Judah Bible Curriculum ~ TOS Review

One of the places we really struggle in our day to day school life and outside of school as well, is remembering to work on and implement Godly character. I think this is probably the most important thing we as homeschoolers should be working on but for some reason it is always the first thing to let slip when things get crazy. We recently decided to cut back and simplify to really focus on this.

Judah Bible Curriculum is based on the Principle Approach method which is, simply put, applying Biblical principles to your student’s life and character. I will warn you implementing it is teacher intensive, but the results are so worth it. Here is a snippet from the website:

A Principle Approach curriculum for Bible class.
Develop a comprehensive knowledge of the Bible.
Build strong, Godly character in your children.
Study the Bible together.
Study the hand of God in the lives of individuals and nations.
For homeschool, Christian school, Sunday school. Teach your children living Biblical principles to guide their lives.
Apply God’s word personally in every area of life.
The Bible is the textbook.

The bible is the textbook, how much simpler could it be. Using JBC and notebooking your student cycles through major themes of the Bible focusing on certain scripture each week. Putting important people, places, ideas, events, and documents on key sheets helps to cement the ideas presented and is great for learning note taking and how to be concise.

This is not a open and go curriculum, there are 8 teacher training seminars that will train you how to teach your children using this method. Also included are the teacher manual, with the weekly theme guide, and the notebooking ideas book. This will give you some ideas for your students to begin creating their own notebook for the study. Each year your student digs deeper adding to previous knowledge and study as they add to their notebooks. Here is a link to their Philosophy of Education.

Our Thoughts:

I used this with my 9 y/o son and I certainly could have used it with all of my children from the 3 y/o to the 16 y/o since it is very open ended. Each child may get different things out of it and put that into their notebooks. Yet it all comes together when you teach the underlying principles and ideas in the Bible. We have really enjoyed using this and have had some good conversations that would not have occurred if we had used our regular Bible study curriculum.

At first I was having a very difficult time wrapping my head around much of the “how” for this method. And really that is what you are paying for, a manual and audio teaching you how to teach the themes of the Bible according to the Principle Approach. I finally just took each week from the manual and we did basic notes on the key sheets and then created a notebook page on the scripture reading. I just had to quit worrying about whether I was understanding how to use it the “right” way and just start.

My son stated he liked it because of the notebooking but struggled with the writing since the key sheets were set up with little room for each section. I feel they could be organized in a different way easily enough myself that I may just create my own so his dysgraphia is not aggravated.

This is very teacher intensive like I said before. Right now with having some very intense discipline issues with my 3 year old and a 2 month old infant who is nursing round the clock it just is not something we will be using. I would love to dig into it in the future and love what I have seen so far.

Cost:

You get:
1) Judah Bible Curriculum K-12 Manual, e-book format to download
2) Elementary Notebook Ideas booklet to view online or download
3) Eight-lecture Teacher Training Seminar listen online or download
(40% discount for online delivery!)

You get:
1) Judah Bible Curriculum K-12 Manual
2) Elementary Notebook Ideas booklet
3) Eight-lecture Teacher Training Seminar on CDs
(includes shipping and handling)
Click the TOS banner at the top of this post to read other reviews on JBC.
Mandy
Disclaimer: I was provided with a free download of the above product in exchange for my honest opinion. My review is based on our family’s experience and may or may not reflect your own. No other compensation was received.