Catholic Schoolhouse?

[Emilylovesbooks]

Does anyone here have any experience with Catholic Schoolhouse? I understand it to be similar to Classical Conversations in its setup. It sounds so lovely to have some community with school and to have my children have to answer to other adults for some school-related work. However, I'm aware that those who have asked about CC have been told that it is difficult to combine, not to mention the extra expenses involved with adding additional materials, even if they aren't many.

Thank you in advance!

[momgineer]

We are in a similar co-op- Classically Catholic Memory. We meet once a week and the kids have classes in the memory work, science and geography and a Catchesis of the Good Shepherd Atrium as well as art/art appreciation. It meshes very nicely with our MP work. We do MP four days a week and co-op one day. We don’t do MP timeline because CCM has a wonderful timeline we use instead. I find that what my kids memorize in CCM is taught deeply in MP even though they usually aren’t taught in the same year. And I love that CCM Latin is all memorizing prayers and hymns. We do hard core Latin with MP and get the Catholic prayers in CCM. Socially it has been an extreme blessing to our family. CCM is light enough to fit perfectly with MP. Im not sure how I tense CS is but I’m pretty sure it is not as intense as CC. I think it partly depends on the co-op. Some are hard core full curriculum focused and others are used for light supplementing.

[DiannaKennedy]

Does anyone here have any experience with Catholic Schoolhouse? I understand it to be similar to Classical Conversations in its setup. It sounds so lovely to have some community with school and to have my children have to answer to other adults for some school-related work. However, I'm aware that those who have asked about CC have been told that it is difficult to combine, not to mention the extra expenses involved with adding additional materials, even if they aren't many.

Thank you in advance!

Last spring, when I was working in the MP booth in Cincy, I had quite a few questions regarding Catholic Schoolhouse. I was not familiar with the program, then a good friend of mine started a chapter here in Louisville. I looked into it briefly, because my sons are friends with boys in the program.

Having said that, to me, it seems like a lot of extra work. My kids are already gone out of the house one day per week for Cottage School. There's absolutely no way we could do another full day activity (in our area, CS is full day) and keep up with our regular school work.

I posed this question over in the MP Catholics FB group a while back, because a) I was considering it, and b) I wanted to be prepared in case the question came up again. There's quite a few responses there.

You might email the CS director here in Louisville and ask her for input as well. She also uses some MP, in addition to CS.

[momgineer]

I think the key is to pick ONE weekly community co-op group. Either a cottage school, Catholic Schoolhouse, CCM, or any other social or light supplement co-op would be good. To try to do more than one would be very hard. I think a weekly co-op commitment can fit in many MP family’s lives. Just pick one that adds to MP and not one that tries to be its own full curriculum.

[10isFam]

Hello,
This is just my two cents, but I have some experience with both Classically Catholic Memory and Catholic Schoolhouse. Seeking Catholic memory work is nice because you can do it family style, but there is plenty of memory work with MP so it's not really necessary. But if you are wanting to do it for a social activity, that may be a good thing. I have done CCM with another family, and second what a previous poster said about them having an excellent timeline. After going to a Catholic homeschool conference, I also purchased one cycle of CS to do as a family activity to see how it would compare with CCM. I very much prefer CCM over CS because the CS seemed less rigorous and more like "fluff". Their songs sound like Disney songs, and like they were trying to make school fun. I *know* this makes me sound like a fuddy-dud, but I didn't care for the style of the memory songs, and didn't want my kids singing those all day. Their approach seems much different than MP, in my opinion. Needless to say, I resold the Catholic Schoolhouse set that I had. I have not been part of a group, so that may be a different experience entirely.

[musdir26]

I've done Catholic Schoolhouse all last year with my 4th grader. We really enjoyed doing it together for the community. My favorite academic thing about CSH are the SCIENCE and ART classes. Those are my son's favorite subjects and also the two that I slack off on the most because they require so many materials. It was great having someone do all of that for me. So for science and art it was definitely worth it. In terms of the memory work, there is a TON of information that will never be ingested in a single year and there's little accountability for making sure they're retaining the information unless the parent really pushes it. What was good about it, though, is that because he was in the older group, the tutor focused less on memory and more on going deeper into the subjects they were discussing. And for me, personally, I'm still a newbie to the area and it helped me connect with other like-minded moms. Hope that helps!

[Emilylovesbooks]

Thank you for all for your input! It sounds like it depends a lot of how each community and tutors set up the classes. The group I am aware of is not as close to home as I'd like, so if we dedicate one day each week to it, I want to feel like it is worth it. I will need to find out more details about how the group is run. A community using MP materials would be ideal, of course, but I don't know anybody who uses the cores or most of the cores. Thanks again!

[DiannaKennedy]

I think the key is to pick ONE weekly community co-op group. Either a cottage school, Catholic Schoolhouse, CCM, or any other social or light supplement co-op would be good. To try to do more than one would be very hard. I think a weekly co-op commitment can fit in many MP family’s lives. Just pick one that adds to MP and not one that tries to be its own full curriculum.

As always, Debbie, wise advice.