Many of you know that our homeschool is based on a unit study rotation that I designed myself. (You can find that here if you’d like to read more about it.) The foundation of the rotation is a read-through of the Bible every four years. This cycle is repeated three times so the kids will hit it at three different levels. There isn’t a lot of Bible study built directly into the plan, though. There’s Bible reading – and then the academic units are plugged in around that reading.
Danika Cooley’s Bible Road Trip fills exactly that gap. Of course, it isn’t designed specifically for use with our program! Any homeschool family can use it. But it’s a great fit with our program, with minimal shuffling. (The breakdown isn’t exactly the same, but it’s fairly close.)
Bible Road Trip
Bible Road Trip is meant to be used over a three-year period, four times. Each week, students will read a selection of Scripture, then do some digging in, and some projects to cement their learning. Older kids will read the whole Bible over the course of the three-year cycle. Younger kids will hit highlights so they’re getting the gist of the Bible’s “flow” and content, without quite as much reading.
I have to say that Danika and I must be “kindred spirits,” because as I read through her explanations of why she set things up the way she did, I found myself nodding and thinking, “Yep. That’s why I made that decision with our unit studies, too.” Bible Road Trip is three years to Daily Bread‘s four, so there’s clearly some disparity in how long the reading takes. And Daily Bread is roughly chronological (because it’s closely tied to academics like history), while Bible Road Trip is in “Bible order” because it’s about familiarity with the Bible.
After adjusting for those two differences, though, the selections are remarkably similar. I plan to make the necessary adjustments and integrate these scriptural studies into our existing unit studies.
What’s in a Week?
In any given week, the foundation is the reading itself. (Of course!) Younger students will read key passages; older ones will read the whole section. Then there are comprehension questions, which increase in “difficulty” with each level. When/where appropriate, students will be encouraged to look up background information for the passages at hand.
Memory verses are suggested (more verses, or longer ones, for older students). Notebooking projects are offered. And prayer topics are provided, to get kids praying for missions.
The last section assigns craft projects. For the little ones, these are literally craft projects. For the older students, they may simply be creative projects like creating a blog post or presentation about the subject the current passage addresses.
Any or all of the portions may be used, depending on the needs of your family.
The Layout
I can attest to how much effort goes into planning something like this out! And this is so thorough!
The only thing I would find useful, that I don’t see, is integrated instruction pages. The way this is set up, each level has its own instructions for each package. If you’re only teaching a single level (or if you have older kids and they only need to read their own level), this is perfect! But if you’re teaching (or planning) multiple levels at once, there’s a lot of scrolling back and forth to see what is and isn’t the same, and much of it is simply duplicated. (For instance, maybe the upper elementary level is answering the same questions as the lower elementary, plus three more.)
As a mom with kids who are pretty spread out in age, it would be really helpful for me to have one single set of instructions for each week, with indications of which level(s) they apply to. That would just simplify the process for me so I’m not scrolling or flipping back and forth a lot. In the grand scheme of things, though, that’s a minor “complaint,” and I will definitely be using this regardless!
Note that there are also notebooking pages available for the various levels, to make many of those notebooking assignments easier (or just more aesthetically pleasing!)
Even Better
Even better, Bible Road Trip Year 1: The Books of the Law & History is part of the Build Your Own Bundle (Homeschool Edition) Sale this week! Check the 4th-6th-grade package for more information.
[…] Rachel at Titus 2 Homemaker: “I have to say that Danika and I must be “kindred spirits,” because as I read through her explanations of why she set things up the way she did, I found myself nodding and thinking, “Yep. That’s why I made that decision with our unit studies, too.”” […]