Are you looking for kindergarten curriculum for homeschooling your child? There are so many options for homeschooling a kindergartener that it can be overwhelming and you may have no idea where to start. So I’m glad you are here.
This post should answer all the basic questions about homeschooling kindergarten as well as give you great recommendations on curriculum to get you started. No need to feel overwhelmed any longer, I’ve got you covered!
Keep reading for the complete guide to homeschooling curriculum for kindergarten!
*Note: This post contains affiliate links, which means I receive a small commission, at no extra cost to you, if you make a purchase using the link. Please see my disclosure for more details.
How old are Kindergarteners?
Children typically start kindergarten sometime between ages 4-6, most commonly around age 5. Legally speaking, each US state has a different age requirement for kindergarten entrance. As homeschooling parents, we have the ability to decide when our child is ready to start kindergarten.
There is a helpful chart on state kindergarten entrance laws at this link.
What should I teach my kindergartener in homeschool?
Kindergarten should be easy and fun, especially when homeschooling. At kindergarten age, it’s more about exposure of the information than deep learning. Sitting down for bookwork should be limited. Incorporating learning into everyday activities with lots of breaks is helpful.
Formal lessons will often cover general topics like reading, writing, and math. Some states require other subjects, so check your state homeschool laws to see if there are other requirements for you. Other subjects you may want to include are science, history, art, music, health, geography, spelling, and P.E.
Here are some ideas of what we like to include in our kindergarten homeschool:
- Focus on play
- Read picture books together
- Learning letter sounds and basic reading skills
- Learn numbers, basic addition, and subtraction
- Read basic chapter books together
- Play outside, run around
- Learn about animals
- Read Bible stories
- Work on gross motor skills, like running, skipping, jumping, and throwing
- Fine motor skills like writing ABCs, holding a pencil, and using scissors
- Sing nursery rhymes
- Read fairy tales
- Play games
- Draw and color
- Play with Lego
- Enjoy nature and learn about what you see
- Visit museums
- Read more books
- Expose them to lots of music and art
- Do crafts
- Sing
- Visit the library and get more books!
- More ideas here
As you can see, Kindergarten doesn’t need to be overwhelming, time-consuming, or difficult! Play with your child, and help them explore the world!
Do I need a curriculum to homeschool kindergarten?
Homeschooling curriculum for kindergarten is not required, though many choose to use it. A curriculum is helpful to lay out ideas in an easy way and to help you know what to cover and when. It can give you fun ideas and a laid-out plan to use as a guide. If you like to come up with ideas on your own, then that is great as well!
An important thing to remember if using a curriculum is that it is a tool and a guide. You can use it as loosely or strictly as works for you!
Which curriculum is best for kindergarten?
There is no one-size-fits-all best curriculum for each homeschool family. What will work for one won’t work for another. Some trial and error and studying how you and your child function are all helpful to narrowing down your options.
In addition to my below reccomendations on this page, check out my posts on where to find the best homeschool curriculum, and more tips for choosing what will work well for you family.
Do I need to use an all-in-one curriculum for kindergarten?
You do not need to use an all-in-one set of curriculum for your kindergartener. This is a set of curriculum that covers all subjects for that age level, either on paper or online. These sets can be expensive and often include a lot of unnecessary busywork, as well as some subjects you may not need or want to cover. Customizing your own set of curriculum is an alternative.
This is a great way to feel like you are covering all you need to with your children but can often lead to some overwhelm for many families.
One of the beautiful things about homeschooling is that you are able to truly customize your homeschool, and it is not that difficult. You can choose curriculum that meets your kids at their level for each subject and follows their interests and abilities. So while all-in-one sets are easy, planned out for you, and great for many families, they don’t work for every family.
If you are looking for an all-in-one kindergarten curriculum, here are a few you could check out. Not all of these come in one grade level package but are easy to piece together from the same company:
- Timberdoodle
- Sonlight
- Bookshark
- Blossom and Root
- Abeka
- The Good and the Beautiful
- IXL.com
- Time4Learning.com
- EasyPeasy online
- Masterbooks
How many hours a day do you homeschool a kindergarten child?
Kindergarteners often don’t need more than one hour of formal learning time. How many hours a day you homeschool a child is really about how long your child can pay attention. Formal learning is the intentional learning time with your child, and doesn’t include all the playtime they are hopefully doing as well.
Homeschooling is not always bookwork, especially for a kindergartener. Children learn a lot through play and experiencing life and the world with your family.
Remember every child is different and frequent breaks are often necessary. Following their lead can be helpful to encourage learning and prevent melt-downs.
Here is a general breakdown of the amount of formal learning a child needs:
- Preschool/kindergarten: 30 minutes-1 hour
- Elementary: 1-2 hours
- Middle School: 2-3 hours
- High School: 4-5 hours
These are averages, and should not limit learning your child desires. They also should not be something you must force on your child either. They are general guidelines.
Kindergarten homeschool schedule
Strict schedules are often difficult to live up to and can make you feel behind and stressed. So I like to think of our homeschool schedule as more of a routine or rhythm we move through in our day without many times listed with each activity.
Here is an example of our kindergarten homeschool schedule you can adjust to make your own. This is a general idea of what you could do in your day with a kindergarten child:
- Morning routine (get dressed, brush hair and teeth, make bed, eat breakfast)
- Read together
- School time
- Free playtime
- Lunch
- Nap or quiet time
- Errands with mom, play outside, or go to a park
- Free playtime
- Household chores
- Dinner
- Evening routine (read book, get on PJs, brush teeth)
- Bed time
Note that free playtime can be directed play with certain toys if desired. However, giving children the ability to choose, be creative, and explore is great for their development. So let them make the messes!
Kindergarten Curriculum for Homeschooling
There are many options of homeschool curriculum for kindergarten so it can be overwhelming to choose from. Because of that, I am sharing my list of some resources I have used for my children in kindergarten. I am also including a couple other options I know are popular and well-loved as I know what we use will not work for every family.
This list could be considered “eclectic” homeschooling, as we do not adhere to any one style of homeschool philosophy. I have gleaned options and ideas from many areas over the years and have found what works for my family and our style of learning. I hope over time you are able to do the same customization for your own family.
Kindergarten homeschool curriculum: Reading
Teaching my kindergarten child to read is the center of our homeschool curriculum at kindergarten age. There are many Language Arts programs that include reading alongside writing and basic grammar, while others teach reading mostly on it’s own. This is what we use.
I think other language information kindergarteners often learn they won’t understand well until after they are fluently reading, so we focus mostly on reading fluently before introducing other topics like grammar or spelling. You can read more about why to delay spelling here.
What we use
All About Reading is an incredible reading program that I have used it with all 3 of my kids. They are very successful readers. The program uses the Orton-Gillingham approach to phonics and is very hands-on.
All About Reading is quite thorough and includes it’s own set of readers that are really cute. It is also great for dyslexic children. It is on the pricey end, but it’s worth every penny and not too difficult to find used.
Here are a couple online games/apps we also enjoy to reinforce reading skills!
Starfall.com is a fun educational website. My kids love this educational website. There are fun activities with letters, numbers and all sorts of other educational topics. There is a subscription option, but a lot is available for free on the website or app.
Teach Your Monster to Read is a fun educational website and app that helps your children learn letter sounds on their way to reading small words. It is a game format with cute little monsters children can design themselves.
Other good options
If your child is still working on connecting letters with their sounds, here are a couple great curriculums to work through before All About Reading.
Here are some other great programs that include reading instruction:
IEW Primary Arts of Language: Reading
at Christian Book
at Rainbow Resource
at Institute for Excellence in Writing
Kindergarten homeschool curriculum: Writing
While I mainly focus on reading instruction in kindergarten, I am also sure to start encouraging good letter formation and increasing writing skills. At this age, we only work on letter formation through copywork – just copying words already written down. Creative writing, sentence formation, and even spelling, are too advanced until they are fluent readers.
What we use
I like to use a basic kindergarten handwriting program. I love the series from Zaner-Bloser. It is colorful and has both manuscript and cursive books if desired as they get older.
My youngest zipped through this handwriting book. So we followed that up with a book that has basic phonics instruction alongside some copywork from Explode the Code. It uses a similar teaching approach to All About Reading so it jives well as a supplement. Online versions also available.
Other good options
If your child is still working on letter sounds and formation, it may be helpful to back up and use these introductory books from Explode the Code.
Other introductory programs for writing:
IEW Primary Arts of Language: Writing
at Christian Book
at Rainbow Resource
at Institute for Excellence in Writing
A Reason for Handwriting K
at Amazon
at Christian Book
at Rainbow Resource
at A Reason For
Kindergarten homeschool curriculum: Math
Early on, I was told to choose a math curriculum and try to stick with it the whole way through. Some programs teach things in a different order than others, so switching can leave holes in learning. I have been incredibly happy with our choice of math, so luckily it has worked out for us!
What we use
We love Math-u-see and will use it for our entire homeschooling experience. It focuses a lot on understanding place value and is a base-10 program. It is very good at explaining why things are done, uses videos to teach, and is very hands-on. Some of the techniques are different than what you may have been taught when you were in school. But to me they just make sense.
Each level has video lessons we watch together, followed by several workbook pages for each new lesson. It uses a mastery approach to math, rather than spiral. One of the best parts of Math-U-See is how they teach place value with a neighborhood on “Decimal Street.”
The block manipulatives are an important part of the curriculum. Especially for hands-on children. It’s a lot to buy up front, but you only need to buy the blocks once for all levels.
Don’t be afraid to buy used too!
Other good options
Kindergarten homeschool curriculum: Science
Kindergarten science curriculum should be fun and hands-on. It can be as easy as exploring outside together. We also enjoy reading books and watching educational shows and documentaries.
What we use
We have used several different resources over the years for science. Here are a few.
REAL Science Odyssey – Life
at Home Science Tools
at Amazon
at Rainbow Resource
at Pandia Press
Focus On Elementary Science – Biology
Many homeschool science curricula have kits for all the harder to find supplies. So worth the money! Check out Home Science Tools for a listing of great science curricula and kits!
We also love great educational shows and documentaries!
Magic School Bus
Books at Amazon
DVDs at Amazon
at ChristianBook
at Rainbow Resource
Other good options
Exploring the Building Blocks of Science
Learning about nature with your children is one of the simplest ways to do science in your kindergarten homeschool. And kindergarten kids love it! Nature study can be as simple as taking a walk through nature and talking about what you see. You could also use a more in depth curriculum.
One more structured approach could be to pick an animal or plant. Get a picture book from the library about it, then go outside to see what you can find! Here is a great blog post with lots of great books options from Our Journey Westward.
Other great ideas on outside time and nature fun can be found on the website 1000 Hours Outside. Here are some of their books:
1000 Hourse Outside
Kindergarten homeschool curriculum: History
Homeschool curriculum for history in our family does not include a lot of memorizing of facts or dates. Instead, we read a lot, like to visit museums and historical sites, and learn about people in the past. It has taken us a while to learn what works for us and I’m probably still figuring it out.
What we use
We have used several resources for homeschool history over the years. I tend to choose a textbook as a base of the curriculum then use historical fiction to supplement. Here are several things we have used and liked.
Mystery of History
at Amazon
at Christian Book
at Rainbow Resource
at Mystery of History
Our Star Spangled Story
at Amazon
at Christian Book
at Rainbow Resource
at Notgrass
I love to get historical fiction book ideas from the above curriculum book lists, as well as from sites like Bookshark and Sonlight.
Other good options
Kindergarten homeschool curriculum: Bible
When it comes to teaching the Bible to my young children, we often will read Bible stories together. We don’t do a lot of study and memorization or application at this point. But I have included options with studies as well below.
What we use
The Jesus Storybook Bible is a great Bible storybook for young children! It is a collection of Old and New Testament Bible stories, all showing how the stories in the Bible point right back to Jesus!
There’s even a coloring book that goes with it!
The Complete Illustrated Children’s Bible is just beautiful! It is full of artwork and has a thorough overview of Bible Stories.
Other good options
Kindergarten homeschool curriculum: other
Art
Supplementary workbooks
Never Bored Kid Book, Age 5-6
at Amazon
at ChristianBook
at Rainbow Resource
Scholastic Jumbo Workbook
at Amazon
at ChristianBook
at Rainbow Resource
Usborne Children’s Encyclopedia
at Amazon
at Rainbow Resource
at Usborne
Kindergarten homeschool books
Chapter Books
There are lots of great picture books and chapter books you can read with your kindergarten homeschooler. Here are a few of our favorite chapter books to read aloud:
Picture Books
Here are some of our favorite picture books:
For some more great book recommendations, check out the Read Aloud Revival booklists.
What do I do now?
Now that youve decided on your curriculum options, you may be wondering what to do next! For more help to get started, check out some of my other posts:
Curriculum for other grade levels
Homeschooling Preschool curriculum
Top 23 Literature-based Homeschool Curriculum Options
Best online homeschool programs: The ultimate list
Homeschooling curriculum for kindergarten
There is a wide variety of homeschooling curriculum for kindergarteners. But I hope this post has helped you realize that a kindergarten homeschool is not as difficult as it may seem. Fill your days with books and lots of play first. Then add in some short lessons on reading and math. And explore the world together! It’s gonna be great – you’ll see!
Do you have a favorite homeschool curriculum for kindergarten? I’d love to know what it is! Comment below.
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