Has anyone ever used or heard anything about this curriculum? I was just told about and started looking into it. Would love to get your opinions on it.
Yes, I remember looking into them. The company is based in south Florida, I think, and they provide a complete curriculum and materials - and they have some kind of correspondence/online academy. For sure, their material is used by a number of smaller Christian schools, and I've seen them exhibiting at homeschool events. They've been around for a while and are well established. We never used their material, though, so I can't comment from that perspective.
IN MY OPINION, it certainly is Christian, but it's definitely not Accelerated, and to me barely qualifies as Education -- but in some cases, it "works" (more or less) for some kids. I have tons of reasons from my experience why I say what I said, mostly from observing the results from other people's use of it. I just added another one: I'm not "too good" to use it when it seems to be the best fit for a kid who just can't handle tougher stuff. I have a kid I'm teaching right now (we're schooling Other People's Kids now) who can barely handle the comprehension of second/third grade material from CLE, R&S, Pathways, etc., and I'm thinking that I'll need to have him do ACE stuff somewhere down the line if he stays with us -- he's 12 right now, in "6th" grade but working in 2nd Pathways Reading, 3rd R&S Science, 2nd CLASS history, 3rd CLE math, 2nd R&S Reading (as Bible), 2nd grade R&S English and Phonics. I had him do the ACE science-and-social-studies-reading-comprehension test just to see how it might go. He did all the first through fifth grade reading passages, and missed ONE item in the fifth grade level. Does that tell you how easy this stuff is? All of that said, I have used some of it from time to time with certain kids who just couldn't handle tougher stuff. I've used the seventh and eighth grade science this year and last, for one kid who just needed a break from the tougher grade-level stuff she's been doing in other subjects, something that wouldn't tax her too much. She's breezing through it, but at least she's sort of getting an overview of some of the subject matter. Next year, I'm planning to let her use the ACE world history (10th grade), again because she needs to have ONE subject that doesn't tax her too much.
That helps a lot! My dd is advanced and would NOT do well at all with it then. On the other hand my mom is thinking of homeschooling my step-sister who is in the 5th grade in ps but should can't pass my dd 2nd grade work. However the ps refuses to hold her back even though she continues to get straight F's on all her report cards. She may do well with it. I will look into another curriculum for our family, but will tell my mom what you said about this one. Thank you!
There are others who will disagree with me about the quality of the education in ACE, but all I can say is what I have seen with my own eyes. I've never tried the math nor the English, nor the primary grades, just a little of the science and history at different levels. OTOH, some of my favorites are Christian Light Education, especially the reading, language arts, and math, and Rod & Staff, especially the English and science. You may wish to look into those. The CLE has samples of some courses on their website www.clp.org and the vendor site Milestone Ministries has samples of the R&S at www.rodandstaffbooks.com . CLE has diagnostic (placement) tests at their site for math and language arts, but R&S has no placement tests - you'll need to read the Table of Contents at the above site, and see what might match up for you. I've never seen this written anywhere official, but rumor has it that the ACE was written originally for slow learners/learning disabled kids (the founder's own).
Interesting commentary, Lindina. Having "Accelerated" in the title and all. We used it for a couple months when we were selling our house and moving. It was nice to have workbooks for the kids to use on their own (3rd and 6th grades). We didn't use their math, though. Anyway, it was boring for my kids who were used to varied formats and scenery. Dd liked the cursive, though. They only completed the first one or two paces in each subject before our move was over and then they went to ps for a time while we built our home. Butlercrew4, you can also go to www.homeschoolreviews.com to read about all sorts of curriculum and reviews by people who have used each. I have found that site very, very helpful when I am looking into something new.
I forgot to note about ACE....in a large city nearby, the city ranks their schools each year by comparing test scores of the senior classes. Consistantly, the Christian school who used ACE scored above the public and Catholic high schools. At least is was better than other options in this area.
I think it depends on the child, but I was not impressed with the sample of a math booklet I got in the mail. It had little to no explanation and some of the problems were repeated in the book indentical to the earlier problems. I could see a child memorizing and not really learning.
You've reminded me of someone locally who made this very point to me a few weeks ago. The teaching approach is formulaic, and it's quite possible for students to learn information by rote without ever truly understanding the principles that underlie the topic.
I like ACE's scriptures in each pace. We have used it in the past but I did not like all of it.... it started out slow (k - 4) but then in 5th grade my dd had trouble with the math. I have lots of friends who use it and like it, but I have mixed feelings...
