After last week’s comparison of Tapestry of Grace and Sonlight, this week I’ve been asked to compare Tapestry of Grace to My Father’s World . Both programs are classical Christian unit study programs that teach history chronologically; and both integrate history, geography, and Bible.
Similarities
Both Tapestry of Grace and My Father’s World
- Present history in the context of a Christian worldview
- Use Living books. What is a Living book?
- Include some books that are not Christian
- Combine history, geography, Bible, and literature studies
- Have helpful and friendly user forums and excellent customer support
- Include hands-on activities
Some of the differences between Tapestry of Grace and My Father’s World are shown below:
| Tapestry of Grace | My Father’s World |
| Weekly reading assignments and activity ideas | Daily reading assignments and lesson plans |
| Schedules many resources every week for teacher to choose from | Schedules fewer resouces, but includes large list of extra resources for a "book basket" |
| Requires more teacher planning | Requires minimal teacher planning |
| Lampstand Press sells only the TOG year plans. (They don’t sell any books or any materials from other curricular areas such as math, science or grammar). |
My Father’s World is a Complete curriculum provider and sells packages that include the history books as well as other materials. Suggested schedules are provided for all subjects. |
| Each year plan can be used for each child up to three times (between 1st grade and 12th grade), but additional books are needed for each level. |
Each one year curriculum package can be used only once per child, but can be reused with younger children |
| The entire program consists off 4 year-plans covering all of world history. Each year plan contains plans for four different student levels. | World history is covered in four years. In addition, there are separate K and 1st grade programs, as well as a U.S. history program for 2nd or 3rd grade and a world geography study. The high school plans are being developed with 9th and 10th grade currently available. |
| Entire family can use the same year plan with different assignments for each of the four levels. |
All elementary and middle school students can be combined into one program with some modifications. |
If you are seeking a classical, Christian, unit-study, history curriculum both Tapestry of Grace and My Father’s World are excellent choices. I have specifically NOT provided a list of pros and cons concerning these curricula, because the things that I deem to be positives, might be considered negatives by someone else. I hope this comparison aids you in your decision. Be sure to visit the above links to learn more about these curricula.
By Kristen H.
Thanks so much for doing these reviews. As a new homeschooler, I really appreciate reading things like these. They are very helpful in deciding, or consolidating my decisions as to what curriculum to get as I progress in my homeschooling.
thanks so much! This is a great place for me to start. I didn't know that MFW only goes up through 10th grade right now. Although mine are much younger than that.
Blessings,
Jennifer
I'm a huge fan of My Father's World. I incorporate all of my grade levels in this program and I do reuse it with more indepth study as the kids get older, like TOG. Loved this comparison, I thought the same thing about comparing the two curriculums after last week's comparison. Thank you for taking the time to do these.
God's Blessings
You're not helping my curriculum junkie status. I am going to relook at MFW though. Thanks for the comparison.
(1)MFW can be reused by the same student for more than one year. They begin the 5 year cycle in 2nd or 3rd grade and then repeat until they reach 9th grade and enter into the high school curriculum. My 7 and 4 year olds will each repeat two levels of the 5 year cycle before they move on to high school.
My 7yo will do Exploring Countries and Cultures, Creation to Greeks, Rome to Reformation, Reformation to 1850, 1850 to Modern and then start over with ECC and CTG for 7th and 8th grades. MFW includes lesson plans for the 7th and 8th graders so she'll be doing the same content at a different level for those two years.
My 4yo won't start in the 5 year cycle until 2nd grade when my (current) 7yo is doing Ref to 1850s. 4yo will do Ref to 1850, 1850 to Modern, ECC, CTG, RTR and then start over with Ref to 1850 and 1850 to Modern when she is a 7th and 8th grader.
(2) While it's true that MFW does only go up to 10th grade, they will be test-piloting the 11th grade program next year and are currently writing the 12th grade year. I just don't want it to seem like there are no plans in the works for 11th and 12th grade. They are in the works and will be tested for 1 year before they are available for sale. MFW does an excellent job of working out the kinks before releasing the programs.
(3) MFW does include a very few non-Christian world view books, but they do not use any book that they have not first read. The TM actually includes notes on the books that tell you what non-Christian ideas may be presented and suggests either skipping it (for the younger kids) or discussing it with the older ones. I have used 1st grade and Adventures (the 2nd/3rd grade program) and we haven't had any issues with these books. Next year we are moving on to ECC and it all looks GREAT to me.
I hope that didn't muddy the waters when I was actually trying to clear up a few things.
I didn't mean to imply that MFW isn't doing high school. I said they were developing high school plans with 9th and 10th currently available.
Also thanks for clarifying about reusing the curriculum. It's hard to be clear in a small table. You are correct of course, if a younger student goes through the beginning of the curriculum at a younger age because they have an older sibling, then they could conceivably use the same program again using the modifications for 7th and 8th grades. I was trying to highlight the difference in TOG and MFW in that area. From my examination, MFW is designed on about the equivalent level of Upper Grammar or Dialectic in TOG. There are suggestions for using the program for slightly older or slightly younger students, but the base program is the same. TOG on the other hand has 4 completely different tracks contained in each year plan. So when the student is doing the program again using TOG, they're not using any of the same resources. That's the difference I was trying to highlight.
Thanks for those clarifications 🙂
This has been our first year of homeschooling, I had 2 in K and we used MFW K. One reason I chose it is because I can reuse it again for my 2 younger daughters later on and only have to purchase the consumable worksheets for them.
I have heard many great things about TOG and was glad to see this comparison here, thanks for the work you put into it for all of us!
This is my third year homeschooling, but officially, it was our first using anything formally (the two previous years, pre-K and K, we had stapled packets to grab from those jumbo books you can get at WalMart).
Is the pricing on both MFW and TOG modest, in your opinions? I mean, for the subjects you have included in each curriculum, is it a good investment? I have heard many good things about TOG, but I've heard some say it was "awfully expensive." It doesn't seem that way to me when I see that it is used many times for the same child. But I would love to hear some more experienced Mom's opinions about the cost-to-use ratio.
Thank you in advance for any help anyone has to offer!
I have a post on my blog that answers the question of cost. Here is a link to it: http://larsonchsa.blogspot.com/2009/06/how-i-used-tog-this-year.html. I'll give you a snippit though. I bought TOG Yr1 DE when it came out in January at the introductory price. Since I plan to use this with all four of my children, I will have used it for a total of 42 grades. If I divide that by the cost, that means that I will have paid about $3.96 per year per child. Makes it sound a whole lot more affordable doesn't it?! As for all the extras and the books, the state I live in has a very good inter-library loan system. I was able to get most of the books I needed. There were a few I already owned, a few I wanted to buy anyway, and a few I just swapped out with another book if I couldn't get it through the library. The initial expense may be bigger than some, but the return is so worth it – and when spread out over the years and the kids it really is affordable. Blessings.
Thanks so much. This was very helpful.