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Preschool Homeschool Curriculum Review: Horizon's Preschool for Three's
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Jul 24, 2023
Today I'm sharing our curriculum completion review of Horizon's Preschool for Three's Homeschool Curriculum. I'll get into all the things including likes, dislikes, subjects, topics, course material, and my personal overview of the curriculum, so that you'll know what to expect if you're considering Horizon's Preschool for Three's too! Websites https://themomresource.com/ https://babesnbeauty.com/ Social Media https://instagram.com/heaven.shropshire https://www.facebook.com/HeavenS.BabesNBeauty
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As a homeschool mom, it is so important for us to make sure that we're choosing a homeschool
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curriculum that is going to work for us and meet our family's needs. We want to find one
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that will keep our little one entertained and interested, but also meets all of the bases
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our learning goals, and our lesson plans for the upcoming semester. But with all the different
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curriculums out there, it can be difficult to know which one best fits our needs. So today
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I'm just going to go ahead and give you a review and kind of like a recap of how our
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recently completed homeschool quarter went while using Horizons preschool for three's curriculum
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I'm going to be sharing an overview, a recap, my likes, my dislikes, the topics and subjects that
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was covered, my personal opinion, and just all the things so that you'll know and have an idea
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of what you can expect if you two are considering using Horizons Preschool for three curriculum
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Hello and welcome. My name is Heaven. I am a stand-home mom and wife. I have a three-year-old toddler boy named Noah Jay. And here I vlog about all things motherhood and lifestyle. I create helpful, relatable, and realistic content. So if that's something that you're interested in, definitely subscribe to my channel. I post twice weekly and I would love
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to have you here. But let's go ahead and get into today's video topic, and that is reviewing
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our past homeschool quarter using Horizons Preschool for Three's curriculum. This curriculum came
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with a Bible story reader with 40 Bible stories that were only a paragraph long. It also had
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some engaging questions, as well as a memory verse at the end and a prayer. It also came with
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the Preschool for Three's workbook companion, which included some hands-on activities. that you can do at the end of each lesson
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It included a teacher's guide, which is pretty hefty, and it explained how you should go about teaching each lesson
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and the hefty student workbook that contained 40 student lessons. The way that it is designed is so that you will be completing one lesson per week
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but it advises you to pretty much just go, you know, at the pace of what is normal
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or what is easiest for you and your student or your student
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your child, each lesson was a couple of pages long. So you could basically just do one page
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each day if you're doing one lesson per week or like we did once we got further into the curriculum
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we started off doing one lesson per week and then later on we started doing one lesson per day
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once my son Noah kind of got the hang-up thing. There are a variety of different subjects and
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topics that is covered in this curriculum. It contains language arts, math, creative arts, science
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handwriting Bible lessons, which was a plus for me, grouping, colors, numbers, animals, letters
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all of the things. It pretty much I can say cover like all the things that were the standard state requirements
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here in Michigan. So I can't say that I didn't quite have to worry about that because every now and again you
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will run into some curriculums that may cover like most or only some of what you know
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is required for your little one or your students or child to learn
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at their current grade level. So it's important that you kind of want to find like a curriculum
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that's going to hopefully meet all of those requirements so that you're not doing extra work
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trying to find ways to supplement. And if you do have to supplement, that's completely normal
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but it's easier if the curriculum that you purchase doesn't, you know, call for you to have to
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supplement with any extra workbooks or lessons. So first I'm going to talk about what were my likes
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of this curriculum and then I will discuss my dislikes and then just like
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some general broad opinions of what I think are worth considering. I think that 40 lessons is very
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doable for a three-year-old, especially if they're just getting started with like workbooks
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which was the case for us. We started off with Montessori learning. So switching over to like
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sitting down and doing like a workbook was, you know, a little bit different for him. So 40 lessons
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was pretty doable and the lessons I felt were not too hard. They were pretty simple. He could
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follow along and even if he didn't get it right away, they were easy enough that after teaching
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it to whom he pretty much could grasp what was going on and what was expected of him. Another thing
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that I really liked is that at the top of each page, it had a line for him to write his name
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which is great because it creates repetition in learning and practicing writing his name. When we first
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began, he was not good at writing his name. Like he just, he wasn't. Like he didn't quite know exactly
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how to write his name when we first began. but not even halfway through the curriculum because we had done it on every worksheet within every page of every lesson he kind of got the hang of it and it became to where it was just second nature and he just knew how to write his name So I do like that because we did
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do a little bit of practice with name writing before we started the curriculum, and we did it
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within, like, a separate notebook, but not having to switch from one workbook to another workbook
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in my opinion, it's just very convenient. Every lesson started off with, like, a coloring page
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which can kind of be a fun activity for a three-year-old to do, right
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Arts and creative arts and, like, being able to kind of just manipulate
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like, writing utensils, crayons and things like that is also, like, a standard requirement or something that you want to be teaching your three-year-old anyway
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So being able to do that at the beginning of each lesson was a great way to kind of just
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like, start the lesson off, like in a comfortable and chill and fun and creative way for your little one
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So I also liked that. Another thing that I really liked about this curriculum is that there was like a Bible study tied into each lesson
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Because there are some curriculums that although it is like faith-based, it doesn't necessarily like teach a specific Bible lesson with each like unit or study
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So I do like that. This one did incorporate some type of Bible study or memory verse or a devotion with each individual lesson
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The activity hands-on booklet was also a plus. it came with like worksheets where you can kind of just step away from like the actual like
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workbook and do like some fun activities like painting coloring glooming cutting and things like that
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which is something else that we typically like to incorporate into our homeschool lessons and
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semesters aside from like the worksheets and the lessons and things like that the teacher guide
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also included additional activities in subjects and subjects. and topics and studies that you could focus on
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an addition from each actual lesson inside of the workbook. So, for example, for Lesson 28, it had four different worksheets that you could work on
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But in addition to those worksheets, you also had your workbook companion and your Bible story reader
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But also, in addition to that, it included like a little science study that you can do
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a phonics study. It included a math, arts and crafts, and physical education study
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So for the arts and crafts, it'll basically tell you like to go to a sand box and have the students make a picture or a design in the sand
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For phonics, it'll tell you to say the word nest with your students, which would be like in relevance to whatever study or lesson you were working on that day
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And then give the toddler like an option to also repeat the word nest
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And then you guys talk about words that rhyme with nest so that you can kind of understand like what rhyming means
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which it was also tied into the relevance of the unit or the lesson that you did for that day
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Science, it says, tell the students that water is something that can be made hot or cold
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and take an ice cube from the freezer, put it in a pan. And basically, like, just different ways that you can incorporate other subjects as well into the lesson
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It had, like, physical educations and is asking you to, like, use a cardboard box
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cut off the end, be creative and, like, create a time. know creative cooking and create butterfly sandwiches with like carrots, bread triangles
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It tells you exactly how to do it. It encourages you to go outside and take a walk
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So this is really great. Even outside of homeschool, if you're always trying to find things to keep your little one
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busy and activities to do throughout the day, these are, you know, suggestions within every
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lesson that you can do, you know, throughout the week to just stay busy
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I like that the teacher's guide was an actual separate booklet because you can kind of just like take this and read it beforehand
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You can study it as far in advance if you want to and it also has like a list of supplies that you need for every lesson so that you'll, you know, go into it prepared
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And you can kind of just like hold your teacher's guide while your little one is working on their student workbook because right now we're using the good and the beautiful but it doesn't have like a separate teacher's guide
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it's all tied into like one, you know, curriculum book. In the back of it, it has all of the memory verses from all of the lessons where you can
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just cut them out and keep them. You can laminate each page if you want to and then cut it up and put it into like a little
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basket that you can use for like your morning basket where you kind of just pull out a memory
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verse and you go through them every day and you can kind of just recycle through them
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as much as needed so that it creates repetitive. and your little one can actually, you know, remember all of the verses. So even after you finish
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up the curriculum, to still be able to have these memory verse cards and be able to have them
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for like as long as needed This curriculum also has like songs with lyrics in here to where it not telling you like go look up this song at this website or go look it up on this YouTube channel It has it in here so that you can you know sing it with your child You don
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necessarily have to use, like, media or technology if you don't want to because it's all
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inside of this book. So that's definitely something that I like. And last, but not least, because
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there were many things that I liked about this curriculum, but this curriculum was extremely
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affordable in my opinion compared to many of the other curriculums that are on the market i think this
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one is very affordable especially the preschool curriculum i know as you get higher up in grade level
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it gets a tad bit more expensive but this one was i believe like seventy nine dollars for all of the
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workbooks together and they have options to just purchase just the workbook or just the teacher's guide
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or, you know, however you want to split it up. But for $79 for all four, I think that that was pretty affordable
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And again, it came with a lot of things packed inside of those 40 lessons, including
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additional extracurricular activities. So I did enjoy that. So now to my dislikes
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I felt that the Bible stories were a tad bit advanced for my three-year-old
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So often I found myself having to. pull out like his little children's Bible to be able to translate what I was reading him from
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the Bible story reader inside of this curriculum so that he would be able to understand it more
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I felt that the pictures were not very like fun for a kid
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Like they were not boring, you know. I get that they're trying to be a little more like maybe realistic
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But I don't quite think it was something that would keep my little one interesting
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Like if I left him this book and I wasn't teaching it to him, I don't think that he would just pick up this book and want to read it just for fun, not like he typically would do with his children's Bible
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So sometimes I would have to like reword the stories so that he better understands what's going on so that he stays a little more interested
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So the Bible story reader honestly wasn't my favorite. I enjoyed that it was tied into each lesson, but I do wish that the verbatage that was used
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or I wish that the wording was just a little bit more three-year-old toddler-friendly
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But that's just my opinion, you know, for my toddler. Obviously, it's going to be different for everyone
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Every once in a while, I did find extracurricular activities that didn't include, like
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the resources needed inside of the booklet, but it wasn't, you know, too much
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It wasn't something that you couldn't look at in advance and make sure you went out and purchased it
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But if that's something that you're not into, they do have, like, curriculums, which are a lot more expensive
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but they do have other curriculums on the market that includes, like, literally everything that you need
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including, like, other books, other supplies, everything that you need so that you're not buying extra stuff
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That's not a deal breaker for me, but that is something that I think is worth considering
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So I think that each lesson was pretty simple. followed along very easily, and it's designed to be completed within eight months, and we
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finished within about four and a half months or so. And we even still have, like, some
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companion works she's left over, but I think we're kind of just like a bit, not necessarily
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too easy, but things that I knew he didn't necessarily need to work up on. So I would have rather
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you know, did something that would be more beneficial for him. I didn't like that this curriculum
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doesn't have units. So it basically one day or for one lesson you will be working on the letter
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A, which you didn't even get to until the end of the book. So it will introduce words in the
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beginning of the book. For instance, dog and have you trace the word dog and you know pronounce the
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letters. But the actual letter practice didn't come until the end of the curriculum. And I think
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it would have been more beneficial to do like letter practice at the beginning of the book. And
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then introduce words towards the end of the curriculum. That's just my opinion of how I think it would
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have flowed a little bit better for us. And then once you finished up like that letter, it didn't
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mention it or come back to it again later in the curriculum. So you'll work on the letter C for the
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lesson and that would be it. You won't revisit it again. Like you won't see it again. It would be nice
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if you would practice the letter A. And then next lesson, you practice letter B, but still have something
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related to the letter A and so forth, the letter C, but you still also have a little more practice
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with the letters A and B so that you don't forget, you know? And I wish that it was broken up
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into units so that it would be like a little bit easier to work with and you can spend a little bit more time you know really developing each specific like skill So it was a variety of different skills but I felt that they were all throughout the curriculum not like unit focus
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if that, like, makes sense. So, like, suppose we were focusing on learning proportion, like size
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It would be nice if that was a unit, as opposed to today we're going to do proportion
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Tomorrow we're going to do shapes. would be nice that it was split up into units so that you can make sure that your student grasps
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that specific concept before you move on to the next one if that makes sense. There wasn't a lot
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of handwriting. I do think handwriting is something that's important to begin working on with
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the three-year-old. It's not a deal breaker for me because I don't mind supplemental, you know
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workbooks and things like that, but I definitely think it's something considering. It had a little
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bit of handwriting, you know, it had a decent amount practicing how to write the letters
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but because, as I mentioned, it doesn't revisit specific, like, handwriting for specific letters
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I don't think it was there enough to create enough repetition. Like, there was one page per letter to practice writing those letters, but that was it
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And I don't think one page of practicing a letter, like how to write it, is enough to really grasp
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that concept. So I do think it's definitely worth purchasing like a handwriting curriculum in
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addition to the curriculum itself. I don't really have a lot of dislikes for the Horizons
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preschool curriculum. For the most part, I do think that it covered all like the standards. I do
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think it could have went more in depth. Some of the concepts in this curriculum I want to go further
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in depth with. And so I think we're going to do a little more preschool work. And I know preschool is for
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three and four year olds and this is just preschool for threes maybe the next you know level up a high
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goes more in depth into it but because i don't specifically like the layout or the flow of how the
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lessons you know with without having any unit studies i decided to go with a different route this time
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i decided to do the good and the beautiful curriculum to see you know how that works and i'm gonna you know
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be sure to give you all like an update of my initial thoughts of it and halfway through the
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quarter and at the end of the quarter and things like that but for four and a half months I think
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that this was a very solid curriculum would I use it again yes I think it's a really good introductory
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like curriculum like if you were using this for the first time ever for your little one this was the
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first curriculum that they had to start with I think this is a great starter curriculum the only thing
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I would say that this curriculum was lacking is debt. So I don't dislike it. I actually liked it a lot
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Would I use it again? Yes, I would probably use it again for like a future students or a future child
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especially as an introductory course or an introductory curriculum. Do you need to like supplement with this
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curriculum? No, I don't think it's necessary. I do recommend it just based on like some of the things that I've already mentioned
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do I think it's necessary? No, especially because I believe that they have like a pre-K curriculum as
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well. So you could do preschool for threes and then pre-k and then kindergarten. So I think that
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there's a lot more to do in the curriculum that comes after their preschool for three. So it's
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probably not even necessary to supplement. I would also very much recommend this curriculum to a
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homeschool mom or a homeschool dad who is just getting started with homeschool
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school because it's very simple and very easy to follow. I felt like once I got further into the
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curriculum, I had a lot more expectations. And before I started using this curriculum, I was creating
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my own lesson plans and my own lesson studies for Noah. But this just made it a lot easier for me to
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not necessarily have to continue like creating my own lessons. So I think that this was easy enough
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for both me and the child. I don't have too many complaints for it
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So I'm very, you know, happy and excited. I'm so proud of Noah for, you know, getting through this curriculum
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Like, it's a hefty book. So, of course, I am definitely like a proud mama
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and I can't wait to see how we, you know, do with the good and the beautiful we've already started it
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So I'm going to definitely feel you guys in on how that is going in a separate video
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But for this video, that's all for now. So if you found this video helpful, don't forget to give it a thumbs up
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And of course, subscribe to my channel for more content just like this
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I would love to have you here. But that's all for today
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Thank you guys for watching. Until next time
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