Hi everyone! I hope you are enjoying the curriculum discussions we’ve been doing lately. I’m hoping they will help you in choosing curriculum for your own family!
Today I want to focus on the subject of Geography. Of course our family had a great time with the Expedition Earth World Geography, then moved to Road Trip USA Geography after that. Both are full year curriculum for elementary aged students. And they’re both really fun, hands-on, visual, and did an excellent job of getting my kiddos to remember what they learned!
Expedition Earth World Geography curriculum is is a hands on world geography curriculum that covers 31 countries across the world. It is designed primarily for K-5 students. Students will learn the continents, oceans, people, cultures, animals, climates, try new foods, crafts and more, all through hands-on activities! Get ready for an exciting voyage across the world! Come along as we walk on the Great Wall of China, wander through the Amazon Rainforest, and climb the Egyptian Pyramids! Within this curriculum you’ll discover the sights and sounds of 31 countries across the globe. You’ll get hands-on with fun activities, crafts, recipes and more! So grab your passports, and get ready to go! It’s time for Expedition Earth!
–> Click here to download a sample of our Brazil Week <–
The revised version includes Lap Books for each country, new information, internet links, and books. Here’s a peek at the Teacher’s Manual. It includes everything you need for each lesson including any additional info, internet links, reading assignments, crafts, and recipes for each country as needed. There are 32 weeks of lesson plans, plus a Christmas Around the World Unit. The Teacher’s Manual is outlined for you on a daily basis and even includes a Craft Supply Shopping List for each country just to make your life a little easier!
Road Trip USA is a United States Geography and History curriculum. From the signing of the Declaration of Independence, to the wild west, you’ll uncover all the secrets this Nation has to offer! Within this curriculum you’ll discover the sights and sounds of all 50 states, including state symbols, U.S. Presidents, famous people, landmarks, historical events, and much more! This curriculum is geared for elementary aged students.
–>Click here to download a sample<–
For you history buffs, this is a great introduction for young learners! You will start out learning about the Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Revolutionary War. Then you’ll move south to learn more about the Civil War and Underground Railroad. From there you’ll journey with Lewis & Clark through the mid-west, live with the Hopi in the southwest, then venture out into the wild west on a covered wagon ride! So grab your Travel Logs, and pack your bags! It’s time for a Road Trip!
Pros:
- Hands on
- Fun activities
- Great memory games and visuals
- Buy once, print multiple times for your family.
Cons:
- Can be pricey if you have a lot of student copies to print.
What do you think?
I would love to hear what you all do for Geography, and if you used one of my curriculum, feel free to comment on how it went or if there’s anything you’d like to have added or changed to make it easier to use!
So, now comes the fun part!
What are your favorite Geography curriculum, resources, websites, etc? Leave a comment below discussing your choices for this year and why.
Feel free to ask questions or reply to each other too!
It’s my way of doing a forum without actually doing a forum haha!
And hopefully this will help us all as we start the process of researching curriculum, and trying to decide what will be the best fit for our homeschool.
Note: Please keep today’s conversations geared towards Geography, I will be posting one for each subject separately so we can keep our comments organized.
Click here if you missed my previous Homeschool Curriculum Forum posts!
Disclosure: This was not a sponsored post, I may however be affiliated with one or more products mentioned. The opinions expressed in this post were not influenced by the company. They are products I have used and felt like sharing, cuz’ it’s my blog and I can if I want to.
For Canadian families and those who want to teach Canadian geography/history, I would highly recommend the geography and history curriculums written by Donna Ward and sold by Northwoods Press ( https://www.donnaward.net/index.php ) For the middle school years “Geography: Province to Province” is an excellent book with a whole bunch of worksheets. They also bundle the books for complete curriculum, inc. a Canadian atlas and additional workbooks. We love their products and have been using them for a couple of years.
As a side note, Northwoods Press also sells curriculums for Canadian History, Native Studies and African Studies. They also have an extensive series of literature, especially adventure books for boys. I had a chance to look at many of their books at the Kitchener-Waterloo Christian Homeschoolers Association annual conference and was impressed with the broad range of materials.
yes! We are canadian and we use Donna Ward curriculum-she’s fantastic!
This is wonderful information. My husband and I are both from Canada but currently living in Texas. We were just saying how we want to teach them more about Canada as well as the US. I will check Donna Ward out. Thank you
Our favorite resource this year is The Scrambled States of America book and game. We focused on history this year and started reading and playing the game so the kids could get familiar with the states before we dive into a full on geography lesson next year. The game is for ages 8+ but if you are creative you can modify the rules, my 3 year old really enjoys playing with me or my husband, and after reading the book 2 days in a row she went up to our wall map and pointed to and knew which state was Kansas. She now knows the names and locations of about 10 states. My boys (6 and 8) are becoming familiar with where all of the states are. I think it’s a good primer for starting a geography coarse or adding it in for something fun to do.
We did purchase your Road Trip USA curriculum and will be starting it as soon as I feel my wiggly Kindergartner is ready for the work load so we can all do it all together.
I forgot to add that if you have a Tag reader, the Interactive United States Map is also one of my kids favorite activities for learning the States and capitols.
Check out the DVD that goes with Scramble States of America. Another great way to remember the states. Your library may have it.
we love Scrambled States of America Game!
We are using Road Trip USA this year and love it! I love the use of the If you lived in…. books. They are clear and easy to understand. I think the kids favorite part is the food. We have made some fun memories this year in the name of Road Trip USA!
Thank you for all your great posts on curriculums. I am from Honduras, and in our country we lack in so many ways in education (that’s part of the reason for me to homeschool!). However, and I mean this in the best way, we look like we have doctorate degrees when it comes to geography compared to most North Americans. (I don’t mean to brag, but I went to college in the US and in my world geography class my professor told me I had the highest grade he had ever given). It is sad A LOT of Americans don’t even know where our country is and we are only a couple of countries south. As a homeschool mom from a third world country, I love Sonlight’s Geography emphasis on the entire world, not just a few countries. In my opinion children are capable of memorizing at least 75% of the world’s country. Just for moms out there to think about!
Ooops…75% of the world’s COUNTRIES..:)
Linda, Well said! Yes, children are certainly able to memorize the worlds countries, especially since most of them haven’t changed for generations. I’m certainly looking to change that lack of geographic knowledge in our family!
We use Classical Conversations for our Geography Memory work.
The students memorize geographic regions, and particular countries, cities or landforms. This year my children and I memorized the locations over over 100 places/landforms around the globe. The knowledge of geography has enhanced our reading and understanding of history (and current events) in ways I didn’t realize we were missing.
Through Homeschooling, we’re indeed restoring two generations of learning!
Thank you Susan, I am glad you are enhancing your children’s learning experience in this way! It does enrich the experience when it comes to history and not only that, but children know what is being talked about when it comes to world news. Keep up the good work!
My husband is also from Honduras. We lived in Honduras together for the first few years of our marriage. We are currently living in Arkansas and homeschooling our children. It’s quite amazing what kind of “bubble” so many Americans live in up here. I love to hear when people are teaching their children a good solid world geography curriculum. It’s so wonderful for everyone (parents and children) to learn about other countries and cultures. There is so much variety in the way people live around the world. We are planning to teach our children geography through Expedition Earth. I am so looking forward to it. I think it’s going to be a wonderful year!
I cannot wait to use these with my kiddos. We use your LOTW and love it!
Evan Moor’s “Beginning Geography” (for kindergarten level) and “Daily Geography” (for grades 1-5, I think) are excellent resources for learning mapping skills. I also love the book called “The Little Man in the Map” for really learning the locations of all 50 states… for students and moms! 🙂
We are from Canada and we’ve been studying both Canadian and world geography this year. We’ve used different puzzles and large maps (very reasonable at Costco). I just ordered GeoPuzzles for next year. They look fun! Each piece is the actual shape of the state/ province/ country.
As far as curriculum choices, we used a book by Donna Ward, mentioned in an earlier post. It was easy to use, and the kids enjoyed it too. We also enjoyed Canada Map Book 1 by Apple Press. We really liked this book and ordered more of the series for next year.
Our family loves to learn facts with music, so we’ve found some songs online that help teach geography to a tune. (For example the names of the continents sung to the tune Frere Jacques.)
Maybe I can purchase a copy of Roadtrip Canada soon! Wink wink.
Great to see the review about the Apple Press map books – we were looking at incorporating them. Who are you ordering them through? Thanks.
We ordered from One Stop Learning, near Vancouver, BC.
I’d love Roadtrip Canada too!! 🙂
I just downloaded your Expedition Earth. We kicked off this week with the first lesson and so far LOVING it! My kids ask everyday to do it. This is not always the case so when I find something that sparks this much interest in my kiddos I get really excited. One of my goals for my children is that they learn to follow their curiosity and interests and become life long learners. I believe that this curriculm is allowing them the opportunity to discover through reading, researching, creating, trying and discussing. Thank you for creating such a great curriculum. (I have a 1st grader and a 2nd grader and my own teeny tot 😉
Visualize World Geography (http://www.visualizeworldgeography.com/) is a fun curriculum that we found at a homeschool convention. It is a great resource. It can be incorporated with any world geography program because it is teaching you how to RECOGNIZE the different countries.
I plan to use y Father’s Wordl’s Exploring Countries and Cultures next year with my kids. We know a family that did that and used supplements for your Expedition Earth curriculum and they went well together, so that is my plan as well.