Preschool Curriculum Review of The Good and The Beautiful
Our family never set out to homeschool. It was a complete God thing. As I started to cut back at work and stay home with my two girls more, I realized we needed structure to our day. We couldn’t go out and about all the time, it’s exhausting and expensive. The girls didn’t want to do chores all day with me, and I couldn’t mentally handle pretend play all day long.
My girls and I longed for something. A sense of accomplishment, bonding and simple joys. That’s when I started planning activities for our day. It started as just playdough or drawing together and then I found Pinterest. We began incorporating little crafts and before I knew it, I found myself totally immersed in this homeschool life. I loved it, my girls loved it and we finally felt like we had found the missing piece.
When I decided that homeschool was the path we were going to take, I spent countless hours studying different methods, reading blogs, watching YouTube videos and trying to figure out a plan that would work for our family. As a public-school high school teacher, I knew about education, but I had no experience teaching little ones and I definitely didn’t know about homeschool.
I am still learning, and my kids are still so little, but I like to plan. I can’t help it. Can you relate to that? When I make a big decision, like homeschooling, I want to be well informed and know as much as I can in order to be the best for my children. After all, I can’t think of a more precious investment.
When researching preschool curriculum and the stigma that comes along with it, I felt torn. I wanted my girls to learn through play. I longed for the Charlotte Mason method, and I still do. But I am just to Type A to not have some type of curated plan in place.
So, after a lengthy research process, I took the plunge and ordered The Good and the Beautiful’s revised and improved preschool curriculum. I must say it is AMAZING! It gave me and my daughter exactly what we were looking for and it has allowed us both to learn at an easy pace, feel accomplished and have fun.
I am going to share with you our top reasons we loved The Good and the Beautiful preschool language arts. Just a note, this is a completely unsponsored and honest review of our experience.
Let’s get to it.
Why we loved The Good and The Beautiful Preschool.
The Good and the Beautiful Preschool Curriculum - Preschool Workbook
It’s Adorable
I feel silly saying this, but the curriculum is called The Good and the Beautiful for a reason. It’s so pretty! The illustrations, format, and the design are beyond cute. My daughter and I would always be excited to flip the pages and check out the next day’s lesson.
I know this probably isn’t a great reason to go with a curriculum, but because of the beautiful design it kept us excited and eager to come back. And hey, when your three-year-old is pumped to start school every day and loves her little workbook, I am all about it. Trust me, you won’t be disappointed with the design quality.
I also wanted to mention that the book is spiral bound which is great for a workbook. Your preschooler will have no trouble writing on all pages of the book and it can stay bound for a sweet keepsake. I only mention this because other workbooks we have gotten have not been spiral bound and she has gotten frustrated trying to write on the flipped pages.
Lessons are Short
When we are talking about preschoolers, we know they have a super short attention span. If lessons are too long or uninteresting, they are going to be in left field and you are going to get frustrated. I truly felt like The Good and the Beautiful preschool had the perfect amount of content per lesson to maintain engagement.
It took us about fifteen minutes or less to get through each lesson. The lessons are broken down into separate bullet points that you can check off (which I love) so if you are finding your preschooler is not going to make it through an entire lesson it is easy to find a stopping point. I also found that each bullet point was a different type of activity, so it prevented boredom and helped my preschooler stay engaged.
The Good and the Beautiful Preschool - Lesson Snapshot
Interactive Lessons
Any type of learning with preschoolers should be interactive, fun, and engaging. That is exactly what The Good and the Beautiful preschool delivers. As I mentioned earlier, each lesson has separate sections with different aspects of learning. They identify a letter, then say it’s sound, practice drawing, paint within the book or play a game.
The lesson structure is great! My preschooler would also ask, “What’s next?” She loved applying her learning in different ways and it really helped solidify the topics we were discussing.
Open and Go
This is probably one of the best parts of The Good and the Beautiful preschool, it’s so simple and easy to teach. You have no prep work, and you don’t have to review it ahead of time, unless you want. It is truly an open and go curriculum, which is great for moms of little ones. Since we competed The Good and the Beautiful preschool curriculum, I have ordered curriculum from other companies just to see what it’s like and it’s no comparison.
The portion for you as the teacher to read is in blue and the rest you read aloud to your child. No searching around the page for what to do or say. No reading the wrong thing to your preschooler and confusing them. It’s great!
There are days where you are to prep a few items ahead of time. It’s typically gathering paint or crayons, picking some grass from the yard or having light craft items on hand. Nothing serious and something you could easily do right before you start.
Extras
When you purchase The Good and the Beautiful preschool language arts curriculum it comes with so many extras. These items were useful, adorable, and interactive. I was blown away with how much we got for the price and how much my daughter loved it.
Examples of the extra items we received with the preschool curriculum:
Alphabet Flip Books
Folder Pack with Games
Upper and Lowercase Flash Cards
Practice Worksheets (so many)
Access to Corresponding Songs
Access to Corresponding Videos
The Good and the Beautiful Preschool Curriculum - Games
Pictured above are some examples of the folder games that came with the preschool language arts curriculum. My daughter still asks to play these and we have been done with this curriculum for months. They are so beautiful and make learning the letters and their sounds super fun. If she just wasn’t into a lesson one day, we would pull out one of these games and “play”.
The Good and the Beautiful Preschool - Alphabet Flipbooks
Academically Strong
It feels a bit extreme to talk about strong academics regarding a three-year-old but as an educator I can’t help myself. I went into these preschool years with zero expectations or goals. I just wanted to have something special for us to do that we would both enjoy and if she learned something, that would be an added bonus.
I have been blown away by how much my daughter has learned from this program. After we completed it, she can identify all her uppercase and lowercase letters correctly and can name all of their sounds. She is beyond interested in reading and can’t wait to learn.
Even though this program is language arts, The Good and the Beautiful adds in other important concepts that are needed at this age.
Other items my daughter learned in this program:
Shapes
Colors
Handwriting
Numbers
Art Appreciation
The Good and the Beautiful Preschool Curriculum
It’s Cost Effective
This is another one of the main reasons I decided on this curriculum. It was substantially cheaper than some of the other curriculums I was looking at and it included lots of extras, which we loved. Plus, I didn’t want to spend a lot on preschool curriculum when I knew we would be adding in lots of our own books and activities.
The Good and the Beautiful even offers free downloads for a lot of their content which is so generous.
Our Final Thoughts
If you are looking for something for your preschooler and not sure where to start, this is a great place. I truly felt like my preschooler mastered her beginning phonics and we had a great time doing it. As I mentioned earlier, based on my personality, I needed something to give me peace of mind regarding what we should and should not be learning at the preschool age.
I would like to mention a couple of things that I feel are important to address. When my preschooler started The Good and the Beautiful preschool, she had just turned three. Therefore, I didn’t feel like I needed to supplement with anything else. However, if you have a child that is doing this Pre-Kindergarten year there are some things you may want to add to the curriculum. They are super simple, but if you unfamiliar with early education then you might not even think about it.
Here are a few examples of things that are not included in The Good and the Beautiful preschool that you may want to incorporate.
Days of the Week
Months of the Year
Reading Daily Books
Handwriting
Counting Past 10
Crafts (totally optional)
Bible Time - See my post here if you need ideas on ways to incorporate Bible time and here for Bible time resources.
All in all, this is a solid curriculum that is adorable, academically sound, and fun for your preschooler. I hope this was helpful in your decision-making process. Please leave a comment or questions below. I would love to answer them for you and help you out on your journey. It’s beautiful and chaotic but I wouldn’t have it any other way.
