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When people ask me where to start with homeschooling little ones, I always recommend Rod & Staff preschool/kindergarten books. It’s where I have been starting for 9 years now! In fact, it is THE ONE piece of curriculum that has stayed constant in all my homeschooling years. That, my friends, is a big deal!
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*They are Christian. While our family is not of the Anabaptist faith, we can still appreciate the modestly-dressed children and mission minded teachings of these books. Life in the Rod & Staff books is presented without the presence of computers and electronic devices. Children are shown working hard and alongside their parents. These are values our family holds dear and values that are hard to find in today’s curricula.
*They are simple. I like simple. There are no flashy colors to distract and the pages are a no-nonsense approach to teaching basic concepts.
*The books are interchangeable. The ABC series isn’t a progressive approach where you have to start with A and then move to B. You can go from book to book at will. When my 5 year old got “stuck” on learning his numbers, I moved to a different book for a time, then when that book reinforced what he was learning and I could see it was making sense to him, we moved back to the numbers book and he took off!
*It’s all there! Everything from cutting and pasting, to spatial skills, to tracing and word recognition, to eventually writing their name and writing letters and numbers are contained within these inexpensive little books. $20 and your school year is paid for!
I have more little ones coming up and as long as Rod & Staff is printing their ABC series, I’ll be using it with them as well!
Amy is the homeschooling mother of a couple of bigs and a whole lot of littles. You can read more about what she uses for the early years of homeschooling at RaisingArrows.net!
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We L.O.V.E. Rod and Staff products.
Great post.
Kelly
Thanks! I’m familiar with Rod and Staff, but was unaware that they had a preschool/kindergarten curriculum.
I’m not much of a workbook person, but my 5 year old daughter sure enjoys them. Maybe I should consider these for her for next year. I’m wondering, though…She’s already a very good reader and is way ahead in math skills as well. Do you think these would still be interesting to her, or would she be bored by them?
Blessings!
I think she could definitely still benefit from them, but they would more than likely be beneath her.
Great thoughts, Amy! Thanks for the info! I will have to check these out to go along with hands on learning for our youngest little when he hits that age.
We are using their Math curriculum with our 3rd grader this year with hands on learning experiences along side it. Can’t wait to see how it works for us.
And I completely agree with you. I love the simple life, hardworking, Christian, non-electronic focus throughout even in their math problems. Helps him see that there are things to do that don’t involve computer games or video games and the emphasis on working together as a family is great too!
Dancing at the foot of the Cross,
Mrs Mary Joy Pershing
We LOVE those books! My youngest is using the G-H-I books from that series this year in first grade. We had planned a different curriculum, but when she found out that there were more of the ABC books, she begged me to add them – and I gladly did. 🙂
Amy, I am working on some ideas for my 4 year old daughter for our school time. She is asking to do “real preschool”, so I’m gathering a lot of cut/paste and pattern type materials.
Do you think this would be appropriate to use for her? I’m not interested in her reading yet since she has shown no interest in that. She doesn’t have any interest in learning to write letters or her name either (she’s a lefty if that makes any difference…?). But I’d love for her to learn her letters down pat and their beginning sounds and that type of thing. I definitely am not going the route of a ‘true’ Kindergarten with her this year.
Do you think this would be a good choice for this level at 4 years old?
Thanks 🙂
-Lauren
4 is where I start these books. There is some writing in some of the books, but even then it isn’t much. There are a lot of tracing, cutting, gluing exercises as well as missionary stories and just for fun kinds of things. I think this would be a great fit for your daughter (and my son who just finished this series is a lefty too! 😉 )
Oh perfect! Thanks so much for your input! Sold.
Yes! We use these as well and I love them. 🙂
This is our first year of homeschooling with 5 kids, 10, 9, 6, 4, and 2. I think I have decided on curriculum for everything except language arts. I have been looking at Rod and Staff. Do the same themes (simple life, hardworking, etc) go through all of their materials? That is something that really appeals to me. Thanks.
Yes, the same themes run throughout their materials. 🙂