For our 2026 homeschool year, my wife and I are trying to lean even harder into books, hands-on learning, and good old-fashioned screen-free education. This is our third year homeschooling our three kids, and we’re always experimenting with what works, what doesn’t, and what keeps everybody actually interested in learning.
Below are six books we’re using this year, and I’ll be adding to this page as we go. Some of the links are affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission if you purchase through them, at no extra cost to you. We’re still building this page out, so check back for updates as we discover new favorites, change our minds about things, and see how these books actually hold up over the school year.
This book will help us build our kids’ writing skills through a classical approach, using fables to practice narration, outlining, sentence structure, and composition. We’re looking forward to seeing how it works for us throughout the year.
Traditional Spelling Book 2 by Cheryl Lowe will give us a structured approach to spelling, with the Student Book providing the lessons and the Teacher Book helping us guide the kids through them. We’ll be using the two together throughout the year.
See above!
Language Lessons for a Living Education 6 will give us a gentle, literature-based approach to language arts, with lessons that will build grammar, writing, reading, and communication skills. We’re looking forward to working through it together this year.
Reading Comprehension Book 4, Grade 6 will give us focused practice in reading comprehension while helping our kids strengthen their ability to understand, analyze, and respond to what they read. We’ll be using it as part of our reading work this year.
Cursive Handwriting Student Workbook will give us a simple, focused way to practice and build our kids’ cursive handwriting skills. It’ll be another easy addition to our more screen-free approach to learning this year.