For the last three years, our family has lived fulltime in a 36′ travel trailer. We were stationary for about 18 months during the birth of baby #6 and some subsequent health issues, but we are back on the road and loving our roadschooling lifestyle again.

Over the years, our philosophy of homeschooling has changed from a strict daily routine with all. the. things. to a more unschooling format. So when I thought about putting together a curriculum post, it seemed a little strange. I mean, how can you have roadschooling curriculum when you unschool for a majority of your subjects?

And the truth is, we do have a few subjects we use curriculum for so that we have some structure for the basics like math and language arts. And then you have our oldest who likes textbooks, which is the beauty of homeschooling – we can tailor our curriculum to each child and their learning style!

Our 2020-2021 Roadschooling Curriculum CHOICES

After baby number six came along our homeschool days looked drastically different. Not only was he early and spent time in the NICU, but I was extremely ill for more than a year after. In order to keep up with our homeschool, it became a necessity for me to consolidate as much as possible. We reduced our actual number of textbooks and I went to a strictly printable curriculum, except for our oldest (by his request). 

And this year is no different. We will change things up a bit again with a high schooler, two middle schoolers this year, and only one in elementary. But we still plan to consolidate and unschool our children for much of their education.

How we consolidate our curriculum

Bible is also our family time, which we do all together. Our middle three also combine reading (practice read alouds), science, history, art, music, and any electives we want to do. Our oldest typically joins us for these subjects, though we often ask him to help teach as a way to reinforce what he’s learned in the past – especially history and science, as those are two of his favorites.

With two middle schoolers and a high schooler, it is becoming harder and harder to consolidate curriculum for everyone. However, when possible we try to study the same topic/subject so we can talk about them together. For instance, this year our oldest will be learning about Shakespeare, so we will talk about poetry with everyone and then he will apply it to Shakespeare. For history, we are learning about the United States, so we will do some of those studies together and then they will break off into their individual curricula.  

Why we changed to a Relaxed, Unschooling Approach

What does a relaxed, unschooling approach look like? For the most part, we take our learning cues from our children. We follow a relaxed format in that we use curriculum for a couple of subjects (math, language arts, history), but an unschooling approach in that much of their learning comes from our travels. We may read about the history of trade up and down the river system, so we’ll visit a lock and dam and river system to see it still in action today and where the ships travel from and to. 

And when we take hikes together, we take notice of different trees or where moss grows (science), practice reading a map (geography), read about the history of the area (reading and history), and maybe even write a review of our day (language arts). We guide them and answer any questions they have, but allow them to explore anything they find interesting for more in-depth studies.

So what are we using this year? 

Our Roadschooling Math Curriculum

We have a couple of subjects that each of our children use the same curriculum. This year it is math and Bible. Once again, we will be continuing our use of CTCMath. Not all of our children enjoy math, but with our favorite math curriculum, we have fewer tears than ever. 

Our oldest is starting his Sophomore year and will complete Algebra II and Trigonometry. He enjoys math and typically completes anywhere from two to five lessons per day, so he will complete one per semester. Our two older middles are entering middle school and will be working through the 6th-grade lessons. And our youngest homeschooler will be going through the 3rd-grade lessons this year.

Our Roadschooling Curriculum: Bible

The other curriculum we consolidate for everyone is Bible. My husband and I both attended Bible college (it’s actually where we met), so teaching our kids to think with a Biblical worldview is very important to us. We have family Bible time together where one child reads the chapter for the day and then we discuss it. We then ask for thankful’s and prayer requests to close out our time.

This year, we are going to work through the Mommy & Me Scripture Journal series I have created to help us focus on one topic and/or book of the Bible during that month. This will also give us a little extra reading and handwriting practice. When our kids are old enough or show the maturity we believe is necessary, they begin working through the Apologia What We Believe series. We enjoy this series and how easy it is for the children to understand how to form a Biblical worldview on their own.

Our Roadschooling Curriculum: Science

This year we will have three children working through a purchased science curriculum – our oldest and our two middle schoolers. Our oldest is a big fan of Apologia science and this year he will be studying Chemistry. He is really looking forward to “blowing things up” so it should be rather interesting.

Our two middle schoolers are going to be using their first official curriculum this year and we’ve chosen Switched on Schoohouse 6th Grade Science from Alpha Omega. While we used Horizons math years ago, this will be our first time using this particular science curriculum. I am excited to see how this works for them and us, plus it saves us on weight and books as we travel around.

Our Language Arts Roadschooling Curriculum

We will be using the Student Writing Intensive DVD Course: Level B this year with my oldest as we continue to work on his paper writing skills. He will also be working more on his writing skills as we begin his 3-year research project. This is something my husband and I did in high school which prepared us for college very well. We feel it is important that he learn how to write a research paper from the basics to the final product. I hope to be revealing more of this over the coming months and layout our timeline a little more. We will also have him complete shorter, easier weekly writing prompts to ensure he has an understanding of the different styles.

This past year, his literature studies have been mostly based on the books he enjoys. So this year we’re going to take a step out of his comfort zone and start reading and analyzing Shakespeare. We will use these printables I’ve created to get started. 

Our older two middles are starting a new-to-us curriculum this year, Learning Language Arts Through Literature from Common Sense Press. I am super excited about this program and really ready to dive in and see where it takes us this year! Watch for a review coming soon!

Our youngest homeschooler will be continuing her language arts studies with curriculum from The Good & the Beautiful. We have used this curriculum with our older two middles and it was literally the curriculum that got them reading! But it really is more than just a language arts curriculum. It includes art and geography, as well as, literature, grammar, punctuation, vocabulary, reading, writing, and spelling. We choose to do the downloadable versions to save space and it works nicely for us.

Our History Roadschooling Curriculum Choice

Our oldest will be using Notgrass again this year, by his request. It is by far his favorite subject and curriculum. He will be working through Exploring America for his sophomore year, which is perfect as we travel around the United States. He can really make connections with the historical places we will be able to visit.

Even though they now offer an mp3 of the curriculum, he loves to read the text himself. So we order the curriculum package and student review pack. We opt out of the literature packs and rather choose our own books to read alongside the curriculum. We do take into consideration their suggestions, but we don’t use all of them.

Our middle schoolers will be studying America the Beautiful also by Notgrass. This is a one-year U.S. History curriculum that will pair nicely with our oldest’s studies but on their level. It will also be a great compliment to our travels and all the historical sites we will see along the way.

Our youngest homeschooler will learn history naturally as we travel around to different historical sites, national parks, battlefields, and more. She loves learning the history of cities near where we camp as we travel. Then she usually comes back and draws what she’s seen and learned and puts it in her own notebook. She has tons of them saved already!

Roadschooling Curriculum Choices for Geography

Since we travel around, geography is pretty natural to our studies. This year my younger three will be using the curriculum I created, Across the USA and An Introduction to the 50 States, respectively. This will give them an idea of not only the geography of the states we are visiting but some of their history as well.

Our Roadschooling Curriculum: Electives

Our oldest decided he wanted to learn Elementary Greek this year. We’ve had this curriculum for quite a while, but this summer he picked it up and said he was ready to learn – so he got started. I’m excited to see where this leads him and how quickly he picks it up.

My younger three will be starting Elementary Spanish over at Schoolhouse Teachers. We will be doing this pretty loosely for now but will take our cues from the kids to see how fast or slow we move through the curriculum. 

Learning life skills is a vital part of growing up. Living on the road, our children learn a variety of life skills they might not otherwise learn. While each of our older children have learned the basics of setup and tear down, we are trying more and more to be intentional with helping them new skills and that’s where Skill Trek comes in.

The Skill Trek system allows kids to learn new tasks appropriate for their own age. You can go through and assign them tasks to learn based on your family lifestyle (feed a baby a bottle), current curriculum (what is an eclipse?), and tasks they will need to know in the future (changing a car tire).

Take 20% off an Annual Skill Trek Membership when you use code: INALLYOUDO at checkout!

More Roadschooling Products to Help You