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.
Hi Erica,
I was curious what you will be doing with the kids once you finish road trip USA? Any plans?
We use your Expedition Earth modified along with many books I order from the library to expand on the literature for the countries (if they want to me to read more and learn more than I’ll do it!) we love the geo puzzles by Geo Toys, the boys (7 and 5) can now label a blank map of the area etc after we’ve completed the unit and reinforced study with the puzzles. I use Evan Moor Daily Geography and Beginning Geog (2 different books) for Grades 1 and 1-2 which is a nice value add for the price (reproducible) where you can create a landform book, learn about map grids and map legends, map each continent with their landforms etc.. They’ve been really fun and its never work when they see it’s EM time! I’m using the next levels of Evan Moor for next year but am not sure what else to pick from for USA yet. I usually have too much curriculum and try to do too much. I love how Road Trip USA looks, and want to add more to it, just not sure what yet. Taking some suggestions from above comments and looking into them. Thanks for all the great ideas!
We use Sonlight which basically has us find the countries on a map that we read about in our history books and read alouds. Next year we go a little deeper into world geography through Sonlight. We also always do the Geography Fair at our co-op and really get into the countries we choose. I also purchased a large self stick world map to put on our dining room wall and that has sparked many learning moments. We also cover one continent in our co-op class each year.
We are finishing up Expedition Earth and have loved everything about it. Next year we are looking forward to Road Trip (which is already printed out and ready to go). This curriculum goes along nicely with FIAR which we use for our youngest and it can also very easily be “geared” toward older students as well with just a few little additions…which we did for our 5/6th grader. We have lots of different go-along books (some which you suggest and others which follow the Oak Meadow and FIAR curriculums). I have found that my children are, just by using this, advanced beyond grade level in comparison with our local schools.
We’ve been using the Trail Guide to Learning Paths of Exploration this year, and my son absolutely loves it. It’s an all-around curriculum (minus math) where everything’s based around a geography core and real books that go with the curriculum text. Lots of great activities, books, maps, and fun. We’re learning about Daniel Boone right now 🙂 http://www.home-school-curriculum.com/learning_series/ We do nature studies, activities out of the original Boy Scout handbook, study animals, and use maps and geography to study spelling, language arts, history, etc. It’s great!! It’s also a multi-age curriculum and can be adapted up and down for each level.
We have used the Seterra program at http://www.seterra.net/ also Globalmania available at http://www.knowledgequestmaps.com/Globalmania.html My kids love the games.
We just discovered seterra and downloaded it. My 4th grader LOVES it and is learning a lot by using it. She is excited when she can beat my times! It is a great supplement to any geography program!
I’ve been using your Expedition Earth with my three, ages: 9, 7, and 5. They all really like it. I didn’t print them all the same pages. For the youngest, we started when she was four, most of her pages are from the ‘net. Color the country and flag type of thing. We haven’t done all the activities, but we do a few here and there. They ask to do it often and we have enjoyed it. I decided to step away from history and focus more on geography and this has been great for that. I’m planning on using your Road Trip USA next year for my 7, 5, and 3 yr old and then my 10 yr old will be doing Sonlight’s American History. I feel that he needs something a bit more in depth, although I have no doubt he’ll enjoy following along with the youngers. I do have a question for you though. Where did you find your map that you have on your wall of the USA? It isn’t labeled and I would like something like that that my kids can label as they learn about each state. Thanks.
Tiffany- I found one almost identical to Erica’s at Target in their $1 section. It was in August for ‘Back to School’. Maybe you can look there soon.
I’ll be doing Expedition Earth next year. I also plan to do your Road Trip USA in a couple of years when we do US History.
We are going to use Ann Voskamp’s A Child’s Geography next year. We haven’t done any of it yet, but I love her book, One Thousand Gifts, and I am looking forward to a more “living” approach to geography. 🙂
Where do you find this? I love Ann voskamo
We used one I think called Children of the World this year My son didn’t really care for it though & got bored easily. I think we will use your Road Trip USA next year. We recently moved across the country & drove through a lot of states & my son wants to learn about all that we saw along the way 🙂
We have spent 2 years using Road Trip USA ( K and 1st grade). We love it!!! We also use SOTW activity book which includes maps. We start Classical Conversations in August which will include geography.