Here is some of my favorite music. Click the play arrow if you wish to listen!
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Hip Hip Hooray... It's Independence Day!
Jul. 3, 2009 • 9:05 AM
Hip Hip Hooray...It's Independence Day!
Here is a really FUN red, white, and blue drink we made last year! You might want to try it for your family or for your celebration of this important holiday.
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Putting FUN into lunch!
Jun. 26, 2009 • 9:59 AM
Here is a simple way to add some FUN to lunch!
My kids really liked these FUN FRANKS! I think they'd be good with melted cheese or spaghetti sauce but this first time they were plain.... and my kids still really enjoyed them!
Looking for something fun for lunch? Try this! All you need is hot dogs and spaghetti noodles.!
Just slice your hot dogs into chuncks. Then stick the dry spaghetti noodles through the hot dogs so that the noodles are on both sides of the hot dog piece.
All that's left to do is boil them in a large pot....
then just drain and serve!
Enjoy ... and Have fun!
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Encourage One Another
Jun. 11, 2009 • 8:15 PM
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Review: ARTistic Pursuits
May. 26, 2009 • 3:07 PM
ARTistic Pursuits: THE Curriculum for Creativity
ARTistic Pursuits is the curriculum for well-taught art methods, elements, and techniques. The book is very appealing to look at. The lessons include color and black & white sketches as well as pieces of artwork as examples that go along with what is being taught. It is also written in a way that is easy-to-read and interesting.
So... here is a very good instructional lesson book that is pleasantly appealing to the eye. Have I gotten your attention yet? Well, here is more about Artistic Pursuits….
This year, The Artistic Pursuits curriculum/family is celebrating their 10th year of serving home schoolers throughout the United States in the area of the fine arts. Artistic Pursuits has programs for Preschool thru High School.
At the K-3 grade level the parent simply reads a lesson once per week and then the child does a project. Older children can easily read and understand the lessons, working independently. This curriculum is in book form and written to the student, making it very easy to follow. The samples of artwork that are right on the page with the lesson help to complete the instruction by allowing the student to see exactly what the lesson is speaking about. It is convenient as it eliminates the need to go searching for pieces of art to view.
We received Grades 4-6 Book one: The elements of art and composition.
Here is a sample page from the book:
The lesson is Looking at Texture in art! You can see here how they show a piece of art then break it down into smaller sections to show the texture. Then as well, they show sketches to help show how to draw the textures.
Find out more about THIS book here!
We also received Junior High Book One: The Elements of Art and compostition.
Here is a sample page from this book:
Here is an example of Chinese art. The sketch draws the viewer into the piece.
Find out more about this book here!
This curriculum has made a wonderful impression on me. I think I will use ARTistic Pursuits with my children for the rest of my homeschooling years. There isn’t much more to say about the curriculum- it is just Outstanding...really super! It isn’t overdone like some programs where you get tired of reading. It is simple so you understand it. Artistic pursuits instructs the student well and has samples and sketches to show you as well as tell you what the lesson is about!
I highly recommend ARTistic pursuits.
ARTistic Pursuit offers books for all grade levels. Each one is $42.95.
If you think this is higher than some curriculums you purchase (especially for a secondary subject), let me tell you that I feel it is well worth it. (The book does have full-color pieces of art within the text.)
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Review: Tapestry of Grace
May. 19, 2009 • 9:05 AM
Tapestry of Grace is an award-winning homeschool curriculum put out by Lampstand Press.
This unit-study style curriculum uses the history of the world to guide your whole family through an amazing humanities education
TOG (Tapestry Of Grace) was created by Marcia Somerville, a homeschooling mom of many children, as an attempt to get all of her kids on the same page using one curriculum, despite their age/grade differences. Her desire to unify their studies has blessed not only her own family but also the lives of many homeschooling families through her development of the Tapestry of Grace curriculum.
TOG is divided into 4 separate year plans, that each cover a different period of world history. The lessons cover a broad spectrum of school subjects not just history. TOG is a very thorough curriculum that covers the following subjects: history and church history, geography, literature, philosophy, writing and composition. The program does not include a phonics program (or any type of reading and language arts instruction,) math or foreign language.
The curriculum plan contains “teacher’s notes” that are very helpful and include weekly summary of what your students will be learning. This curriculum is mainly literature based. You will use many literature books that are suggested in the unit, each book list being broken down into learning levels. The teacher chooses from the books listed and acquires the titles from a library, book store, or possibly off your own bookshelves. Various worksheets are provided including a lot of discussion questions, hand-on activities, writing assignments and other worksheets to go along with what is recommended to read.
The Lampstand Press website has a great page on their site called The Loom. This page provides many wonderful resources to go with your TOG unit. The supporting links section has many wonderful ideas and resources to continue your study even more.
We received the digital version of Unit 1 and Unit 2. It is great having it on the computer but I think I personally “get” things better when they are hands-on. It is a savings though to purchase the curriculum’s digital version over the printed book format.
The curriculum itself is very well done. There are a lot of great bonuses online. I printed out most of the reading material and placed it in a binder. Then we had printed materials and online resources. I recommend this wonderful well-rounded and very interesting curriculum.
Do you want to explore more about Tapestry of Grace? Start at their website Here! I know you will find a wonderful curriculum, maybe it will be the right fit for your family!
You can check out more Tapestry of Grace reviews over at the TOS Homeschool Crew page, too!
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Apologia Science!!
May. 15, 2009 • 9:06 PM
Are you looking for a wonderful Christ-centered Science curriculum? If you haven’t already tried Apologia, you may want to give it a try! My review is following but (as you’ll read) I truly think this is one of the BEST Science curriculums on the market right now!
“Apologia provides fun and challenging K-12 creation-based science curriculum specifically designed for the home school.” This Science curriculum is such a breath of fresh air to me as a Christian homeschooling mother that isn’t too “into” Science. I do however LOVE the world that God has created and I am thankful to have found a curriculum that teaches from this same perspective. Apologia products are written by a former university professor and homeschool parent. Each book provides college-preparatory science in a way that is both clear and challenging. The texts are readable, easy to understand. When I started reading, I was really impressed at how it really drew us in and kept our attention. The curriculum also has many engaging experiments that can be performed at home with simple materials. I like too that there are photo, graphs, and drawings included all throughout the books.
Apologia publishes a full-range of science texts for the Christian homeschool. They began with high school science texts which have been very popular with homeschoolers for many years. More recently, Apologia began publishing elementary texts. Currently, the elementary science series includes five titles: Astronomy, Botany, Flying Creatures, Swimming Creatures, and Land Creatures.
In each unit, they have included notebook assignments, experiments and other projects. In the experiments, the scientific method is emphasized including discussions of variables, controls, hypotheses, data collection, and drawing conclusions.
Here is a free sample! It is Module one from Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day! The lesson of called “What is Zoology?” Read it and see how interesting this curriculum is!
Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day
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What is Zoology?
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What Makes a Bird a Bird?
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Birds of a Feather
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Flying Factuals
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Nesting
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Matching and Hatching
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Bats
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Flying Reptiles
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A First Look at Insects
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Insect Life Cycles and Life Styles
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Social Insects
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Beetles, Flies, and True Bugs
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Interesting Insects
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Order Lepidoptera
In this Zoology book you will examine the dynamics of flight and animal classifications. You will learn how to attract birds to your yard and how to identify them. You will also learn bird anatomy and God’s glorious design that enables birds to do remarkable things. After becoming amateur ornithologists, you will explore the world of chiropterology, which is the study of bats. This book is for K-6th grades and costs $35.
We also received Teaching Creation with General Science:
The General Science book covers topics such as the scientific method, designing experiments, simple machines, geology, human anatomy and so much more. This book is for 7th grade and up and costs $85 which includes the student textbook and the solutions and test manual. (You can purchase them separately).
Here is a sample from this book, too!! It is Module one entitled A Brief History of Science!
Apologia also has a FREE help line to answer any questions or problems you may encounter. Their toll-free office number is 1-888.524.4724. They also have a money-back guarantee if you are not completely satisfied. I know I am completely satisfied with this wonderful curriculum. I am truly looking forward to doing all of Teaching Creation with General Science next year! We plan to do a human body lapbook with it! (Can’t wait! Can’t wait!) I will probably always use Apologia now for our Science!
Check out more reviews for Apologia products at the TOS Homeschool Crew page!
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Tot School: new activities
May. 8, 2009 • 9:24 PM
We had some fun new activities with TOT School recently!
This was a fun project I got from my blogging friend Angels of Heart!
This activity is simply to count the number of chicks on the given card and then place that many chicks with the card. I helped her with this and she counted with me. She should be able to do this one on her own next Spring.
We did a color match activity that is also great for fine motor skills. This wonderful idea came from the TOTally Tots site. I love this colored paper clips idea. We keep it in a ziplock bag and I often grab it for our Bible bag and the "littles" quietly work on it while sitting in the church pew.
She did a picture match-up using the My First Lotto game.
My toddler, "Precious" and her brother, "Peanut" each colored a new juice cup! Then used them for lunch. They thought they were neat. They were purchased at OrientalTrading.com.
They also had fun outside a day with a friend, while the older siblings worked on their Old Testament Lapbooks.
And... we did another new color-matching activity that is a favorite with my kids. Everytime I put it away (It is still in reach) they get it out again to do! This great idea came from Montessori Journey.
All the supplies were bought at the Dollar General Store for $1 each. (Total for everything together was $3) I might go back for more flower cubes to have more for the children to count out.
I thank all the wonderful blogs I mentioned for these great ideas! You'll find many more ideas for fun activities to do with toddlers when you check out the other TOT SCHOOL particiapants!
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Homeschool Share's Blast!
May. 8, 2009 • 8:17 AM
There is a really great contest going on over at my favorite website: Homeschool Share! Check it out!
If you like to lapbook and enjoy creating your own school units, you might want to sign up to create a unit for them! The prizes are so wonderful! I am really excited to see all the new projects that will get created and shared on Homeschool Share, too! What a Blast that will be!
Find out all the details here at Homeschool Share's Contest page!
The contest ends June 20th! So don't delay!
If you've never seen all the wonderful resources over at Homeschool Share.com, you really must check it out now! You will be thrilled to have found such a wonderful resource for free educational and FUN projects that are also FREE!
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Homeschool in the Woods
May. 8, 2009 • 6:55 AM
As part of the TOS Homeschool Crew, I received the New Testament Activity-Pak from Homeschool in the Woods. I was thrilled about this because my children were already making their Old Testament Lapbooks with the activity-pak we previously purchased from Homeschool in the Woods.
The creator of Homeschool in the Woods products is Amy Pak, a homeschooling mom of four. She has great artistic and creative talent. These educational unit studies and lapbook kits not only become works of art but also excellent learning and teaching tools.
My family loves making lapbooks, myself included. I wish there would have been such a thing when I was in school. I would have made a lapbook for everything I studied (if allowed!)
Here is a wonderful quote from their website: "It is our heartfelt prayer that children develop a love of learning that will not end when they are finished with "school." We at Home School in the Woods have a passion for supporting the education of our children, specifically in understanding God's providence through history."
My older children were already working on the Old Testament Lapbook from Homeschool in the Woods when I heard we’d be getting the New Testament Activity Pack from Homeschool in the Woods! We are making these with another homeschooling family from our church, adding some Bible Study lessons as we go.
All of the activitiy paks that Amy Pak has created are so full of great detail. She really worked hard on the pieces included in each activitiy pak. The composition of the lapbook is also very creative with flaps, pockets and many great interactive pieces throughout. Here are some of the completed pieces from our OLD Testament activity pack that are ready to go into the lapbook!:
Like I said, I was fortunate to receive The New Testament Activity-Pak. This pack is designed for grades 3-8 to use independently but I think it appeals to all ages. ( I know I love it myself but I won’t reveal my age! 
)
Now that we have completed our Old Testament lapbook from Homeschool in The Woods' Old Testament Activity-Pak, we are anxious to begin with the New Testament one.
The New Testament Activity-Pak contains 15 mini-book projects to create and then put together into a finished lapbook. Once completed, the lapbook is so appealing, everyone will enjoy looking at it over and over again. It takes you through the history of the New Testament beginning with the Birth of Christ and ending with Paul’s Missionary journeys.
The following activities are included in the lapbook:
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Books of the New Testament,
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Prophecies fulfilled by Jesus
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Jesus' lineage
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The birth of Jesus
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The Beatitudes
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First 12 Disciples
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Parables of Jesus
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Miracles of Jesus
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The Last Supper
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Crucifixion, resurrection, ascension and Pentecost
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Christ's resurrection
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Fruit of the Spirit
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Paul's missionary journeys
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Paul's letters
In addition to the lapbook, The New Testament Activity-Pak contains directions to create “The New Testament News” and an “Armor of God” poster.
She includes clear directions on how to assemble the pieces with photos of the completed pieces which are very helpful.
This is an activity Pack created as a “go-along” project with your study of the Bible’s New Testament! The New Testament Activity-Pak New Testament Activity-Pak sells for $18.95 as a download product or $19.95 plus shipping on CD.
Homeschool in the Woods has many other great products as well. We have many of them and have loved each one we have used so far! We have done the Homeschool in the Woods Colonial study that is part of their Time Travelers series. We also plan to do the American Revolution one next school year. I am also really thinking about purchasing the Artists Activity-pak once we've completed those we already own. (The Civil War study looks great though too!) I can easily give Homeschool in the Woods 2 thumbs up! 
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Review : Spell Quizzer
Apr. 23, 2009 • 12:33 PM
Spell Quizzer is a fun learning tool to help your student with their spelling practice. The program is designed for Windows, and it downloads right to your computer. It is basic and is very easy to use.
Dan Hite created this software to help children learn their spelling words in a fun and easy way.
It’s a simple program yet good.
It is very easy to create your spelling list(s). Just type in a word and then record the sentence or phrase that you want your child to hear. Click to add that word to the list and continue this process until you have all the desired words for that list entered. If you don't want to make up your own spelling lists, the SpellQuizzer site is in the process of adding downloadable spelling lists that can be imported into the program.
Then you type in a sentence to be given your sentence with that spelling word or use a microphone and record the sentence.
The software is then used by the child to practice their spelling. It corrects the student each time a word is misspelled with an amusing prompt showing them the correct spelling. When the student finishes the list it offers to re-quiz them on the words they missed.
SpellQuizzer is $29.95. A free 30 day trial is available at SpellQuizzer.com. Visit the website for more information!
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TOT School: Easter Week
Apr. 16, 2009 • 11:15 AM
This week, we read these stories...
We also read this great Book entitled "Benjamin's Box." It tells the story of the Resurrection eggs. We've done the Resurrection eggs every year since we've had them but it was especially nice with this book to go with it.
We had a LOT of fun painting eggs. They wanted more and more to paint so I boiled all the eggs I had except for the 3 set aside for my son's birthday cake!
Precious really did a great job painting her eggs!
Here she is helping me make that birthday cake I mentioned. Besides being the week of Easter, it was also my oldest son's birthday! Precious loves to add ingredients, stir and of course, lick the beaters.
For my son's birthday we went bowling...
"Precious" really enjoyed her first time bowling...
She did a great job, too!
Then we also had an Easter egg hunt with cousins at our family Easter celebration.
They're off....
If you'd like to see other TOT SCHOOL participants, click here!
Have a great week!
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Happy Resurrestion Day!
Apr. 10, 2009 • 8:22 AM
Happy Easter!
Happy Resurrection Day!
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Review: Bonnie Terry Learning
Apr. 9, 2009 • 11:16 AM
Fact: Up to 87% of students do NOT learn from hearing alone. Most of us homeschooling moms know this and that is why we teach our child to their learning styles.
Bonnie Terry also knows this fact and has produced products to help students practice their reading and study skills.
Bonnie Terry is an Educational Therapist who specializes in learning disabilities. Bonnie has over 30 years of experience working with students. Her products were created to help ALL students improve their reading fluency as well as retain what they read.
I received two of her products through the TOS Homeschool Crew. I got Five Minutes to Better Reading Skills and Ten Minutes to Better Study Skills! Whoo-Hoo! This sounds great to me and five or ten minutes a day is something that won’t even uproot our already busy schedule.
Five Minutes to Better Reading Skills
Five Minutes to Better Reading Skills turns your child or students into confident readers in five minutes a day with these 45 phonic reading drills. Perfect for anyone with short attention spans; spend only five minutes a day in individual or group lessons leading your child or student to success. This reading approach has proven to be very effective for all ages. The approach improves reading through visual and auditory learning.
This is a set of two spiral-bound books. The teacher's manual includes some record-keeping forms and the instructions. The student text contains forty-five drills of words. The drills increase in difficulty as you progress through the book.
The worksheets can be photocopied and used with many students at many different times.
Ten Minutes to Better Study Skills
Practical 10-minute exercises, students will soon be on their way to higher test scores, improved writing skills and more! Spiral-bound workbook features reproducible activities and tips to help students organize information, take notes, make comparisons and write essays. Includes reproducible planning calendars, test taking tips, research paper organizers and more! It contains 58 pages within four sections. This product, geared toward 3rd through 12th grades. The Price is $37.00.
According to Webster’s New World dictionary, study means “the act or process of applying the mind so as to acquire knowledge or understanding, as by reading, investigating, etc.”.
This workbook will help our students to apply the mind in this manner to acquire the needed knowledge and understanding. By using Ten Minutes to Better Study Skills with our children we will help them improve their writing, note taking and study skills.
She has a weekly and monthly planning calendar. Story and Book Organizers, Book Report Forms, Cause & Effect, 5 Ws, Compare & Contrast, Formal Outline, Letter Writing, Spelling Patterns, Many Tips and grammar Rules as well.… and most pages also have a duplicate page that has been filled out for an example of how to use the form!
I am planning to print the last few pages: Punctuation Rules, Helping/ Being Verbs, Definitions, and Types of sentences and use them for my older three students to make a grammar mini-office (lapbook) over the summer. This will be very useful when we start back into our lessons then again next school year.
Bonnie Terry Learning has many other educational products you may wish to look further into. If so, check out the website here!
You can also read more reviews from other TOS Homeschool Crew Members Here!
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Wordless Wednesday: Shopping Cart Nap
Apr. 9, 2009 • 8:04 AM
Wordless Wednesday: Shopping Cart Nap
Hardware stores ARE pretty boring!
Visit Tiany's Wordless Wednesday Blog Here: http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/Tiany
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Review: Math Tutor DVD series
Apr. 6, 2009 • 3:56 PM
Learning by watching a presentation on DVD sounds pretty good to a busy homeschooling mom especially in the area of higher Math (for this HS mom, at least.) So receiving a product from Math Tutor’s line of educational DVDs was something I was glad to be able to review.
One of the DVDs that we received is called The Basic Math Word Problem Tutor. It is an 8 hour course! WOW! 8 hours is a great value for it's sale price of $26.99.
The following topics are part of this educational DVD:
Disc 1
Section 1: Adding Whole Numbers
Section 2: Subtracting Whole Numbers
Section 3: Multiplying Whole Numbers
Section 4: Dividing Whole Numbers
Section 5: Adding Decimals
Section 6: Subtracting Decimals
Section 7: Multiplying Decimals
Section 8: Dividing Decimals
Disc 2
Section 9: Adding Fractions
Section 10: Subtracting Fractions
Section 11: Multiplying Fractions
Section 12: Dividing Fractions
Section 13: Percents, Part 1
Section 14: Percents, Part 2
Section 15: Ratio and Proportion
We also received the Algebra 2 Tutor DVD!This 2 DVD set is a 6 hour course of study.
Here is what is taught on these two DVDs:
Disk 1
Section 1: Graphing Equations
Section 2: The Slope Of A Line
Section 3: Writing Equations Of Lines
Section 4: Graphing Inequalities
Section 5: Solving Systems Of Equations By Graphing
Section 6: Solving Systems Of Equations By Substitution
Section 7: Solving Systems Of Equations By Addition
Disk 2
Section 8: Solving Systems Of Equations In Three Variables
Section 9: Simplifying Radical Expressions.
Section 10: Add/Subtract Radical Expressions.
Section 11: Multiply/Divide Radical Expressions.
Section 12: Solving Equations With Radicals.
Section 13: Fractional Exponents.
Section 14: Solving Polynomial Equations.
Section 15: The Quadratic Formula.
You can also purchase a companion CD that has the worksheets that you can print for your student. This way they can work through the problems. This CD contains the set of worksheets for every section of the "Algebra 2 Tutor" DVD It allows your student to gain practice and test their mastery of the material by working problems not found on the DVD. Every problem has a step-by-step written solution. This CD contains 320+ pages of problems and solutions in the worksheets. This sells for $24.99.
The Website has a great overview:
"All of the topics are taught entirely through example problems.
- No boring lectures to bog you down.
- Immediately helps you with homework and exam taking skills.
- All courses are many hours long giving you value for your money.
- Courses are inexpensive yielding an average cost of only $3/hour!
- All sections feature a wide range of problem complexity.
- Thousands of students have benefited from our Math Help on DVD"
The DVD lessons are very basic- no fancy graphics, etc. but that could be distracting. A male teacher stands in front of a white board and works through Math problems while explaining each step to solve the problem(s).
Click on over here to see a sample lesson! It will give you a great idea what the lessons on the DVDs are like!
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Muffin Tin Monday: Spring
Apr. 6, 2009 • 2:06 PM
This week's Muffin Tin Monday theme is: SPRING/Easter
I didn't plan this so we went with the Spring theme. I realized right before lunch that it was Monday and thought I'd check out the Muffin Tin Monday site to see the theme.
The Easter theme would have been great but I need to plan on it. A cross-shaped sandwich, a licorce crown of thorns, something round (popcorn ball or something to represent the stone that was rolled away) and white pudding with Cool-Whip on top to represent Heaven since our Savior rose again and sits in Heaven! It would have been a great theme but needed some planning!
I am so thankful that Jesus paid this debt and He offers us the gift of salvation and eternal life in Heaven if we accept His gift! I have accepted, have you? ( I hope so!)
Here is our SPRINGTIME Muffin Tin Meal:
Our lunch consisted of scrambled eggs, carrot sticks, an apple, yogurt topped with Springtime sprinkles, a Berry Punch juice pouch, and Robin Eggs (cansy) for dessert. The orange beside the tin is something i tried to do with their utensils. It is an orange paper napkin with the utensils inside and tied to look (somewhat) like a carrot, tied at the top with a green pipe cleaner. It didn't turn out as great as I had imagined but the kids liked them!
If you'd like to see other Muffin Tin Monday participants or are considering joining in on the FUN, check out this post at Her Cup Overfloweth, the host of Muffin Tin Mondays!
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Tot School!
Apr. 6, 2009 • 11:09 AM
I used to be a regular TOT School Post-er but have not been able to post much recently. We have continued to do Tot School activities but I didn't have the time to post them 
I am trying to get back into the swing of it though and get it back into my regular blogging schedule. There are many more of you TOT School attendees now and I look forward to getting to know all of you better as we educate our young ones and share our lessons and learning with each other! Thanks to Carisa, as always for starting this great meme and keeping it going. She also started a wonderful new site called TOT-ally Tots. You should check it out when you have some free time!
Now... to our TOT Schooling...
My older children are working together with another homeschooling family we are friends with to make the HS in the Woods Old Testament Lapbook. While they do this, the younger crowd also has school-time activities they work on together.
Here is Precious adding animal stickers to her Noah's Ark paper.
Another time they made The 10 Commandments Books. These are very cute with 10 pages to color. Each page tells them one of the commandments. I purchased these at Oriental Trading!
Here she is working on one of the coloring pages for inside her Book of the 10 Commandments!
After they completed their booklets, they got to play with play dough. That is always FUN!
Almost every week consists of doing puzzles at some point:
This week, we also did some construction with our wooden blocks!
One of Precious' older sisters collects erasers. She had them out so we turned it into a color sorting activitiy. After that, we also sorted Lego block pieces.
Here is a picture of a SPECIAL UN-planned moment. My oldest read a tiny Golden Book to Precious. She sat right down on her nap and listened happily to the story.
We had a new activitiy this past week as we went roller skating with our church. It was a fun family activity. It was Precious' first time on roller skates and she did a great job. (Truth be told, she did better than her mom! 
)
Check out the other TOT School participants HERE!
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Love is Not a fight but it's something worth fighting for!
Apr. 4, 2009 • 6:02 PM
Have you seen the movie Fireproof yet? If not, I really recommend that you get this movie to watch soon. It is such a wonderful movie full of important messages!
Besides being a great story, it is filled with wonderful songs! Here is one of those songs that I really like and was singing all day.
We recently had a Sweetheart Banquet at our church. A sweet young couple that is very musically gifted played and sang this song too.
I hope you enjoy it. Listen to the words!
Love is not a fight but it's something worth fighting for!
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Review: Generations of Virtue
Apr. 4, 2009 • 12:33 PM
It is an incredible responsibility (and privilege) to raise our children for the Lord! That is why it is so nice to find good Godly materials to help us parents teach and raise our children to have a testimony/life that brings honor to the Lord.
The company Generations of Virtue is a wonderful company that sells products to encourage our children to live Godly lives and seek the Lord in all that they do!
Generations of Virtue, is "a non-profit, volunteer-driven ministry that equips parents to empower their kids for purity in our world today".
Their mission is to work with parents, teens, churches, and homeschooling groups to equip today's generation for one of the most critical battles our culture faces--the battle for purity of heart, mind and body.
I received four books to review from Generations of Virtue.
Teknon and The Champion Warriors, written by Brent Sapp is written for boys aged 11-16; available for $13.99. Science fiction personally is not my favorite so I didn’t find it to be a favorite. If you are looking for Christian reading that is also in the Science fiction genre, check out this source! I think my son may enjoy this book in a year or two.
Beautifully Made, is a three-book set edited by founder of the ministry Julie Hiramine is written for girls aged 8-12 to share with their Moms. The Beautifully Made series is offered on the Generations of Virtue website for $18.99.
We read through the first book so far and it was a wonderful way to approach some harder-to-talk-about topics in a positive Christian way. Our time together over the book started great and open conversations.
All three of the books contain about 40 pages of text that are presented pleasantly. There are small graphics on each page and Bible verses that stand out from being in decorative text boxes. The author works scripture and Biblical connections into her explanations of the biology and emotions of womanhood.
Book 1 is called Approaching Womanhood
Book 2 is Celebrating Womanhood
Book 3 is Wisdom From A Woman- Mother’s Guide
These books came at just the right time as I was beginning this to discuss these important topics with my pre-teen daughters.
Thanks to Generations of Virtue for these great products and for providing good products that give a positive and Godly message!
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Two A a activities
Apr. 4, 2009 • 9:27 AM
Here are two other fun activities we did with the Letter A a.
First is a great fine moter skills activitiy: Apple Picking
The Apple Picking sheet came from a great site called KidsSoup. It is a subscription site but it is filled with great toddler activities and projects.
You could make your own version of this very simply though. The page has red circle outlines on it and the children simply place red (green or yellow) pompoms, representing apples onto the circles. Sometimes we do this activitiy simply with fingers other times we use tongues or tweezers.
The other fun activitiy we made was a craft of an ant eater with a movable tongue.
The idea came from a Kathy Ross book we had checked out of the library.
As you can see the pattern is simple. You could easily draw up a pattern from looking at my photo or even trace it off the screen and enlarge it. It is cut from brown bag paper. Cut from a double layer of paper for a front and back piece.
It stapled around the head and belly leaving a large opening near the top. Then take a red pipe cleaner, approximately 12 inches long. Place the pipe cleaner into the long end of a flexible neck plastic straw. Bend the smaller end up. This goes into the ant eater with the red tongue come out throw the small mouth hole.
You can also place a velcro dot on the end of the tongue (which we did after the picture was taken). Then cut black felt scraps into little "ants" and the children can move the ant eater's tongue and try eating up the ants! My toddlers thought this was a lot of fun!
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