What do you think of the "Sonlight" Homeschool Curriculum?

Question

What do you think of the "Sonlight" Homeschool Curriculum?

Answer 1

Like it...love it...want some more of it!  It's especially good if you are a family of literature lovers.  It seems very intensive at first glance, but once you get into the rhythm of it, it moves along nicely.  Not only is the program very interesting, it leaves lots of room for inspiration and curiosity.  I very rarely have an "aw, Mom, do we have to?" kind of day.  You have to be committed, though.  Kids in the higher grades can look after themselves, but for younger kids, Sonlight is not a "set them and forget them" type of program.  There's a lot of reading and parent interaction.  That's another reason we like it.

Edit to NJRoadie:  While I agree that the books do become more "religious" as you go along, the program is advertised as a Christian curriculum.  What you considered a detriment was a real positive to me.

Answer 2

I think it's a great curriculum.  It's not the structure that works for us, so we don't use it, but I do still integrate some of their books.  However, it does work for a lot of my friends' kids, and they swear by it.

Answer 3

We've been using it for 4 cores now.  The religious parts aren't all that bad.  If you prepare, like you're supposed to, you know the books that are coming and you can leave those parts out and substitute them with something else.  You should always read ahead and make sure you agree with what's being taught anyway.  The bible, ie. missionary stories are kept seperate, so they don't really intertwine.  I highly recommend it.  We often start with Sonlight and once something catches our attention, we might study that more in depth and then return to the Sonlight program when we're done with that.  We've really liked it so far.

Answer 4

We love Sonlight! This is our second year using it and plan to continue using it for a few more years. We tried ACE earlier this year and went back to Sonlight as fast as we could because we all hated ACE.

It is a Christian Curriculum but that's part of what we like about it. You can pretty easily skip what you want or need to. We let our daughter skip 3 readers a year. They are books she's started but she is not enjoying. If she finds a book she like less than the three she skipped then she has to read one that she skipped. That way she has some say as to what she is doing.

We also bought the core 3+4 and plan to use it for 2 years. We don't stress if the LA and Science sections aren't finished because we can easily go back to them when we finish the history and reading sections at the end of the first semester next school year. We enjoy the books and I find myself picking them up to read now and again.

Answer 5

We are a non-religious family and have used it for 5 cores (World History 1 and 2, American History 1 and 2, Eastern Hemisphere history).  In many ways I love it, but since I find critical praise more useful, here are the drawbacks:

1. Many books about missionaries, some of which are clothed to look like non-religious books until you are several chapters in.

2. Overall the book choices as you move up the cores go more religious and less topical. This year in Eastern Hemispheres they are leaving out many great books in order to cover religious books instead. This is annoying.  I supplement heavily at this point.

3. Their science curriculum is extremely creationist/young earth based. Used it for a few lessons and dropped it.  The book about the dinosaurs being on the ark did me in.

Other than these complaints, I really do like the overall pacing and depth of the curriculum, which is why I continue to use it.

Good luck!

Answer 6

Here are ten pages of reviews!

http://homeschoolreviews.com/reviews/cur...