Are you looking for a fourth grade homeschool curriculum for your student? A few years ago I was in the same position. I talked to many of my more experienced homeschool friends, I attacked the internet with a fury, and just like a good homeschool mom purchased what I believed was the best for us for as little money as possible. And we loved it! Looking back, fourth grade was probably my favorite school year (minus the stress of having to move to a different state). Let me share with you our fourth grade experiences in hopes that they may help you with your own choices. But first…
What Is a Typical Fourth Grade Homeschool Curriculum?
The typical fourth grade homeschool curriculum includes the following:
- Math: Fourth grade math adds more complexity to the knowledge already acquired, especially in the areas of fractions and decimals. It also includes understanding graphs, multiplying and dividing large numbers, and solving multi-step word problems.
- Language Arts:
- Reading: Fourth grade is considered a year of challenging reading. By this time your child has solidified the foundational reading skills and is ready to encounter more challenging writings both in fiction and non-fiction genre.
- Writing (includes Spelling and Grammar): Your students will be able to write informal reports with structured paragraphs as well use research for their descriptive and persuasive writing.
- Science: As fourth graders develop more of their reasoning skills, teaching science at this age is a pure pleasure. Most curricula include electricity, geology, animals and their habitats, and the systems of the human body.
- Social Studies: In general, fourth year’s social studies mainly include world geography and US history, including the American Revolution and the early presidents. However, this is the most flexible arena for determining your own preferences.
Some fourth grade homeschool programs also include PE, art, and music.
How to Choose the Best Fourth Grade Homeschool Curriculum?
In How to Choose the Best Homeschool Curriculum we describe the best practices for choosing a curriculum based on your state’s laws, your purposes and goals, how much time you want to spend teaching, etc. I always try to look for curricula that meet the following criteria:
- They are engaging and taught in a clear and fun way.
- They include regular reviews in order to reinforce the material taught.
- They encourage problem-solving skills.
Our Fourth Grade Curriculum Journey and What We Would Do Differently
As I already stated, fourth grade was probably my favorite school year. Our curricula were engaging and our co-op classes very exciting. However, we also worked hard, especially in the areas of math and language studies.
Following are the fourth grade homeschool curricula that we used:
Note: As I am more of an eclectic homeschooler, we have combined a number of curricula from various resources. However, if you prefer using a complete curriculum set, Abeka and BJU Press are some of the most popular ones (but there are many others!). These packages will provide you with all textbooks, workbooks, tests, teacher’s manuals, etc. so that your only time investment will be familiarizing yourself with the material.
Reading:
Building Our Lives and Living Together by Pathway Readers: The fourth grade reading found us combining both fourth and fifth grade Pathway Readers into one school year. We were able to finish Building Our Lives very early in the year but didn’t want to stop reading yet. That’s where Living Together came in. Both of these curricula present a child with beautiful, real-life wholesome stories and keeps the reader excited to continue reading. The workbook not only requires the student to answer the questions but also leads them back to the text in order to search for particulars.
Note: All these readers can be found for purchase on second-hand sites like Ebay or Thriftbooks for a fraction of their original cost.
RELATED: Fourth Grade Reading List
Math:
Primary Mathematics 4A & 4B, Standards Edition by Singapore Math: We followed the same curriculum that we used since kindergarten. To learn more about the benefits of Singapore Math, please read a detailed description at Singapore vs. Saxon Math – Which Is Better?. Also, you can read about our personal math journey in Singapore Math? Really?.
English:
Climbing to Good English 4 by Schoolaid: This is a Christian based curriculum, easy to use and very economical. The series takes the student from the first grade all the way to the eighth, but can be joined in any grade. It is very complete and thorough and encourages independent learning. We used it for several years before switching to more hands-on English program in middle school, which became more suitable for us at that time.
Penmanship:
After taking a very flexible approach to penmanship in the third grade, namely printing our own handwriting pages and copying Bible verses, we opted for New American Cursive Penmanship by Memoria Press in the fourth grade. If I knew then what I know now, I would have started my son on cursive handwriting right from the first grade though. [As the theme of this article does not allow me to share more on this subject, I will have to share my reasoning behind cursive writing sometime later.]
Spelling:
We built on the third grade knowledge with Spelling by Sound and Structure 4 by Rod & Staff Publishers. It is a very affordable, phonetics based program, however it is not very suitable for children who do not particularly enjoy filling out workbooks or who need more multi-sensory approach. We continued with the same curriculum through the fourth grade, but then we switched to another program that seemed to be more suitable for my son’s needs.
Later in the year we dove into Spelling Power by Beverly L. Adams-Gordon. It is a very comprehensive curriculum with many support activities and games. We stayed with the curriculum until high school years when we determined we needed to bring a change to our spelling.
Science:
We continued with Considering God’s Creation by Eagle’s Wings that we started in the third grade science. It was one of my favorite science curriculum ever. Even though it may seem to look a little old-fashioned to some, it presents the student with very comprehensive overview of the animal species and keys for their features. The lessons include new vocabulary, effective games, experiments, songs, poems, arts and crafts projects, and related Bible studies. The notebook pages are designed to help the students become true scientists, carefully observing and investigating God’s creation. Even though I really enjoyed the curriculum, my son was not as thrilled as I was. In his opinion, it included too much paperwork. However, he did learn a lot.
In addition to our home studies of God’s creation, my friends and I taught a science class at our local co-op. I don’t know who had more fun whether the children or us, teachers! We dissected flowers, learned kinetic energy with Rube Golberg’s projects, experienced angles with Angles in Art, build rockets, catapults, electric circuits, bridges, and much more.
Toward the end of the school year, we discovered the most fascinating Mystery Science, “open-and-go lessons that inspire kids to love science.” They usually offer a free trial between March and June which we took full advantage of. My son really enjoyed these lessons and projects.
History:
We continued with The Mystery of History by Linda Lacour Hobar from the third grade. It is an outstanding history curriculum that has gained much popularity in the Christian circles. It teaches history from the Creation in a chronological order all the way through 2000s and describes both world and Biblical events in parallel. You learn, for example, that Jonah was in the belly of the fish at the same time as the first Olympic Games were held.
Over the years we completed all four volumes of The Mystery of History, including various projects, time-line on a board, as well as time-line book. Our entire family profited from this curriculum and can highly recommend it to you too.
Geography:
We continued our geography studies with Around the World in 180 Days by Apologia. This curriculum was probably one of my favorite geography curricula so far because of its flexibility and research-based approach. To spice our lessons we added many projects and videos to our general work and had lots of fun.
In the second semester we created a small homeschool group and studied physical geography together. We explored world’s rivers, mountains, lakes, valleys, etc. It was a very dynamic class with many activities and games.
Bible:
In addition to reading the Bible itself, we turned to studying the Tabernacle of Moses in the wilderness, this time based on the book I wrote a few years prior to that called Mystery Beyond the Veil. It is a study guide that leads a student to understanding the application of the Word of God in their personal lives.
We also learned from God Chooses a Family by Rod & Staff Publishers, Grade 5 Bible curriculum. It is a beautiful workbook that teaches about the generations of God’s people in the Bible. For some reason, we didn’t get far in this book before desiring a change. I am sure it had nothing to do with the book itself but rather with our need to take a different direction in our Bible studies.
Arts & Crafts:
As we still had a number of projects left to finish from the third grade in Art with a Purpose, Artpack 2, we continued with this delightful curriculum. It includes simple coloring skills, cutting, pasting, simple perspective drawing. I can highly recommend it.
Music:
My son built upon his previous piano skills with Hoffman Academy. This program provides students with basic understanding of music and teaches them to play both classical and other genre. Whether you play a musical instrument or not, Hoffman Academy is very easy to use and will teach your child more than just fundamentals of music. It is the best program I have seen thus far.
PE:
Again, as in third grade, our local Christian co-op gave us an opportunity to join them for their PE classes. They not only provided gym activities, but also swimming and soccer classes, ice skating, and much more, and all of that for very reasonable prices. I cannot emphasize enough the advantages of a good co-op community as an excellent addition to your homeschooling journey.
In summary:
Our fourth grade was a pure joy. Many times my son and I still talk about that particular year, the hard math curriculum he didn’t enjoy but is grateful for having done and discuss his fun co-op classes. Apart from making slight adjustments, we would probably take the same approach to our fourth grade if we did it again. I trust you will make the right choices for your family with your fourth grade curriculum and come out on the other side with feelings of great accomplishment.
