Religious Studies

First things first! In order to keep my homeschool Catholic, I need to integrate Catholicism into our daily activities.  For formal religious studies I look primarily to these areas:

1. Regular prayer times.  We aim to say at least a Morning Offering together before we begin, the Angelus at noon and prayers before meals.  Our evening prayers vary with our seasons; a nightly Rosary is ideal, but if we can't do that, we try to say all of our basic prayers before bed time.
2. Familiarize the children with the Saints and the Bible using good children's books. 
3. Teach the catechism.  The Baltimore Catechism is an old standby which is well suited to homeschooling and is widely available and inexpensive.  Catechism study can be easily incorporated into handwriting or copy work practice. 
4. Celebrate the Liturgical Year.  www.catholicculture.org is an excellent online resource for this.  They have a daily liturgical calendar available complete with prayers, readings, activities, recipes and songs for the various feast days.  

Beyond the formal religious studies,  I use good catholic books wherever possible and will make up our handwriting worksheets using prayers, catechism, Bible quotes and other Catholic-inspired passages.

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