Disclaimer: I received a FREE copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way.
There’s something to be said about the classical education method. It really encourages your child to learn and take an active role in the education process. I’ve recently become more familiar with this method as I’ve had the opportunity to review Little Wonders Preschool from Wisdom Wonder Project. A couple of my younger kids have had a blast playing with blocks, reading books, and doing art projects as we’ve worked through the material.
What Is This Product?
The Wisdom Wonder Project Little Wonders program is a subscription based curriculum that contains products for kids in Preschool, Jr. Kindergarten, and Kindergarten. Inside each downloaded bundle, you’ll get loads of hands on projects and activities for Literature, Block Play, and Art.
The lessons are all downloadable. However, there will be quite a few things you need to purchase to make the lessons happen as written. The curriculum does a great job of providing information right away on these products, so you don’t get to a random lesson and realize you need something new. I appreciate that. Unfortunately, many of the items they recommended were on the expensive side that just didn’t fit into our homeschool budget. So, we got creative.
We used products we already had on hand, even if they weren’t exactly the same. We utilized online read alouds for some of the books we don’t own, though our local library did have a few of them. I love that with homeschooling, you can be flexible. You don’t have to do any program exactly as written – you get to do what works for your family.
The Curriculum
Once you unzip the file, you’ll be able to open a PDF with the lesson information. It’s presented in an easy-to-follow format that is very user friendly. There’s a suggested schedule, but we really didn’t stick to that. Then, you keep scrolling down to find the lessons.
Each month, you can select one bundle to download and explore. Over the summer, there were shorter, less formal bundles. Then, when September rolled around, there was a more in-depth one to jump back into school.
In order to get a better sense of the program and see what would work best for our family, I downloaded one month of the summer content for my kindergartner, and the September bundle for my preschooler. While there are many overlapping components, the activities are definitely age appropriate for the intended levels. In the future, I will only download the kindergarten bundle, and just make some small adaptations to make it appropriate for my preschooler. That way we aren’t trying to do two at once, and adding confusion to my days. Sometimes simple is better.
How Did We Use This Product?
About three days a week, we’d do projects and activities from the curriculum. I occasionally let my children pick between a couple of them. Other times, I’d select the activities based on what worked best for that day. We enjoyed spending time together, learning in a fun way.
We read (or listened to on the computer) several great books. Each day, we’d read a book first. Then, we’d do something fun. Here are a few of the many things we tried:
My kindergartner, Brynna, got to try making a bed for her toy. This went with the fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood, to show how the wolf climbed into Grandmother’s bed. The directions asked her to use blocks and any other materials she could find to make a bed large enough to support a toy of her choice. She had a lot of fun experimenting, and finally made this simple bed for her My Little Pony toy. She even gave it a sleeping bag from an old sock. Next time, she said she’s going to try making bunk beds.
Bryson worked hard at drawing a house to go along with the book The Little House. He was very proud of his finished picture, and had to show it off to the rest of the family.
After reading the book Urashima and the Turtle (which was a new one for us), Brynna got to try building a castle underwater in the bathtub. That didn’t turn out quite like she expected, since many of the items she wanted to use floated. But, she had a blast giving it a try. Then her sister helped her to build this one:
She had more success building a castle out of Legos after reading Cinderella. She likes building buildings that she can play with on the inside, so you’ll notice there’s no roof. Then, we watched the movie to hear the fairy tale another way.
Bryson tried hard to make crayon rubbings after reading Harold and the Purple Crayon, but he just didn’t have the fine motor skills to make it work. Thankfully, his siblings were more than willing to provide some support, so he had some fun rubbings to look at.
What Did We Think of This Product?
I really liked how this curriculum was put together. It was user friendly. There were so many great ideas, and even though we haven’t done them all yet, I’m looking forward to seeing what the kids get to do next month.
The kids had fun listening to books and doing the activities. They really had a variety of options, so I was always able to find something even my little guy would be successful at. He appreciated getting to sit in on “school time” and have his own projects to work on.
We will definitely keep using these throughout this school year. So, if you’re looking for a fun, flexible way to try classical education with your family, I highly recommend Wisdom Wonder Project.
