.
Please consider sharing thispodcast or my main podcast, the
(17:55):
Homeschool how To with friends,family, on Instagram or in your
favorite homeschool groupFacebook page.
The more this podcast is shared, the longer we can keep it
going and the more hope we havefor the future.
Thank you for your love of thenext generation.
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