Catholic Schoolhouse- a New Resource for Homeschoolers!

Today I just wanted to share this unique (and brand new) Catholic resource for homeschoolers with all of you!  I don't know how many of you have heard of Classical Conversations, but there's a brand new program called Catholic Schoolhouse that is an authentically Catholic alternative to Classical Conversations. It has been tested and developed over the last 3 years, and is now being released to Catholic homeschoolers everywhere for the upcoming school year! This program can help you to organize your own Catholic homeschooling community.  

Catholic Schoolhouse is looking for individuals who can start new chapters of this program, and they can help you organize your Catholic homeschooling group each step along the way! From finding a location and new members, to organizing, and supplying the backbone of your academics for each age group, the Catholic Schoolhouse program can take the guess work out of organizing your own "schoolhouse"! The program is set up for homeschoolers to meet and experience a classroom environment once a week. Each week they also do hands-on art projects and science experiments. I actually took this picture when I had the pleasure of visiting my mother-in-law's chapter last year.

I watched these kids figure out how to light a light bulb

using potatoes and lemons. Pretty cool!

 

Here's one of their art projects: The Angelus

Isn't this great? (It's based on Millet's The Angelus)

I love that they include Catholic art in their program, but they don't limit themselves to it. Check out this art project they did on Degas! (Degas is one of my favorite painters- especially his ballerinas.  I'm a total sucker for impressionism!). 

My favorite part of this program is that all the elementary-aged children in the program cover the same topics at the same time, but they still meet with their own age group and cover the academics at their own level. This means that your whole family can study the same topics at the same time, which encourages family togetherness.  

Although this program runs much like a co-op, it was developed in an attempt to avoid common problems with the traditional co-op, such as burnout and disorganization. If you're interested in starting up your own Catholic Schoolhouse community, you can find more information about the progarm and their prices on their site. If you'd like to try being a director of your own chapter, you can actually make money running your own division!

The day I visited, they read a play. They even let Lydia join in-

see her in her little purple pants? :-)

 In the classroom, the children are introduced to topics from many subjects including history, science, geography, fine arts, math, language arts, foreign language, and religion. Each week this program has these great visual pages, called their "tour guides", to help children familiarize themselves with the topics. These can be used as a springboard for further study at home, and you can see a sample of the tour guides here.

You can also sample some of their overview sheets here.

If you are participating in a division of Classical Conversations or a similar program, I would encourage you to look into Catholic Schoolhouse. There are other options out there that you can teach your children with confidence, without worrying about each lesson and second guessing the religious perspective of the academics.

Disclaimer: I wasn't paid anything for the "mention" of this newly available program, but my mother-in-law is one of the developers. She consulted with me on many of the art lessons, and I've had a great time bouncing ideas around with her over the past 3 years! I got to observe one of their typical days, and was really impressed- I just knew I wanted to share it with all of you! :-)