ABC's and Sweet Tea: WAY Comes Home Kit by HomeSchool Scholastics, an i4 Learning Company ~ A Schoolhouse Crew Review

As long as we've been homeschooling, I've never implemented a formal health curriculum. We've always just talked about all aspects of our health and eating healthy. I recently had the chance to review a fun health curriculum called the WAY Comes Home Kit by HomeSchool Scholastics, an i4 Learning Company. If you're curious like I was for what the the WAY stands for, it is an acronym for Wellness, Academics, and You! We've been using it over the last few weeks, and have had a lot of fun with it.

What did we receive in the WAY Comes Home Kit?

I think what we DIDN'T receive would be a much shorter list! They really kept the homeschool mom in mind while creating this curriculum. They sent pretty much everything that we needed to use the program. I didn't have to go trekking off to stores to try and find anything I needed in order to get started! It was a fun box to open, because it had so many fun things in it!

DVD that goes along with the program
3 Journals for ages/grades K-5 (1 for each level)
Parent Guide
2 foam balls
plastic eggs
counter chips
vocab cards and activities already printed on card stock
3 bins
tape measure
stethoscope (my kids LOVED this)
scale (my kids loved this also)
glitter
ink pad
large and colorful 2 sided poster

I hope I remembered to include everything because like I said, they thought of everything!

One of the things that really impressed me is that all of the consumable journals are included for each age group. There is a journal for K-1, grades 2-3, and grades 4-5. You don't even have to order separate supplies if you have children of different ages! That's definitely a blessing!

How does the kit work and how did we use it?

After we added this into our schedule, I had Gavin work on this 2 days a week. It worked out great for us that way. He could do part of the lesson one day, and continue on with it the next. I would say that the time it takes to do a lesson varies. We were working on the 4-5 journal, the WAY Innerspace Adventure, and it had a lot of writing, so sometimes it would take longer than others. I would say normally about 30 minutes.

There are 5 modules to the program. Each module takes a look at different ways to be healthy.

Getting Started
Where do You Begin?
Let's Get Active
The Nutrition WAY
Health - It's Personal

In each module, it is broken down into the 3 different activities, or in other words, the 3 different age levels. The Parent Guide is laid out nice and neat with easy to follow instructions for each level. This again makes teaching the same subject to multiple ages a simpler task. They also have a nice Lesson Layout which makes it super easy to jump right in.

Also, each lesson is very specific in telling the parent how to be prepared, the vocab words for that lesson, and any supplies needed.

The entire program is centered around journaling. Not only will the child learn about being healthy, but they have also incorporated in language arts, math, and science. They get a little bit of everything rolled into this one subject.

When we first got the kit, and in the first lesson, he got to even decorate his journal so that it was customized just for him. I think this is a great idea to get the kids motivated in using their journals.

The modules start out with watching a short segment on the DVD. After that they worked on the lessons given.

You can really tailor it to your needs and keep it on the shorter simpler side, or you can take it out a little further past a week if you wanted to. They even give you the option to do what they call "Weekends with WAY". That way the lesson can even be incorporated easily into a busy weekend.

Most of all what I loved is that this curriculum encourages prayer at the end of every module! That is always wonderful thing to incorporate into a curriculum!

What did we think?

Well I really believe that they went above and beyond on this program. It's fun, educational, and is EASY for a homeschool mom to teach. Gavin enjoyed it too, and was even asking if he could do the younger levels because they looked fun. He learned quite a bit, and still likes to look through his journal. I would say that if you are looking for an affordable health curriculum, then you will be very pleased with the WAY Comes Home Kit, by HomeSchool Scholastics, an i4 Learning Company!