Layers of Learning Curriculum Guide
Layers of Learning is a family-style, hands-on, pick-and-choose curriculum.
Family Style
Designed so all ages, six years to eighteen years, can learn together.
Hands-on
Projects, crafts, paper crafts, and experiments teach concepts instead of boring paragraphs.
Pick-and-Choose
Mentors decide which books to read, which activities to do, and which concepts to teach.
Jump to: Worldview • How a Unit Works • Scheduling • Subjects & 4-Year Cycle • Formats & Pricing • Reviews
Our Approach & Worldview
The Layers of Learning Slant
Neutral by Design. Guided by You.
Layers of Learning is neither a Christian nor a secular curriculum. From day one, we have believed it is the role of parents—not curriculum writers—to teach values, faith, and worldview. We present the facts and spark thoughtful questions, leaving you free to guide the conversation at your kitchen table.
Because of this balanced approach, our books are approved for charter and public school funds as well as faith-based and independent homeschools
Layers of Learning Educational Philosophy
We’re Karen and Michelle—sisters who have been homeschooling our own kids since the early 2000s. Between our eleven children, we’ve taught bookworms, hands-on builders, reluctant mathematicians, and struggling readers. We’ve survived the tough days and cherished the cozy afternoons on the couch, and we started writing Layers of Learning in 2008 because we wanted a curriculum that made real-life homeschooling easier and richer.
Every book we write is shaped by decades of kitchen-table experience, feedback from thousands of homeschool moms, and a few simple truths:
- Kids learn best by doing. Combining great library books with hands-on projects, art, and experiments makes lessons stick.
- Family-style learning saves your sanity. Teaching all your kids together builds strong sibling bonds and cuts your prep work in half.
- You are the boss. We provide an organized, flexible framework—you choose the activities, the pace, and the values and faith you want to teach.
- Repetition builds mastery. Cycling through broad, rich subjects—including often-skipped gems like geography and art—gives kids a wide frame of reference for a fulfilling life, not just a test.
Ready to bring this approach to your kitchen table?
How a Unit Works
Every unit follows the same pattern. First, there is an introduction to the topic. Then you will see:
- Step 1: Library List
- Step 2: Explore
- Step 3: Show What You Know
Step 1: Library List
Skip expensive book packages and use the best resource you already have—your local library. Every unit includes a curated list of engaging, well-written books chosen to capture young readers' imaginations.
Can't find those exact titles on your library's shelves? No problem. We include a list of topic search terms at the start of every Library List so you can easily find great substitutes your library does have.
Step 2: Explore
This is the heart of every unit. You get a rich menu of hands-on activities, science experiments, art projects, and field trip ideas—all designed so your whole family can learn together.
Each Exploration combines reading, optional videos, and a memorable activity with a simple supply list and clear step-by-step instructions. You are never meant to do them all—just pick the ones that fit your week and save the rest for your next rotation.
Step 3: Show What You Know
Forget boring fill-in-the-blank tests. At the end of each unit, your kids show what they have learned through creative projects, presentations, narrations, reports, or quiz games.
Because every family customizes their learning, we don't hand you a rigid, one-size-fits-all exam. Instead, this section gives you plenty of engaging ways to wrap up the unit and see what stuck.
All Ages? Really?
Yes! Layers of Learning is designed for family-style, multi-age teaching around a single table. Activities use three colored smiley face ratings for quick reference:
Grades 1-4
6 to 9 years old
Grades 5-8
10 to 13 years old
Grades 9-12
14 to 18 years old
Most activities scale naturally to all levels. Here is an example from People & Planet: Maps & Globes:
☻☻☻EXPLORATION: Sphere to Flat
For this activity, you will need:
- Orange for each student
- Markers
- Book or video about map projections. You can find book recommendations in the Library List for this unit. You can find video recommendations in the YouTube playlist for this unit.
It’s not easy depicting a sphere on a flat surface. All flat maps of the earth are distorted for this reason.
- Draw your own imaginary continents on your orange globe with a marker.
- Peel an orange so the peel is in as few pieces as possible.
- Try to flatten the orange peel on a surface. How well does the sphere shape translate into a flat shape? How did flattening the orange distort your continents?
- Read a book or watch a video about map projections.
- Eat orange slices while you learn.
While younger kids grasp basic concepts (like a flat map showing a round Earth), older students explore deeper discussions on how projections distort reality and influence perception.
Teaching together saves prep time while fostering shared memories, sibling patience, and rich family discussions.
Scheduling Your Week & Year
Weekly Schedule
Layers of Learning bends to fit your family—never the other way around. Unlike rigid, scripted programs that dictate what you must do every single day, our pick-and-choose guides put you in the driver's seat.
You decide how much or how little to cover. Dive into history every day or tackle it once a week. Spend one hour at the table or three.
Not sure where to start? We recommend our simple Subject-a-Day routine.
Monday
HISTORY
Tuesday
GEOGRAPHY
Wednesday
SCIENCE
Thursday
ARTS
Friday
FLEX DAY
On Monday, pick one history exploration to do together. On Tuesday, tackle one geography exploration, and continue through the week with science on Wednesday and arts on Thursday. Leave Friday open for a short day, an elective, or catching up on another subject.
After following this rhythm for a month, you will have a great feel for the program and can easily adjust the schedule to fit your family.
Writer's Workshop fits in daily. Spend a few minutes teaching a quick mini-lesson, then choose a writing exercise from your unit. Once a month, kids pick one favorite piece to polish through the writing process and turn in as a finished project. Learn more about Writer's Workshop.
Daily
WRITING
Yearly Pacing
Each Layers of Learning unit is designed to last about one month. Because this is a pick-and-choose menu, you are never meant to finish every single activity in one pass. Instead, you will come back to the same unit four years later and explore brand-new projects at a deeper level.
With nine units per course, one full volume covers a complete 36-week school year, whether you follow a traditional September-to-May calendar or homeschool year-round.
Best of all, you set the pace. Take more time on topics your kids love or breeze through others. Layers of Learning was built for real homeschool families, not rigid classroom deadlines.
Subjects & the 4-Year Cycle
Layers of Learning offers courses in history, geography, science, arts, and language arts.
History
Explore human history chronologically from 3000 BC to the 2000s across four core courses: Ancient History, Middle Ages History, Colonial History, and Modern World History—plus a dedicated American History course from the colonists to today.
Geography
Explore the entire globe region by region alongside key concepts like landforms, cultures, government, and map skills across four courses: People & Planet, Mapping Our World, World Cultures, and People & Place—plus a dedicated U.S. States course.
Science
Build real scientific thinking through hands-on labs and experiments across the four main branches of science: Earth & Space, Biology, Chemistry, and Physics.
Arts
Discover famous artists and art history while creating with drawing, painting, sculpture, poetry, music, and folk art across four courses: Art Beginnings, Middle Ages Arts, Colonial Period Arts, and Modern Arts.
Language Arts
Nurture reluctant writers and challenge young wordsmiths with Writer’s Workshop—a single, whole-family writing program you reuse with all your kids year after year.
4-Year Rotation
Layers of Learning is built around a four-year cycle.
Layers of Learning follows a repeating four-year cycle. After finishing all four years, you circle back to Year One using the exact same books—only now your kids are four years older, diving into fresh projects, deeper books, and higher-level discussions. Families complete the full cycle three times from 1st through 12th grade, saving you hundreds of dollars in curriculum costs.
Your Writer's Workshop book stays on your shelf and gets used every single year alongside the cycle.
Explore the Courses in Each Year
Each year pairs five core books together so your history, geography, science, arts, and writing topics line up naturally.
Year One
Language Arts: Writer's Workshop
History: Ancient History
Geography: People & Planet
Science: Earth & Space
Arts: Art Beginnings
Year Two
Language Arts: Writer's Workshop
History: Middle Ages History
Geography: Mapping Our World
Science: Biology
Arts: Middle Ages Arts
Year Three
Language Arts: Writer's Workshop
History: Colonial History
Geography: World Cultures
Science: Chemistry
Arts: Colonial Period Arts
Year Four
Language Arts: Writer's Workshop
History: Modern World History
Geography: People & Place
Science: Physics
Arts: Modern Arts
If you are an American, you can swap out Modern World History for American History, or do a fifth year of history.
Likewise, you can swap U.S. States for any geography course.
If you are Canadian, you can swap out Modern World History for Canadian History & Geography, or do a fifth year of history.
Units at a Glance
To see all of the unit titles and some topics that are covered in each unit, get the Units at a Glance PDF.
What You Get & How It's Sold
Unit Book & Printables
Layers of Learning units all include a unit book for the mentor and a Printable Pack of student worksheets.
Unit Book
Designed for the mentor, the unit book is your all-in-one teaching guide. Inside you will find curated Library Lists, step-by-step hands-on activities (called Explorations), and helpful sidebars packed with background facts, famous people, writing prompts, and rabbit-trail ideas.
Printable Pack
Included free with every unit book, the Printable Pack is a ready-to-print PDF of maps, worksheets, templates, and games your students use to complete the Explorations. Simply print as many copies as you need for your whole family.
Peek Inside a Layers of Learning Book
Want to see how the lessons, sidebars, and printables look before you buy? Watch a quick video tour of Ancient History, or click through the interactive sample of Art Beginnings to explore the pages at your own pace.
How Is It Sold?
Layers of Learning can be purchased unit by unit. Each unit is a month of learning. There are nine units in a year-long course.
Or you can purchase an entire course at once, all nine units, in a single volume.
Single Unit
Want to test the waters or focus on one specific topic? You can buy individual units—like First Civilizations, the opening chapter of Ancient History—as standalone PDFs.
Each single unit covers roughly one month of learning (with plenty of extra projects to stretch even further) and includes its matching Printable Pack.
Full Course
Ready for a complete school year? Full courses—like Ancient History, which starts with First Civilizations—bundle all nine units into one cohesive volume at a discounted price.
Available in both durable paperback and instant-download PDF formats, a full course covers nine months of learning and includes the digital Printable Packs for every single unit.
Adapt the Curriculum To Your Family
Buying units one by one gives you complete freedom to mix and match topics that fit your family's interests.
Prefer a ready-made plan? Follow our suggested sequence—every unit is thoughtfully designed to coordinate across history, geography, science, and the arts when used in order.
Guidebooks for the Mentor
Want extra confidence before your first lesson? Every Layers of Learning subject includes a dedicated Mentor Guidebook packed with practical tips on scheduling, grading, and teaching across multiple ages.
Going far deeper than this overview, these quick-read guides show you how to get the most out of every unit. We highly recommend grabbing them before you start teaching.
Printing
Buying PDFs is budget-friendly and works great straight from a computer or tablet. If you prefer printed pages in hand, we recommend Little Hearth Printing Company—a small printing service run by homeschoolers, for homeschoolers.
Testimonials
What Our Customers Say
We have done Year 1 two rotations, now. The opportunity for learning is forever growing with your kids and this curriculum!! No matter how “deep” we dived into the information first time, there was still so much to learn the second time around.
-Holly
This curriculum has restored the JOY of teaching all of my children at one time. High school, middle school and elementary. In love ♥️😍
-Samantha
I have four kids in grades ranging from 1st-5th. We are almost finished with Year 1 and absolutely love it! Our last curriculum was open and go but it was so boring. I really appreciate that I can pick and choose activities that fit our family. There are so many choices to help our kids learn.
-Brianne
I have struggled to get my son interested in history. Someone suggested Layers of Learning and I brought it up to my husband. He didn’t want to spend money on yet another curriculum that wouldn’t work for our son. I decided to take a chance-signed up for the newsletter, received Unit 1, and printed it out. It was an immediate win with my son. Within a few days, even my husband realized that we had found the perfect fit for our homeschool.
-Kryste
I was using another curriculum for social science and my kids were getting bored and asking not to do it every day. I downloaded the sample of Unit 1-1 and started it last week and we are all loving it! The hands on activities and fun explorations are just what we needed to make learning fun again!
-Jodie
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The Authors
Layers of Learning was created by sisters Karen Loutzenhiser and Michelle Copher: lifelong learners, and longtime homeschool moms in North Idaho who have homeschooled eleven children between them.
Combining Michelle's biology degree and love of history with Karen's child development background and passion for arts and writing, they began writing Layers of Learning in 2008 to give families a flexible, hands-on way to learn together. Today, their curriculum helps thousands of homeschool families make learning joyful and memorable.