Spreading the Feast | Subjects in a Charlotte Mason Homeschool

When I was researching homeschooling my oldest for preschool several years ago, I had no desire to homeschool for his entire education until I stumbled upon a blog about the Charlotte Mason method. My eyes were opened to this beautiful way of educating children by offering them a feast of delectable ideas. It was a way of education I wish I had experienced for myself, and I knew I wanted to offer it to my children.

Admittedly, I felt unequipped for the job and I knew I would learn just as much if not more when I undertook this endeavor. Fast forward 11 years, and I can’t imagine educating my children any other way.

Spreading the Feast – Subjects in our Homeschool

I’m currently reading through Karen Glass’s In Vital Harmony, and I appreciate the way she’s broken down the nuts and bolts of a living education according to how Mason listed all of the parts of a curriculum under the three great areas of relationship: Knowledge of God, Knowledge of Man, and Knowledge of the Universe.

Here I’ve put together a graphic of many of the things we study. Living books teach us both history and literature, and so much more! I’m sure I may have missed a thing or two, so let me know what you would add!

We follow the Mater Amabilis curriculm fairly closely, but I do tend to change things up here and there. Here is a little more in-depth look at our studies this school year. I’ll show you the studies of my kids in Mater Amabilis Level 1A. I’ve combined my third and fourth graders in this level.

Knowledge of God

What subjects do we teach that help expand our knowledge of God? These subjects would be reading from the Bible, our catechism, and other religious texts and resources. For us, these include saint biographies, as well.

Here’s a look at the books we are currently using in our homeschool for my kids ages 10 and under:

• Faith and Life catechism series
• The Life of Christ
• The New Catholic Picture Bible
• Saints Around the World
• Catholic Tales for Boys and Girls

Knowledge of Man

All of the subjects that would be under the term “knowledge of man” include history, artist study, composer study, literature, and civics.

Here are the books I’m reading with my kids’ ages 10 and under for the Knowledge of Man subjects.

• The Pharaohs of Ancient Egypt
• Lives of Plutarch
• The Harp and the Laurel Wreath
• Tales from Shakespeare
• Morning Time: A Liturgy of Love (memory work, poetry, civics questions)
• Ambleside Online (hymns, folksongs, composer study, artist study)
• Of Swords and Sorcerers
• The Story of the U.S. along with History Unboxed supplements

Earlier this school year we did a study on the U.S. Constitution and we learned about elections. I found lots of wonderful living books and great resources for that!

Knowledge of the Universe

Knowledge of the Universe covers subjects such as math and science. While there are a variety of Charlotte Mason style resources available in these subjects, we do tend to veer a bit from them.

For example, we use Math with Confidence for my youngest learners and Teaching Textbooks for Math for my oldest kids. I feel comfortable with these choices and they work well for my kids.

We use several different resources for science including Apologia, The Good and the Beautiful, Journey Homeschool Academy, and living books! I recently did a blog post on what we used for our astronomy study. We are currently doing a paleontology study with The Good and the Beautiful, and you can see my review of Earth Science Explored!

Knowledge of the universe also covers geography and other earth science studies.

This term we are studying the Arctic and the Antarctic.

We are studying insects in our nature study.

We are doing a simple study of mountains and volcanoes.

We are also studying Asia!

Of course, we do have other subjects we do such as language arts, handwriting, art, learning musical instruments, etiquette, and reading and listening to lots of literature! We truly spread a feast of an education!

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