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Website: Sonlight (may contain affiliate links)
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Reviews are solely the opinions of the contributor.
As featured on
Cons: Not transparent, and unable to find out any details regarding their perspective
At first I thought that the Person(Margaret) replying to my emails was avoiding my questions regarding the faith side of things, since she kept on repeating the same phrases.
I eventually realised that it was not a person, bit A.I replying to my emails, which made me realise that the phrase" evangelical protestant christian perspective" was merely a sales line.
One of the replies I received was that they rather use authoritative Roman Catholic voices on Roman Catholic perspectives so that kids can make up their own minds. For me this looks more like indoctrination.
Unable to find out the answer to my questions, I'm moving on and looking at other Christian curriculum options.
Sonlight does a bait and switch. Shows one thing and then says another. When you bring it up to sonlight they back pedle and wont honor when the website and all the paperwork they give you. They need a class on how to lie, cheat, and steal. Great Christian example.
Cons: The package deals do not come with arts and crafts. Not all kindergartners will appreciate chapter books without colorful illustrations for story time. When I wa in Kindergarten, books like Brown Bear, Brown Bear were the staple.
Grades Used: Kindergarten
First off, I want to begin by saying I did a lot of research on curriculum for my son's kindergarten and have an elementary teaching credential. Based on my son's learning styles and my philosophy of education, I was torn between My Father's World and Sonlight. Sonlight has selected some of the best literature ever written for children in terms of richness and rigor, but My Father's World more closely aligned with who we are and what we believe as a family. If my son was purely an auditory learner, I would have went with Sonlight all the way, but he is also visual and kinesthetic. He loves beautiful illustrations and lots of crafts like the materials in My Father's World. I am also a fan of Charlotte Mason and classical education inspired learning. And yet I wanted the rigor of Sonlight. So, I bought the basic package at My Father's World and supplemented with my favorite American history, phonics, handwriting, science and math resources from Sonlight. When it was all said and done, we spent almost as much as if we would have just bought a complete curriculum from Sonlight, but we will still have to go to the library to get more literature. I don't regret doing it this way though because it will be exactly what we want as a family.
My bottom line is, if you want a literature and history based program that is academically rigorous, I think Sonlight is worth every penny. Yes, it is expensive, but you also get A LOT of literature and other materials for your money. Every cup and paper clip that you need for Science is included, so there is nothing extra you need to worry about finding or purchasing. If you start piecing together as I have done, you will still spend a small fortune and you will not even own all of the books. For these reasons, next year I will just get a complete Sonlight package. Of course, if money is tight and you don't care about getting the workbooks and planners, you could take the hand-picked sonlight booklist to the library and still give your child a great education!