Sonlight Elementary History Curriculum for Homeschool: Is it Right for Your Family?

I absolutely love studying history. But my love of history didn’t come from school. When I was growing up, my history education included reading dry textbooks, memorizing long lists of dates and facts, and trying to remember them all during the test. Although this process gave me a good knowledge of history, I didn’t fall in love with it until I was older and could read historical fiction books. When I was choosing an elementary history curriculum for our homeschool, I knew I wanted one that uses stories, not textbooks, to teach history. Enter History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History from Sonlight. This complete American History curriculum is designed for kids ages 6-8 and includes everything you need for a whole school year right in the box! Here’s why my family loves this curriculum.

I received compensation and access to History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History in exchange for my honest review, but all the opinions in this post are my own.

Sonlight History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History

History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History is Sonlight’s complete history curriculum for kids ages 6-8. This curriculum is designed to be completed during level A, which corresponds to first grade. But one of the things I love about Sonlight is that each curriculum is created to work for a wide age range of kids, which means that the whole family can learn history together.

Sonlight offers a wide variety of curriculum option for kids from preschool through high school, including history and science boxed curriculum, unit studies, and all-in-one curriculum options.

Each Sonlight History/Bible/Literature Curriculum includes a variety of resources, including lesson plans and all the books you will be reading for the entire school year. This is great because it means I’m not spending time looking for books or worrying about whether we have what we need. I can just go to the bookshelf and pull out the next book when it’s time!

The History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History curriculum was updated in 2023. Here’s what you will find in the most recent version.

Check out everything that’s included in the History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History curriculum here.

Done for You History Lesson Plans

Each Sonlight curriculum kit comes with a full set of done for you lesson plans inside the Instructor’s Guide. I love these plans because they allow me to spend more time reading and learning with my kids, and less time trying to figure out lesson plans each week.

Each week’s plan begins with a calendar so I can see immediately everything that we’ll be doing that week. I usually use the calendar as a checklist, so that I can see what we have completed each week. If my kids are interested in something and want to keep reading, it’s easy to skip to the next day’s reading, and if we don’t get everything finished, we can always add it on the next day.

Sonlight also offers the option to choose either a 4-day or a 5-day curriculum for each level. The 5-day curriculum comes with more books to read, but the 4-day curriculum is perfect for busy families or those times when life is unpredictable (think: homeschooling with a newborn, or a chronic illness, or during a time when you have lots of commitments outside the home).

I’ve found that even with the 5-day curriculum, the lessons are generally short enough that we don’t have a problem completing them at some point during the week. My kids enjoy these lessons, so we often work ahead at their request!

Download a 3 week sample of any Sonlight Instructor’s Guide here to see the lesson plans for yourself!

History Books for Elementary Homeschool Students

History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History comes with 15 history books to read out loud to your kids over the course of the school year. The spine of the curriculum is Heroes and Happenings, Volume 1 and 2 by Amy Lykosh. Lessons from these full color textbooks are included throughout the year to help kids see how the stories they are reading relate to each other in the timeline of history.

Other history books included with the 5-day curriculum include:

• Mary on Horseback
• Johnny Appleseed: The Story of a Legend
• Granny Han’s Breakfast
• Abandoned on the Wild Frontier
• Maps and Globes
• George vs George
• How We Crossed the West
• The Very First Americans
• The Amazing Impossible Erie Canal
• Three Young Pilgrims
• The New York Colony
• Your Life as a Settler in Colonial America
• The Magic Treehouse #21 Civil War on Sunday

I love that this curriculum includes a variety of both historical fiction and non-fiction books. There are also both picture books and chapter books. This variety makes the curriculum interesting and ensures that everyone will find something they like, no matter what their age.

Learn more about the history books in the History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History curriculum here.

Bible Books in Sonlight History/Bible/Literature Level A

History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History comes with 2 resources for Bible study. The One Year Bible for Children is a daily devotional with a Bible story each day of the year. My kids are excited to complete the Bible in a year challenge this year using this book!

We also received Sing the Word: Teach Me Your Paths which is a CD of songs based on Bible verses. We put this in my car to listen to as we travel to different activities throughout our week.

Literature and Read Aloud Books for Homeschool History

One of the foundations of every Sonlight History/Bible/Literature curriculum is the selection of read aloud books. I love that this curriculum comes with a wide variety of different books to read together. Some are set in the historical time periods we will be studying, and others are just fun books for this age group.

I also love that each Sonlight curriculum comes with a mix of classic books that I remember from my childhood and can’t wait to share with my kids (like Mrs. Piggle Wiggle or The Hundred Dresses) and new books that I never would have found otherwise (like Adventures with Waffles).

We have used several different Sonlight curriculum kits now and I also really appreciate knowing that the books are always family friendly and age appropriate. I don’t always have time to preview the books before reading them out loud to my kids, and it’s nice to know that I won’t have to improvise because I come to language or concepts I don’t want to share with my kids.

Literature Read Aloud Books included with the 5-day curriculum include:

• The Light at Tern Rock
• The Apple and the Arrow
• The Hundred Dresses
• Twenty and Ten
• In Grandma’s Attic
• The Family Under the Bridge
• Here’s a Penny
• Adventures with Waffles
• Astrid the Unstoppable
• The Ordinary Princess
• The Berenstain Bears’ Dollars and Sense
• The Kitchen Madonna
• Mrs. Piggle Wiggle
• Sled Dog School
• Cool Beans
• Book Uncle and Me
• Room One
• Frankie Sparks and the Class Pet
• The Bill Martin Jr. Big Book of Poetry

Learn more about the read aloud books in the History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History curriculum here

Sonlight Readers for History/Bible/Literature Level A

Each Sonlight History/Bible/Literature curriculum also includes the option to add on a set of readers. These are designed for kids to read to practice their skills.

I chose the second grade readers for my daughter, whose reading has really taken off this year. Now that she can decode words well, I know that she will be able to read most of the words in these books. We are reading them out loud together, and this is a fantastic way for her to practice her reading skills.

The readers come with a separate set of lesson plans that divide them out into a 36-week school year, so you can make sure that you finish them all.

I love that the readers package begins with The Beginner’s Bible. When my kids learn how to read, we talk about how they are old enough to read God’s Word on their own, and this is a major step for them. I love that reading through this Bible helps kids to build that habit of reading the Bible for themselves as soon as they can read independently!

Other Readers included with the Grade 2 package include:

• Surprises (this is a poetry book!)
• Frog and Toad are Friends
• Frog and Toad Together
• Frog and Toad All Year
• Owl at Home
• Mouse Tales
• Hill of Fire
• Pompeii… Buried Alive!
• The Titanic Lost and Found
• Wagon Wheels
• The Big Balloon Race
• Daniel’s Duck
• Nate the Great
• The Fire Cat
• Greg’s Microscope
• Amelia Bedelia
• The Sword in the Tree (This is a chapter book, but I think that after reading the others, my daughter will be ready for this).

Learn more about Sonlight’s readers for kids in kindergarten through high school here.

Reasons to Try History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History

I am so glad that I chose History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History as my family’s history curriculum this year. Here are four reasons why I am loving this curriculum:

Done For You History Lesson Plans

All I need to do when it’s time for school is open the Instructor’s Guide to this week’s plans and we’re ready to go. I love that I get to spend more time reading and learning with my kids, and less time planning lessons. This was one of the main reasons why we made the switch to Sonlight, and I’m so glad we did!

Complete Elementary History Curriculum Comes in the Box

All the books we need for the whole school year came right in the box. That means I don’t have to track down books on a book list- everything’s on the bookshelf ready to go. This is so much easier and less stressful for me as a busy homeschool mom!

Make Elementary American History Come Alive

I love the way that my kids connect with the historical figures and characters in the stories. They have a much deeper understanding of history than they would if they were memorizing names and dates from a textbook, and I know that the connections they are making will help them to remember what they are learning better, too.

Make Homeschool History Fun

Reading stories together is my kids’ favorite time of our school day, so I love that we get to do more of it. Any time that my kids are begging to do school on weekends, I know that we’re doing something right!

Try Sonlight History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History for Your Family

If you are looking for an elementary history curriculum for homeschool that makes history fun and homeschooling easy, I highly recommend History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History from Sonlight. The done-for-you lesson plans and the box of books take all the guesswork and stress out of teaching history at home. And the engaging stories help kids connect with history in a way that they just can’t when reading a textbook.

Learn more about Sonlight and get the History/Bible/Literature Level A: Exploring American History curriculum for your family here!