Why buy a Sonlight^® Core program?

Sonlight Curriculum seeks to offer full curriculum packages rather than "just books" because our focus has always been on the entire educational experience.

When you purchase one of our Core packages, we are convinced you get one of the very best deals available anywhere in the world when it comes to homeschool materials.

You enjoy the benefits of Sonlight's 18-Week "Love to Learn" Guarantee.

Purchase any Sonlight Core, Newcomer program, Instructor's Guide, or Eastern Hemisphere Explorer, and you're covered by our exclusive 18-week guarantee.

Not only that, but you can create your own program by combining any Sonlight^® Core with any Language Arts, Math, Science, and/or Bible program (one each, per Core) plus the coordinating Required Resources you'll need, and you're still covered!

Whether going with a predefined or customized curriculum program, use it for eighteen weeks. If you are not convinced it makes homeschooling a pleasure for you and your kids, please return it—the entire package, used books and all. We will give you a full refund of everything you paid us.

Use it for eighteen weeks. If you are not convinced it makes homeschooling a pleasure for you and your kids, please return it — the entire package, used books and all. We will give you a full refund of everything you paid us.

Note what that means. Because of the 18-week guarantee,

"It tears me up when my daughter's best friends talk about what they do for homeschool. One of them asked the other day, 'How many pages do you have to do every day?' She was required to do two pages per day out of each of her workbooks — six or eight books, I think. I just wanted to take her home with me and let her fall in love with real learning."

--Jeanne

You enjoy the program more...even while you evaluate it.

Because we offer our 18-week "Love to Learn" Guarantee, we know you will evaluate our Core programs — and the materials within the Core programs — differently than you would if we merely sold you books. If purchasers of individual books hold any hope of returning something they have purchased (from us or our competitors), they have to treat the books like fragile eggs.

They have to take special care as they crack open the cover: make sure they don't bend it too far or dogear the corners.

They live in fear that one of the kids might spill something or the baby may try teething on it.

As a Core curriculum purchaser, you experience none of these worries or fears. You get to test the program as it was meant to be used. You read your books like any book owner: open wide, bookmarks in place, pages turned down — however you would read any other book you own.

You let your kids study and enjoy them, too...without fear. They can take the books to bed, read them in the tree house or the bathroom: you'll be glad to see your kids enjoy the books so much. You won't cringe in dread that one of the books will become non-resalable... and, thus, non-returnable.

You and your children enjoy a richer, more positive educational experience.

We design Sonlight's Core programs purposefully to include a wide variety of literary genres, a range of reading difficulties, and subject matter that will appeal to male and female students.

Use a wide variety of literary genres

Think about it. If you are evaluating an individual title, on its own, you're likely, first, to skip it entirely if it is of a literary genre that doesn't normally appeal to you.

If it's part of a complete curriculum, however, while you may first look askance at it, you will likely try it to see if, just maybe, it holds more value than you would normally expect.

Based on what we hear every year, you may surprise yourself and find — as others have before you: "I have never read a [fantasy/science fiction/poetry/____] book before! I'm astonished at how lovely _____ is!"

Point: If you purchase a Core program from Sonlight, you and your children are likely to read more widely than if you choose all the books individually, on your own — because we've made those tough choices for you.

"I like that you schedule all these great books in a Core and I just order the whole thing. If I were ordering books individually (being somewhat frugal and second-guessing most purchases), I would have never thought to buy that many books. I would have wanted that many, but I would have "gotten by" with fewer. My kids' education is richer for doing it your way!"

--Leah in Texas, March 2005

Yes, you have our list here in the catalog. But if you are prone to purchase book-by-book, let's be honest: you will either leave those non-intuitive books alone or you will make the choice only after prolonged and agonizing mental struggle.

In truth, some customers are thrilled with absolutely every book we include. Very, very few find more than one or two that they don't love.

So why not save yourself the headache? Make one decision: "I'll buy the Core." — And give your kids a broader, fuller education.

Some books will challenge and others will soothe

Some customers we know feel that they should eliminate any Readers that don't push their children at every turn.

We've taken a different tack. On the one side, we say, education can't be all sunshine and cotton candy. Sometimes it requires real discipline and hard work.

On the other, after your students have slogged through a more difficult title, we think they should get a breather: an excellent title that will challenge or feed them emotionally, perhaps, but that they can breeze through at an easy clip.

Fact: You and your children will almost certainly enjoy most of the books you read in any one of our Core programs. However, in every Core program you'll find books with a range of reading difficulties.

We believe — based on comments we receive from customers just like you — that if you purchase a complete Core curriculum, you're more likely to help your child persevere through the more difficult times...because you will recognize the book as part of a whole, and you will recognize that the package as a whole was designed to provide a variety of experiences.

"My first year, I ordered the whole deal, the Core, the matching Language Arts and Science. We have done the same thing the last three years. I will never give up the convenience of having the schedule all laid out for me, the readings correlated and the assignments interrelated. Even my 11-year-old daughter said yesterday, "Mom, it must be hard to put together your own curriculum like Sonlight has done." No kidding! I did that before I tried Sonlight."

-- Laurie, February 2005

You get all the benefits of Core membership in the Sonlighters Club.

• 10% Discount on all your homeschool needs — including your qualifying Core purchase — for a full year. Ten percent off not just the relatively inexpensive paperback novels you can get from the big-box stores or online book merchants, but the expensive stuff you can't find there: your science, math and language arts texts, science supplies, art supplies . . . and more. All year long.
• Genuine Ancient Roman-Era Widow's Mite! A $49.95 value.
• FREE FedEx shipping to the lower 48 United States for 1 full year. That's free shipping on every order of any dollar amount — including your qualifying Core purchase.
• Two-year FREE access to the Sonlighters private online forums. — A $54.99 value! All the latest thinking and insights of the international, multi-thousand-strong Sonlight Curriculum community.

  You'll find kindred spirits who are ready to...

  • Help you homeschool your children efficiently and effectively... no matter what their learning styles, special needs or capabilities.
  • Maximize your ability to wring every benefit from your Sonlight curriculum.
  • Pray with you and offer counsel on how to interact winsomely with family & friends...even when life looks bleak.
  • Clue you in to breaking news at home and around the world that can affect your life.
  • Lend a hand with practical advice for just about every trial you face... domestically... on the job...in a relationship...anywhere.
  • And lots more!
• Two-year FREE subscription to the A Beam of Sonlight e-newsletter. — A $19.95 value! Specially edited biweekly collection of "the best of the best" from the Sonlight forums . . . plus additional special offers, announcements and inside scoops from Sonlight headquarters. . . . Yours — FREE for the asking as a member of the Sonlighters Club.
• Additional benefits reserved only for Core members of the Sonlighters Club.

You build eligibility toward the Sonlight Curriculum Scholarship Competition.

For the last ten years — from 2000 — Sonlight Curriculum has given $60,000 or more a year in college scholarships to students whose families have purchased and used at least three Sonlight Core programs. This year we awarded twelve Sonlight students scholarships for $82,000 over their four years in college. We will offer even more this year.

In 2009 — for scholarships to be awarded beginning in autumn 2010 — we intend to grant $92,000 to thirteen deserving students whose families have purchased and used at least five Sonlight Core programs.

If you want your son or daughter to participate in the competition, now is the time to begin building eligibility.

"But I already own a bunch of the books in the Core program I'd want to buy..."

You may still want to consider purchasing the Core program. In order to make the decision, consider:

• What is the total value of the books you already own? Is their cost (at 10% discount) greater than the total discount you will lose on all — all! — the other items you will want to purchase in the coming year, including Math, Language Arts, and so forth? If not, why worry? Even if their value is greater...
• Ask yourself: Will the duplicate books make good birthday presents? At our house, we often used our duplicate homeschool books as wonderful gifts for the children whose birthday parties our kids were invited to attend. — Now you will know not only that your children are giving the very best quality gifts, but you won't have to worry about making a last-minute dash to the store in order to find "something" to give the friends!

"People often say, "You get what you pay for."

That may be true with other curricula, but with Sonlight you get way MORE than what you pay for. Not only do you get a rich literature-based curriculum, you get well-rounded children. Not only do your children get a good education, they get a love for learning. Not only do you get carefully and well-planned Instructor's Guides that are quite robust in content, you get extra time with your children that otherwise would have been spent planning.

When the Sonlight box comes in the mail, the mailman often comments about how heavy it is. I tell him that's because there is a treasure chest in it! Sonlight is worth its weight in gold (and books are heavy)!!!"

--Charity, April 2005