Boundary Stone-Economics Online Course Bundle Review

 

Disclaimer: I received a FREE copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way.

 

It’s been a long time since I have taken an Economics course and the last several weeks I have been using the Economics Online Course Bundle from Boundary Stone. This curriculum is unique and approaches the topic from a different perspective that will weave you through the historical economics in our history. You will not be looking at economics through the lenses of math but though ideas. Your jaw may drop open trying to grasp an economic course without math but, hang on as history and government policy has a huge impact on economics as you are building the foundation of economics.

I received 12 months of access to the online course. A textbook Basic Economics A Natural Law Approach to Economics also part of the bundle.  A PDF Teacher Guide, Grading Sheet in both Excel and a PDF format is available. Budget Mini Course access is included.

You will also need The Law by Fredric Basiat (which can be bought or downloaded free as a PDF), and Whatever Happened to Penny Candy by Richard Maybury.

The course is a full semester course using it 5 days a week. This comes from a Biblical Worldview of economics.

Teacher Guide

The Teacher Guide comes as a PDF 128 pages. It has a summary of the complete course. An 18 week Lesson Plan that has all components of the program laid out. An answer key to the questions by Chapters in the textbook.

Basic Economics A Natural Law Approach to Economics Textbook

The textbook has two authors the late historian Dr. Carson and an economist Dr. Cleveland. The textbook covers three main sections: The Frameworks of Economics, The Production and Distribution of Goods, and the Politico Economic Systems.

Each lesson you will have assignments out of the textbook which will help prepare you for your quizzes and test. Several of the quizzes are based off of the questions in the textbook like the “Getting the Point” questions. You can write your answers out on paper. I really like the Study Guide at the end of each chapter like a Chapter Summary, point of emphasis, identification, review questions, activities, and further studies. The book flows nicely and is overall an easy read for an economics course. I really like the historical approach to the course.

 You have vocabulary throughout, quotes, highlighted points, and so much more.

 Online Course

 The course is broken down by 4 Units and within each unit you have Modules.  The videos are engaging and several resources are used with the videos like artcles. The videos have Dr. Cleveland and other individual YouTube videos throughout. The course goes over everything from inflation, government and money, national debt, Socialism, morality in government, property, living on credit, mercantilism, economic impact, and so much more.

 The course has a nice orientation and is great resource in this course as it takes you through every aspect of the course from how to navigate the online courses, explaining in detail each aspect of it.

On the left side of the screen you have the dashboard which will show you all the lessons. It’s very easy to navigate the course online with the drop down menu feature.

 A schedule is provided for 18 weeks. It provides a schedule for the textbook and the online course, along with projects, and quizzes and test. 

A built in review to prepare you for quizzes and test from flashcards, fill in the blank by dragging words to the appropriate sentence, and other methods

A schedule can be followed online too.

 You cannot advance in the course if you don’t complete it in the attended order. Once you have watched all the videos and taken the quiz, read through the reading material in the textbook and any extra articles in the module you will click on the green Mark Complete Button.

A grading spread sheet is available as a PDF in which you will have to calculate the grades or a spread sheet that will calculate the grades. You will have to determine grades for everything other than the quiz and test for your student. This resource is located online.

There are four types of quizzes and test:

Diagnostic Quizzes-This is at the beginning of each quarter and consists of 10 questions and you are allotted for 30 minute time limit. This particular quiz can only be taken once. This is more of a self check up and will not be reflected on your grade.

Topic Quiz- five questions that are reflected on a single video, chapter or a paper assignment. You have 20 minutes to take it. You can retake this one as many times as needed. Each time the quiz will generate a set of 5 new questions. However I noticed that the questions do come back around again. You just need to remember to mark complete when you are satisfied with your final grade.

Module Comprehensive Quizzes- this quiz only allows you to take it once.  The questions are based off the modules.

Unit Test-The Unit Test will be based off of either one or two Units. You have an hour time frame to complete the test. You have only one chance to take this and will need to study before you take it. When you are done you can see your questions and the answers afterwards.

You can set up a separate parent account to track grades and to look at the material without interfering with the student’s lesson order. You will need to contact them to set up

How Did I Use Boundary Stone-Economics Online Course Bundle In My Homeschool?

For this review I was the primary user. Setting up my account was very easy. It didn't take me long to look over the book and the online component before I jumped into my studies quickly after going through the orientation.

I didn’t follow the schedule as I needed it to fit into my current schedule. I used this around 3 days a week. I started at week one using the Lesson Plan and worked my way through it. Some weeks I found that I did more than a planned weeks lessons. Other weeks I felt like I didn’t accomplish much. I usually combined several lessons together with reading and the online format. I almost felt like I was back in college cramming for an exam! 

This has been an interesting course for me. Like I mentioned I enjoyed the historical approach to the course and it made it not as dry. There were a few things I didn't always agree with but overall a lot of it I did and I thought the course was good. 

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Other members of the Homeschool Review Crew have been using Boundary Stone-Economics Online Course Bundle too. Click on the graphic below to see what they think.