End of the Year Hits! The Best of 3rd Gr & Kinder

Añadido: 2026-05-15

[00:00:04]Hi folks. Welcome back to Crazy Brave Homeschool. If you're new here, my name is Ashley and this year I'm a homeschooler to a kindergarten and a third grader. Kindergartener and a third grader and we are wrapping up our fourth year of homeschooling. So these videos are always really fun at the end of the year. I love reflection videos, um, hits and misses and curriculum reviews. So, that's kind of like the mindset that I am in right now with all the videos that I'm putting out. Uh, I think last year I had my daughter rate her curriculum at the end of the year and that was a fun one and it was telling. It definitely helped me make some choices for the coming school year.

[00:00:47]Um, I did a similar thing off camera with my kids right before term three because I was really trying to solidify curriculum choices for next year. And I had my kids I it was such a project. I laid out all the curriculum that we had used including all the books uh from the year and I had them one at a time come in and put into piles their favorites and their least favorites. So I sort of recently within the last few weeks uh I believe I put out a video of our curriculum misses of the year. So uh those misses were very much based on that um kind of activity I did with the kids um and based on my own personal opinion of how the curriculum went. So if you're interested in the curriculum misses, I will definitely link it in the description box for you to check out.

[00:01:40]This video is on a high note. the These are all of the gems of our homeschool year this year. Um, I'm looking at some pretty good stuff. I'm going to show you my uh third graders favorite stuff of the year and then I'll show my kindergartenner. And I didn't really include my favorite stuff because honestly, I kind of agree with the kids.

[00:02:04]Like my favorite stuff is pretty much the favorite stuff I did with the kids or the favorite stuff that they chose.

[00:02:10]But I will have a 25 26 reflections video that I I did last year and that was really just more about like me and my opinions of the school year. Did we hit our goals? Um how am I feeling about the skill-based subjects and like uh the progress my kids made this year? How any of that is influencing where we're going next year with um with curriculum. So, um, that will be more of like my own personal opinion of the school year and, um, so hang tight on that one. This is really mostly about the kids. Okay. So, I'm going to start with my daughter. I'm just going to hit the number one like top hit of the year for Poppy was literature. She did not do a whole lot of reading on her own this year. She's a young third grader. She was eight all year through, and she really only became a very fluent reader. uh the summer after second grade. So, we have only had less than a year now of fluency and she also is not super drawn to reading herself, but thankfully um and that's something we're working on. I do require independent reading every day, but thankfully she adores being read too.

[00:03:25]And I'm really pleased that this year was such a positive year for literature because second grade literature was probably one of the biggest misses.

[00:03:33]Unfortunately, I just chose the wrong books for her. I think I chose books that were maybe over her head or just the wrong content. And I will say this year I made some bold choices as well.

[00:03:46]Um I made some risky choices. We brought in, you know, stories from Shakespeare.

[00:03:50]We brought in brought in Greek mythology. And I brought in several classic books like Alice in Wonderland, Little Women, Understood Betsy, um, Princess and the Goblin. So, uh, let's get into what Poppy's favorite books of the year were. So, I'll actually start with the first one. Like, this was one that I required her to read aloud for a little while. And we had read this in the first grade with Blossom and Root, but she wanted to read it again as like her fluency reader. So, this was not technically a readaloud. This was her reading to me the Vietnam Vietnamese children's favorite stories. Um, again, Blossom and Root level one book list.

[00:04:33]This is a really great book. Um, Greek mythology went really, really well this year. So, we did not quite finish the Wonder Book for Girls and Boys scheduled with the Alviary. Um, but we got pretty far. I think we have two stories left that we did not get into with this one. Um, but we'll probably continue reading this over the summer.

[00:04:58]Greek mythology went very, very well for us this year, which is great because mythology is going to be scheduled every year within our, you know, very Charlotte Mason home school. So, This one went over great. On that same note, Tales from the Odyssey, part one and part two by Mary Pope Osborne also went over very, very well. These were a couple of titles that I pulled in from Build Your Library, so at level one. So, if you can tell, I um I did do another DIY literature list. Many titles did come from Blossom and Root. Uh some came from Build Your Library and some came from Alvary. Uh some came from Ambleside. So, I definitely made my own list again this year and thankfully it went over really well. So, these two were definitely a hit. We read these very quickly.

[00:05:47]All right, so that's Greek mythology.

[00:05:50]Stories from Shakespeare was her absolute favorite um subject, book, whatever that we read this year. We read all of the stories that Ambleside assigns. Um we didn't follow the schedule at all. We just consumed Shakespeare stories. I do kind of wish that maybe we had um started this last year so that that we could like digest a story well before starting another. But she absolutely loved these. She cared.

[00:06:17]She liked the tragedies more than the comedies. And her favorite genre of writing uh she told me and told all of you in a recent video is murder and romance. So there you go. You're going to find that with Shakespeare. This went over wonderfully. Okay. And then I grabbed six chapter books that she really really enjoyed. I did not grab all the ones we read this year. I think all in all we read 13 books. Um but these were the six that uh she would definitely say were the top six. So probably at the bottom of that six would be My Side of the Mountain. Uh we definitely enjoyed this. Uh there was nothing wrong with it. There were a couple times where it got a little boring, but she really enjoyed learning about survivor mentality in the woods. I would say we did not like the ending of this book, though. Um, uh, I'll hit the absolute favorite at the end. I would say the next one after that, I'm kind of guessing right now. I would say it was Crenshaw. Crenshaw was really, really good. So, this was obviously one of the more modern books we brought in um about a family who is actually struggling with homelessness. Um and the whole kind of premise of the book is that Jackson, this little boy who I believe is maybe a fifth grader is his family is facing uh homelessness again after living in a home for for a while. and his imaginary friend Krenshaw revisits him from his youth or from you know when he was really young comes back to kind of um you know sort of I believe like spiritually help him through the um uncertainty of homelessness again. So it was a heavy topic but but still lighthearted and funny enough for a third grader to really enjoy. Plus my daughter very much likes real world problems. This is why books like these go over really well because I think that she just really appreciates real problems versus imaginary story, you know, books like Alice in Wonderland, that kind of stuff. Um, she likes fairy tales and stuff, but when it comes to novels, she likes the real problems better. Okay, the next one I would say she would say is The Last Map Maker. So, we just finished this. She's still working on her book report. Um, this was a very long book about four almost 400 pages and honestly in my opinion was quite boring until the end. Like it was around 200 page 260 that finally some excitement was happening. But she liked it the whole way through. So we just had different opinions about it. But she she really enjoyed it. Um, okay. The next one I would say on her list would be Understood Betsy. This is in the top three. Um, we loved reading this together. Uh, it was so cozy and Poppy was struggling with some chronic tummy troubles at this time and so it just made her feel better. I don't know, this book has a warmth to it that you just feel like you're wrapped up in a blanket uh, when you're reading this and I really enjoyed reading this with her.

[00:09:34]Uh, let's see. The number two I would say is wonder. Apologies that I don't have the jacket for this. This um sorry and I haven't said where these books are from. This is with Blossom and Root.

[00:09:46]Wonder is about a boy who has birth defects in on his face and so he looks a lot different from all the other kids and he was homeschooled until fifth grade and then he uh it's funny that she liked all the books about fifth grade boys.

[00:10:04]He starts school at a public school. And so this book is all about his experience going to public school for the first time in his life um after being homeschooled and dealing with his you know the making fun of and the insults and the bullying but also the friendships that he builds and um it just has a wonderful happy ending. This book was fantastic and we really enjoyed the the movie that was made um with Julia Roberts after we read it.

[00:10:31]And then if you've been following our year, you probably won't be surprised by Poppy's number one choice was Little Women. We got through uh the uh the part one of Little Women and then about a third of the way through part two. But uh we did notice that as the girls got older and started dealing with like um older, you know, like young lady, you know, types of conflicts or problems or u career goals and stuff. she was losing a little bit of interest just because agewise I think she couldn't connect to them as well as when they were younger.

[00:11:05]But um all in all it was still absolutely her favorite. This was a beast of a book. It was a challenging read and I'm so impressed that she was able to follow along with it and um really enjoy it obviously because it's her number one. And then we had some really fun movie nights with the different versions of Little Women Out there. So, this was a super special year for literature. Oh my goodness. Truly a beautiful stack of books this year. I can only hope next year is just as good.

[00:11:37]Okay, there was only one piece of two pieces of skill-based subjects that my daughter chose as um you know, top favorites this year. So, it I I should have mentioned earlier, you're not going to see any reading, uh barely any language arts or math in this video because they were just not um their favorites this year because my kids don't really like skill-based subjects.

[00:12:03]So, the the two skill-based subjects she did she did pick was she likes the victory drill book. She really likes time tests. She likes trying to beat the clock. She's incredibly competitive in her everyday life. So, um she really likes this book a lot. This is all like reading fluency with speed.

[00:12:21]And then uh she picked cursive with logic of English. Her cursive is um the best handwriting that I have seen from her. And I think that there is something to be said about the um you know like like the flow of cursive and how that could be easier than learning how to write print. Her cursive is definitely nicer than her print handwriting. So this went over really well this year.

[00:12:46]All right. for history. Um, Poppy's favorite. I think I only have two resources here and we did not use these for long. We did not have a great history year for Poppy, unfortunately.

[00:12:59]Um, one of our history programs she did like, but she didn't pick it out as her favorite. My son did, so you will see that. But her two picks for history were um, Our Island Story and 50 Famous Stories Retold. We only did this for a month. It was only for four weeks. um before we decided to change history for reasons I won't get into now, but we did bring back um 50 famous stories retold.

[00:13:24]I I put this in the morning basket and we have been reading one story a week for the last six weeks and I've been reading it to both kids which has been fun and they like these. Um our island story is coming back to our home school for both students next year.

[00:13:39]All right, for what was her other favorites?

[00:13:44]Uh, my kids all had the same enrichment favorites. So, I think we Oh, I'm sorry.

[00:13:53]One more history book. She picked out this one. People of the Breaking Day.

[00:13:58]This actually kind of surprised Well, it sort of surprised me. Alvier history was a miss for us this year. We did do it all. We finished it. We got through it.

[00:14:08]But my daughter um in this book was from Alvieri, but my daughter really likes Native American history. So, the fact that she chose people of the breaking day is not a huge surprise because this is all about the Wampaog tribe um out of Massachusetts.

[00:14:24]I think that's right. So, um she chose this one. So, thankfully there was one title out of Alviary that she did actually like. Okay, I think we'll hit uh my son and then I will go over some of the enrichment that they picked that they liked the best. Okay, I will hit my son's literature.

[00:14:44]First, poetry. So, um, Woody is in kindergarten and I wanted to introduce poetry. We've been doing the Jack Perlutzki poems on Fridays. So, poetry is nothing new to our homeschool. Um, what was the one I read last year? It was like all about plants and animals that are native to California and they're like really silly poems. That went over really well last year. So, I had high hopes that this would go over well. And I've heard that boys um and I'm sure girls, but boys tend to really enjoy their Jack Poopski poems. They're kind of like Shell Silverstein. And um we were about halfway through this and I couldn't really tell if he liked it. And I asked him if he wanted to maybe switch to a new author and he said no, I love this book. And he did choose this as one of his favorites. We are uh almost done with this. We just have a handful of poems left. So we'll finish this um by the end of the school year, if not this summer. But this was definitely a huge hit. Okay, for Woody's like um story books this year. So, I had originally um decided to go with Blossom and Root Level Zero, I did find though that gosh probably about half of the books on that list weren't really going to resonate with us. And so, I decided pretty early on to pick the ones that I knew he or thought he would like and then to choose my own picture books for him. So, this is going to be a hodge podge of blossom and root and ones that I chose.

[00:16:12]All right, Owl at Home is one that I chose. And right now, we are finishing this up. Uh, we have a couple stories left, but he's really enjoyed these stories. These are very just cute and weird and funny.

[00:16:25]The Snowy Day is one that I chose. This is a really simple book. Um, and I was surprised that he liked it so much because it's just so simple, but it's also a classic for a reason. So, this one went over really well. I tried to keep a lot of our books um, seasonal for him since he's still learning about weather and calendar and all that. Uh, around Halloween time, I chose Arthur's Halloween. We have continued to read this year round. Another Halloween one he really liked was Room on the Broom.

[00:16:56]This was really sweet. We did a very fun story basket narration with this one.

[00:17:01]And this is one that I chose, too.

[00:17:04]I think I've chosen all of these so far.

[00:17:07]Uh, cactus hotel. This is a really cool one about a siguarro cacti and how it is home. Well, how big it grows, how old it lives, and all of the animals that live in it and rely on it as a home. He really liked this one.

[00:17:26]Yeah, so far I chose all of these. I promise I do have some from Blossom and Root. Um, and also this is not all the ones that we did. These are just his favorites. Three Billy Goats scruff. He absolutely loves any version of the Three Billy Goats Gruff. It's like his absolute favorite. So, this was a big win. Oh, one I forgot to grab is the Thompton by Astred Lingren. That is definitely one of his all-time favorites that we brought in around winter time this year. And then I actually only have two from Blossom and Root that he that he would have put in his favorites pile.

[00:17:59]Um, Jabari Jumps is a really good one about a boy overcoming his fear of jumping off the high dive.

[00:18:08]And Frog and Toad are friends. Uh, this was probably uh I would say this might be his favorite this year. He really loved Frog and Toad. These have been fun. And he had never read them before.

[00:18:22]All right.

[00:18:24]He Okay. So, what Woody did not choose any skill-based subjects as his favorite. Uh, which is fine. He chose Let's see. So, for history, his absolute favorite, and my daughter really liked this, too, was Unfolding Ancient History, ancient Egypt from Little School of Smiths. I've talked about this program a few times now on my channel because this was a huge win. He really enjoyed all of the crafts and activities that are in this. It does um he liked it so much that I do have it on my mind about next year trying to squeeze in one of Lindsay's ancient history units. Um probably ancient Greece amidst our other curriculum plans. And um it's tough to do because there's so much in these, but um I'm I might try it because he really loved it. Um he also really enjoyed geography. So actually both of my kids had map work as their favorites. They um both learned all their 50 states within the last year and that has been really really exciting. So they really like um being they like being tested and quizzed on stuff um which is just funny but that's what they're into. So map work went over great. Uh Woody chose for one of his other favorites. He had three geography favorites this year, which is cute. He chose the land and water forums unit that I did. I don't have much to show. Um I'll show you his the notebooking page that we did with it, but these I got I don't even know maybe Etsy. Uh I think it was Etsy. And it's 10 land and water forms. And it took us 10 weeks to learn them all. And then we have continued doing flashc cards uh during like our morning enrichment time.

[00:20:14]So I will ask the kids, you know, Woody, can you describe an island to me or describe a cape? Or Poppy, uh what is an archipelago?

[00:20:23]Um and then I will also quiz them with the flashcards.

[00:20:27]So we have our term exam coming up and we'll see how they do with it. Okay. And then his third geography favorite this year was Paddle to the Sea. This was probably his top favorite geography thing that we did. We did this early on in the year. I actually am having a hard time even remembering us doing it this year, but I'm pretty sure we did if not for summer school before the year started, but he remembers it well. And we're actually bringing this in again next year to reread um with the Ambleside schedule, but he loved Paddle to the Sea. Okay. Okay. And then lastly, I'll get into some of the enrichment picks that the kids loved the most. I just grabbed a couple of books that they said were their favorites. Uh, How much is a million? We brought this in at the very beginning of the year. Um, and they just like totally adored this book. This is a really fun book to kind of grasp what a million actually is. So, we've read this several times. The other book that they really really liked is Consent for Kids. I was planning on bringing this in for a summer enrichment read. Um but we started running out of things to do this year, so I brought it in early and they loved this. They thought it was so funny. Um it has, you know, it's not typically our type of book, but it's really um funny. and my third grader, well, both of them, they just really enjoyed the conversations around like bodily autonomy and having boundaries.

[00:21:53]Um, and yeah, just learning what consent is. There were a lot of funny situations, but also very important situations to get acquainted with so that you can be safe. So, this was a huge win. I would probably read this again to them next year.

[00:22:11]They both chose woven melodies as another favorite enrichment. This is something that took us a long time to finish. I did set it down for a couple of terms. Uh we started it when my son was in TK, my daughter was in second grade, and then I brought it in for term three of third grade and kindergarten.

[00:22:29]So, um it's been with us for a while and they really enjoyed this. They like I think they like that it's basically screen time during school because they get to watch YouTube videos of musicians, but also it is just it's so rich because it's so diverse and they cover so many different instruments from all over the world, different composers of all nationalities and it's just a very rich study. I really recommend woven melodies.

[00:22:56]Um, they both chose picture study uh from our Simply Charlotte Mason picture portfolios. This is no surprise. They love this because they get to paint the um picture that we study and um we've been doing this for, you know, the last this is our third year using the artist um picture portfolios. So, those are always a hit. And then the last thing that they chose was a kids herb book. I feel like I've been showing this so much in my recent videos, so I won't talk much about it at all. This is the the book that we used for term one of our year studying plant science. And there's a lot of just like really cool information in here about all the medicine that's found in nature. There's folklore and there are fun recipes. So, this went over really, really well.

[00:23:48]Okay, those are all of the favorites of our year. And I hope that you guys got some maybe some good ideas. I'd love to know what some of your favorites of the school year were. Please share in the comments. And any questions, just hit me up there. I'll see you guys soon. I