Longtime readers will know of my love for Sonlight. It is a history and literature based curriculum I have used for over 10 years.
Until now.
As hard as it is to say it, (because of loyalty) I have found something even better.
We started using The Good & the Beautiful for language arts this past September for Laura (middle school) on down to Jason (pre-k). It has been wonderful! I have been heard to say several times these past few months, “This is exactly what I’ve been looking for since we started homeschooling almost twenty years ago.”
Why Do I Love It?
Everything – reading, writing, phonics, spelling, grammar, punctuation, and literature is covered. And bonus, art and geography are thrown in too. WHAT? Yes! In the language arts program!
Not only that but it is all wholesome reading with emphasis on faith, families, and strong morals. Beautiful paintings and other art are incorporated right into the books. Take a look at this page that Jason did a couple of days ago.
Notice the delightful artwork. The discussion starts with “Let’s talk about this picture. This picture shows the love of families. Look at how the mother donkey loves the baby donkey. Look at how the sisters are holding hands.” Then questions are asked of the child to help them notice the details in the painting as well as reinforce skills they have been learning. “Point to the clouds. What letter does CLOUDS start with?”
This page also shows another thing I really like about The Good & The Beautiful. There are no separate lesson or teacher plans. It is all written out in the books. The curriculum I was using before I had to pull out several different books as well as open the lesson plans which were in a giant blue binder. There are still a few separate books with The Good & the Beautiful but not as many as they try to have the literature already in the books.
For levels K-3 there are phonics flash cards and reader books to practice those essential skills needed for successful and strong readers.
The older grades also discuss artwork but with more details. Children practice oral narration and are encouraged to be very descriptive in their language. Levels 4 has a creative companion that teaches art techniques while learning geography and practicing writing skills.
FREE CURRICULUM
One great thing about this curriculum is you can download levels 1-5 of Language Arts & Literature for absolutely free! You can try it out with your own children and see if it will work for you. If it doesn’t you haven’t lost any money. You don’t have to worry about returning books in good condition. But, I can almost guarantee you will love it.
Before you purchase anything you can see sample pages of the books or units. I’m not talking about 1 or 2 page samples either! Samples are over 20 pages so you can really get a good look at what you are purchasing.
Through Saturday, Nov. 11th only you can download The Good & The Beautiful book list for free. It recommends books for children of all ages from pre-k up to high school. These books are uplifting, have no bad language, teach good morals, etc. And there are a lot of them! The book list is 117 pages long. Did you know there really are good books out there for children and families to read?
HISTORY
We loved the language arts and literature so much we recently ordered the history and science.
Take a look at the difference between Sonlight on the left and The Good & The Beautiful on the right. Do you know how much more shelf space I am going to have to fill with more good books to read? Squee! Sonlight is done on a daily basis while TG&TB is just a couple of times a week so that does affect the size a bit.
Again, beautiful artwork is sprinkled throughout the books as stories from history are told.
I LOVE that women and girls are included in TG&TB world history as much as the boys and men are. Have you ever heard the story of Madeleine Vercheres?
Another wonderful part of the history courses are the dramatized audio recordings. My children love listening to Old Time Radio classics like ‘Tales of the Texas Rangers’ and ‘Gunsmoke” so these recordings are right up their alley.
SCIENCE
We haven’t started the science yet. I ordered The Solar System and the Human Body units to begin with. We start them next week.
HAPPY KIDS – HAPPY MOM
Overall we have all quite enjoyed The Good & The Beautiful!
My kids are actually excited to do school, still. They are usually excited when school starts in September but that wanes pretty fast. Here we are three months into the school year and they are still enjoying it.
If you knew Gideon, you’d realize how much of a success this is!
If you are looking for academically strong curriculum that also teaches good morals along with faith and family, The Good & The Beautiful is everything it’s name implies.
We love TGTB! We started using it when it was first released. I’m so excited for the upcoming HS courses. Our daughter is a Freshman this year and working through Level 7. I like to print the book list and put it in a binder for when we go to the library.
We just started the LA part this year as well. Due to a kitchen remodel we’re off to a slow start, but I am loving it. When the kids were little I created all my own curriculum which was SO MUCH FUN, but I have eight kids now and I feel like I am letting too much slide. That’s why I purchased an actual curriculum this year–to make sure in the chaos of many children, I wasn’t letting major things slide. If it works for us, I’ll probably be purchasing the history and science next year. I hate admitting that I can’t have the joy of creating my own, but there is no joy when nothing gets done either. Thanks for the review. I’m glad it is working for another large family!!
Yes! I loved creating my own curriculum when my older kids were little. When we had six kids it became too stressful and I just didn’t enjoy it anymore. So I searched and found the best I could for us at the time, which was Sonlight, and it worked and was wonderful. But, this, oh I am so glad it has come along!
Oh, and another thing–if you even want to write a blog post about what you do for high school math, that would be great. I just put my oldest (14) into an Art of Problem Solving class online and I think that might work for her, but it is probably too much reading for the next in line. I’m incompetent at any math above prealgebra and too busy to learn it, so I need outside help. Thanks!
We use the Mathematical Reasoning series from The Critical Thinking Co from k-6th and love it, so that isn’t a problem.
We’ve just used BYU Independent Study courses for math. I LOVE math and so far we haven’t had to get a tutor for any of the kids. Too bad none of them inherited my love of math. At least I can help them!
I’m happy that at least one of my children (so far) has inherited my deep, deep love for sentence diagramming. The rest all love math. Weirdos.
Well I’m just envious! Resources have come such a long way since we began back in 1994, and even since we ended in 2008. What a blessing to find such good curriculum!
I know! My oldest, who was born in 1995, would have really thrived with this curriculum. She did great with Sonlight though. We have just tried to use the best we could find. I am so thankful for people who use their time and talents to produce good curriculum and share it with others.
How long does it take to get through on an average day? I was looking through it quite a bit tonight and it was hard to tell how long it would take and how much help each child would need. Right now I feel like everyone needs my help for everything all the time and I just can’t manage. The website made it sound like the history would take an hour 3 times per week! I couldn’t tell on the science. Any thoughts on that?
I’m glad you mentioned the free book list download! I snagged that and saw lots of books I haven’t heard of which is unusual! I’m excited to look into them!
Urgh. I tried to leave a comment and I think it didn’t work. I’ll try once more!
About how long does it take your kids to do the work on an average day? Can they do most of it independently? I’m at a place where I feel like everyone needs me to help them with everything all the time and it’s driving me nuts!
Also, have you tried the history yet and found out how long that takes to do? The website said something like 3 hours per week! That seemed like a lot just for history.
I’m glad you mentioned the free book list! I snagged that while I could! Lots of books I’ve never heard of, which is exciting and unusual. Yay!
We use The Good & The Beautiful too! (See my review here) https://theycallmegranola.wordpress.com/2017/11/08/an-honest-thorough-review-the-good-the-beautiful-homeschool-curriculum/.
Time is another thing I love so much about The Good and the Beautiful ! It’s open and go so I’m not scurrying about during school hours wasting precious time gathering supplies, or printing a forgotten worksheet. I’m homeschooling four children Level 2 and under, so all of our lessons in the Language Arts book and for History and Science are done with me there. We start school at 8am, and we’re done between 11-12! That’s 3-4 hours TOTAL! I’m not even kidding! And I spend at least 30-40 minutes with each child INDIVIDUALLY and then we do History together twice a week and Science and Nature together once a week. I have the family lessons sprinkled throughout the week on different days so it’s not all clumped into one day. Not only does this 3-4 hours include The Good and the Beautiful Language Arts, History, Science, and Nature… I’m also doing Math with all the kids and one is doing The Good and the Beautiful Typing! We are ALWAYS done before lunch!
Thank you for this! We are a large family using Sunlight now but looking for something else as my littles hit school age and I’m being stretched too thin…as is the budget 😉 I can’t wait to start it!
Hi! We are sonlighters too. My son is finishing up core a. I think we are going with TGTB next! Would you say level k is more like grade 1? We flew through sonlight core a. I have done the placement tests but am expecting some growth through summer as we really practice reading.
Yes, Level K is advanced K or grade 1. The Primer is really great for kindergarten level!
What do you use for math? I have 3-9 graders.
We use Abeka math until about 5th grade than we use Christian Light Education (CLE) and Khan Academy.
What did you think of the science? I’m also a devoted Sonlighter, and feel like I’m cheating just looking at another curriculum! I came looking for LA and now considering switching it all. How did you like the science? I’m looking for older elementary age. Thanks!
Sorry for the redundancy. I didn’t catch it until it posted!
Are you still using The Good and The Beautiful. I am a long time Sonlight fan. I have 6 kiddos and my 6 and 8 year old are struggling with reading… more b/c I’m struggling with motivation. Curious if you are still using this and how you are liking it for your emerging readers?
Yes, we will be using it again for the next school year! I already have all the materials in hand. My two emerging readers have done really well. We are still in the Primer K and also use the “I Can Read It” books from the Sonlight Grade 1 Reader Packs with my 6 year old. Level K is equivalent to a mix of Grade 1 and 2 Reader packs from Sonlight. We will start Level K this summer, probably around his 7th birthday in July. (We homeschool year round). I also ordered “My First Reading Library” from Usborne books because the parent or older sibling reads a page then the beginning reader reads a page. My six year old has really enjoyed them!
My eight year old struggled with reading when we first started last fall. She has improved dramatically! We started with Level K even though it was a bit easy for her at first. She flew through that level and is now halfway through Level 1.
Will you tell me how long Level K for LA lasted? I am trying to loosely lay out our calendar and with only 40 or so lessons, I’m not able to tell when it will be finished. With Math I have 115 lessons so I can easily tell where that might end. We are in the Primer now and are really enjoying it with our twins. We will be doing science and handwriting as well. Thank you so much for your post, it is very helpful!
We did level K with my 7 year old and she breezed through it. We started level K in September and finished it by February. I will start Level K with my 6 year old in July. I expect it will take him longer to go through it than his older sister did. Sometimes I don’t do a full lesson if they are having trouble. Other times when they “get” it we are able to do two lessons a day. I usually just shoot for about 20-30 minutes for language arts at this age.
Great, thank you! Did you move to Level 1 with your daughter after finishing level k?
Yes, we moved right into level 1. She is on lesson #42 right now.
Nice, thank you. It’s so great to have the flexibility to do what they need and not what someone else says. I’ve been loosely trying to plan out our year and since there are 47 lesson on level k, the way I was trying to count them out to plan isn’t working. I’m trying to not worry about grade levels but when that’s how we were brought up and is all we know it’s tough to get out of that. I just want to make sure I’m doing what’s right for them. 🙂
It took me several years to get out of the “grade” mindset when I started homeschooling my children. And I was homeschooled! It’s amazing how ingrained it is in our society.
Your children are blessed because they have a mother invested in their education, whatever that education looks like – homeschool, public, or charter. When a parent is really invested their children will be all the better. You are doing great!
HI thank you so much for your thoughts and info here I really apprecieat your opinons! I am wondering why you dont use the Good and Beautiful Math program?
Math wasn’t available when we started using TG&TB. We use Math K and 1 now for my younger kids. We still use Abeka Math for those who are older and recently discovered CTCMath which we use to supplement the Abeka.
Love this review and I’m hoping you’ll still reply to messages on here. 😉
New to homeschooling. One starting kindergarten (5yo/smart/eager to learn) and one who would be starting 2nd in public schools. I just pulled him last week due to all the COVID “stuff” and how it will oppress in-class learning even more than it may have already been. With him missing instruction since schools closed in March and also due to the fact that he was starting to struggle with math around that same time…I’m trying to realize that starting him in TGATB level 1 math won’t actually be holding him back. Speak some truth to me about this. I saw a previous comment above discussing how we have to break out of that “public school grade level” mode. I am finding that to be so difficult!
Also – what to do about a rising kindergartener and the appropriate level to choose? Is level K actually appropriate for kindergarten? He passed 100% on the math assessment for level k/haven’t done the assessment for LA yet.
Hi Laura,
All great questions! Congratulations on your decision. It will be a great year with lots of learning for all of you. 🙂
For any of your children I highly recommend having them take the assessment test to see what level you should place them in and stick to what the results say. You will do a great disservice trying to place them in a higher level when they aren’t ready for it. It is so important to meet them where they are at and work with them there to improve.
Here is the test for Language Arts: https://www.goodandbeautiful.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Course-Level-Assessment_2_0.pdf
Here is the test for Math: https://www.goodandbeautiful.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/K-3-Pre-Assessments_FINAL-WEB.pdf
Level K is pretty advanced. It’s more of a grade 1 if you are wanting to compare to a public school. There’s nothing wrong with starting in Pre-K and if your child breezes through it they will feel confident in their skills. Most children are on varying levels. Like yours some are in one level for math and a different level for language arts. That’s okay and totally normal! The beauty of homeschooling is being able to tailor their learning.
I know this post is old, but I hope you’ll reply. I was leaning toward Sonlight because of all the great literature being the main vehicle for teaching. From what I understand, TGATB uses mostly free things that are free due to copyright dating. Do you still use your Sonlight cores as a framework at all or do you use the books with TGATB’s history? The literature is the main thing I am attracted to and would feel that I would miss out on with TGATB. Also, I’m just getting started with K next year. But from what I have heard, Sonlight weaves a beautiful tapestry with all of the literature.
Great question! I still have all the Sonlight books because they are great for extra reading for my kids. I also have the cores for older grades, especially the American History ones. As far as teaching my children to read, grammar, writing, etc TGTB has been a better fit and easier to use. I have found that less is more for the younger grades. TGTB’s booklist has many recommendations that are available through Sonlight but they are also beginning to publish the old classics that are harder to find.
Sonlight is excellent for history which is why I kept the American History cores. I am still using those for my junior high aged kids. It is very thorough!
Hello! I know this post is really old , but I am hoping to get some help. I am homeschooling my children ages 7, and 6. I also have a 3 year old, and an 18 month old. My 7 year old is struggling with reading. We have been using CLE and it is just not working for him. Do you think that the Good and the Beautiful would maybe be a good fit for him? Also have any of your kids been in the same grade at the same time? I think my 7 and 6 year olds will probably both be in level 1 this year. Just wondering if this curriculum is good for teaching two kids at the same time. Thank you for any advice you can give me:)