Ignite Wonder with a Charlotte Mason Inspired Geography Curriculum

A Delightful Charlotte Mason Inspired Geography Curriculum

My entire life, my family has joked about my being directionally-challenged.  As a child and young teen, I have always been oblivious to my surroundings.  No matter how often I traveled the same path, it seemed like I still could never figure out where I was in relation to where I was going.  

As an adult, now that I am responsible for driving, I am less directionally-challenged than I used to be, but the running joke still stands.  Even my husband raises his eyebrows at me when we’re headed someplace new and I tell him, “I know where we’re going.”  And I’m slightly embarrassed to say, I still get us lost about half the time, no matter how many times I look at a map.

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This is why I was so delighted when I found a Charlotte Mason-inspired geography curriculum to add to my homeschool.  No more trying to teach my kids geography based on maps alone.  No longer did I have to spend our homeschool days forcing memorized facts and figures into my kids’ heads, or even worse, ignore geography class altogether and hope they would ‘get it when they’re older.’  

Thanks to the wonder of curiosity-driven living books, now I could engage my kids in geography studies that they would actually retain.

Ignite Wonder with Living Books

Those familiar with the Charlotte Mason education approach are familiar with the term ‘living books.’  But what exactly is a living book?

According to Charlotte Mason, a living book is a book that is written by somebody who has a passion for a particular subject.  These books will naturally draw the reader in, usually in a conversational or narrative way.  A living book will involve the reader’s emotions, so it is easy to retain events and facts.  

Essentially, a living book will come to life and engage the reader in compelling and memorable ways.

It’s easy to see why Charlotte Mason advocated the use of living books in a child’s education.  And contrary to popular belief, living books are not limited to books and stories about nature or language arts: history and geography can also be enjoyed through this unique Charlotte Mason approach  

Homeschoolers will experience wonder and magic when they engage in a curiosity-driven exploration of the world around them through the use of these living books in their studies of local and world geography.    

My Struggle with the Read Aloud

I’m going to be totally honest with you.  

When I first started homeschooling, I never thought I would be able to teach my kids something like geography by simply reading a storybook.  I mean, who does that?  Who actually learns about maps and borders and bodies of water by reading a story?  

If I’m being extra honest with you, I will admit that I have never enjoyed read alouds with my kids, and when my older kids were small, I avoided storytime read alouds whenever I could.  

I know, I know, the horror!  I was actually shunned in many parenting circles whenever I admitted this, so I stopped telling people and started keeping this horrible secret to myself.

It’s no surprise that I always rejected the idea of a Charlotte Mason education.  Sure, the Charlotte Mason approach worked well for some homeschooling families, but certainly not for me.  

Ahh, I was so young.  So naive. 

Thank goodness I’ve matured a bit since then.

I still don’t particularly enjoy a read-aloud with my kids, but I no longer reject the whole idea.  I’m beginning to see the benefits of reading out loud to my kids, particularly living books that are actually fun and engaging.

Easy-To-Use Geography Literature Curriculum

My liaison with living books and reading out loud to my kids really began with my Geography Through Literature pack from Beautiful Feet Books.

I was first seduced by the large and beautiful maps that came in my kit.

Aren’t these beautiful?

I have always been a sucker for a good visual aid, and in my opinion, maps and globes are particularly striking.  In fact, in all my years of homeschooling, I have always dreamed of acquiring a great big globe and putting it in my homeschool room.  

I envisioned my kids playing with this globe and talking about all the wonderful places they wanted to travel, and telling stories about all the history and geography lessons we were learning in relation to this terrestrial sphere. 

Sadly, I have yet to obtain a globe of my own, but knowing how I feel about globes, you can imagine my thrill when I opened my Geography Through Literature pack to find a fancy tube with four beautiful, rolled-up maps.

They did not come laminated, rather they came on some strong paper, but I decided to get my set laminated so that I didn’t have to worry about ruining them and so that they could become a permanent fixture in our homeschool room. I spent $15.00 at the local UPS store to laminate these maps. Easy peasy.

The nice thing about getting them laminated is we can draw on them and color things in without worrying about messing up or ruining anything. As long as we use dry-erase markers (or you could use wet-erase markers) we can wipe the markings away.

So of course, after I had fallen in love with these world maps, how could I not get at least a little bit excited about reading the geography books that came in the kit?  

In addition to the tube of maps, my box also included a lovely bookmark, four geography books, and an easy-to-use teacher guide.  And when I say easy-to-use teacher guide, I truly mean easy-to-use.  The teacher guide walks you through exactly what you need to read and what to do after you read.  It’s really quite fool-proof.  

My kids were surprised at first when I told them to gather around so I could read them a story.  However, they happily complied and we began our first day with our new Charlotte Mason inspired geography curriculum.

Upper Elementary Geography When You’re Directionally Challenged

I mentioned before how I am naturally directionally challenged.  Sadly, my kids don’t seem to be any different.  They definitely inherited my sense of direction.  However, the kids have been so engaged in the stories on my book list that they’re naturally picking up geography concepts! 

I remember the first book we read, Paddle to the Sea, and how interested the kids were in the journey of little Paddle.  As I’d read, they’d hang on every word.  

When I was finished with that day’s reading assignments, the kids would jump up and run to the maps, eagerly tracing Paddle’s path from Lake Nipigon in Canada, all the way to the Atlantic Ocean.  And every day, they’d notice more and more the other rivers, lakes, and even states and cities along Paddle’s journey.  

They even began making connections between other maps and pointing out how a certain landmark would show up on maps that showed different parts of the world.

Color me impressed.  Their elementary geography experiences were proving to more effective than my 12+ years of public school had been.  Even in my own high school geography classes, the names and specific locations of the Great Lakes had never really sunk in, as much as my teachers tried.

I guess there is something to this Charlotte Mason homeschool method and the study of living books after all.  Perhaps a curiosity-driven education is more effective than a textbook driven one.  (Who would have thought?)

Benefits of Homeschooling with Beautiful Feet Books

As I mentioned before, my experience with Beautiful Feet Books and the use of living books and the Charlotte Mason method they stand for has really been eye-opening.  If you’d asked me a few months ago, I would have said I was confident in my chosen homeschooling method, and that my kids and my homeschool were doing just fine, and thriving even.  

But I guess you don’t know what you don’t know, right?

Yes, we were doing well in our homeschool.  But yes, there was absolutely room to improve, and I’m so grateful I was open to trying something new and trying a Charlotte Mason inspired geography curriculum, complete with living geography books, in my homeschool.

Here are just some of the benefits I’ve witnessed in my homeschool, and in my kids.

• The illustrations are detailed and engaging, which kept my kids interested while I was reading.  Nobody was fidgety or begging me to stop; instead, they were eating up all the illustrations.  In fact, even I was interested and wanting to find out what happened next instead of counting the minutes until I could stop. #truthbomb
• The books were written in such a way that we felt like we were really there with the characters.  We were able to visualize their journeys and pretend like we were really there.  This definitely boosted learning as well as the entertainment factor.
• There was so much flexibility in regards to learning with our Beautiful Feet Books.  If we wanted to learn more about a sawmill or the flight formation of geese, we could!  And if we didn’t want to dive into anything deeper that day, we didn’t have to.  I love homeschool resources that allow for flexibility.
• Facts and lessons were easily retained because they were presented in an engaging story format.  When I quizzed my kids on what we had learned that day, they were actually able to tell me which is not always the case when we learn in other ways.

All in all, I can definitely say I am a fan of this Charlotte Mason inspired geography curriculum, and all things living books – especially those by Beautiful Feet Books.  If you have any interest whatsoever in igniting wonder in your homeschool with a curiosity-driven and easy-to-use approach, you should definitely look more into Beautiful Feet Books.  

I for one will be exploring the other subjects this wonderful company has to offer, as soon as we are done with our geography through literature pack. For the children’s sake, of course. (insert wink-face emoji here)

You can learn more about Beautiful Feet Books by checking out their social media accounts.  Give them a follow and see all the wonderful resources they have to offer homeschoolers.  Maybe you’ll discover a great new resource to enhance your child’s home education.

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Curiosity-Driven Living Books Worth Reading

Using living books as part of the morning time routine is a popular habit amongst followers of the Charlotte Mason approach.  Using living books as a part of regular lesson plans is also a popular approach.  There is no one way to use a living book, just like there is no one way to homeschool a child.

Lovers of the Charlotte Mason method are always searching for new living books to add to their homeschool library. This can include picture books and chapter books alike. However, with the millions upon millions of books out there, and with all of them claiming to be ‘great for children’ or ‘Charlotte Mason-inspired’ it can be difficult for parents to know which books to look into more closely.

If this sounds like you, I encourage you to sign up for this free printable resource from Beautiful Feet Books, 5 Ways to Know If A Book Is Worth Sharing With Your Kids. This 7-page pdf walks you through the elements of a good book that you will want to share with your kids.

And make sure you check out this wonderful giveaway Beautiful Feet Books is sponsoring! Five lucky winners will receive a $100 gift card to Beautiful Feet Books.

Related Posts:

Charlotte Mason Inspired Language Arts Program
Homeschooling with Age of Empires
Practical Storytelling How-Tos For Beginners

Geography for the Charlotte Mason Family