Homeschool Heartbeat Radio Program

Michael Smith:

As a home schooling mother of four, I know that you have several tips you can share with our listeners on how to use of their limited curriculum dollars. What do you recommend, Beverly?

Beverly McCord:

Well, first investigate all the public libraries near you. Next, find out when local home school support groups are going to be holding their used curriculum sales. Most of them hold them in the spring a couple of weeks before their local curriculum fair. You can also find some year round used booksellers listed on our website at homeschoolbookfair.org or the used books sales page. Third, you can make a lot of things yourself. For instance, I made all my math manipulatives and all my phonics flash cards. Now I'm going to make some unorthodox suggestions that are going to rankle some people. For example, I discovered that it was a waste of time and money to buy any curriculum before second grade especially for boys. And I have 3 of them. I really couldn't get them to sit down and do much work until they were about 7. I also found that the first half of most second grade curriculum is a review of first grade. And last, I never found teachers manuals helpful so I never bought them. And I never bought test booklets and answer keys until 6th grade. They weren't helpful either.

Michael Smith:

Beverly, what great advice! Listeners, you can check out Beverly's website at homeschoolbookfair.org.