Nov. 20, 2009 - Gymathics

Today we did a workout with Gymathics by Exploramania.  It’s the next product up for review with the Old Schoohouse Crew.  The creator of  Gymathics states, “I wanted to create products that synthesize education and a healthy lifestyle, beginning with my passion for math education.”  I would describe it as a cross between a kids workout class and a math concept introduction.

The DVD is about 30 minutes of exercise set to some background music with graphics put up on screen showing various math concepts.  They concepts are things like skip counting, prime number, types of triangles and patterns.  It’s recommended for grades 2-5 for the math concepts and the exercise for kids of all ages.  There is a clip on their site so you can get an idea of the format.   For my own kids I could only get my 4^th grader to try it out.  My older kids gave me looks like, “You’ve got to be kidding.”    

One of the teaching concepts Gymathics is taking advantage of  is multi-sensory learning.  I know from my own research in teaching language arts to younger children that motion is simply more then keeping the kids busy, it’s actually been proven to help make brain connections.  Their web site has a page devoted to the research behind this philosophy.  The basic idea is that kids will retain the knowledge better the more senses they involve to learn it.

Lexie liked it okay but I don’t know if it’s something she’d do more then a few times.  I think younger kids may want to do it over and over more readily.  It sells for $24.99 so I know for our family I would want it to be something we’re going to watch more then once or twice.  My daughter already participates in a fit kids class so the exercise part may not be as novel to her.  The math concepts she didn’t already know she wouldn’t fully get from doing this once or twice but if you had a child who watched it repetitively I think they could gain familiarity if not mastery of some of the concepts.

It’s a great idea especially to get kids active and moving! 

One thing I do just have to note is that in one scene the main instructors t-shirt appears a bit too tight (or the room was too cold) which would be bothersome if my teenage boys had been watching.  They have been trained to look away if something like that appears.  I’m sure it was not intentional and my daughter did not notice but it was obvious to me and just want to mention it as it might be offensive to some families.

*The DVD Gymathics was provided to me free from Exploramania for the sole purpose of my honest opionions in the review.

Nov. 18, 2009 - Avko Membership site

We were given a free membership to the Avko site as part of the Old Schoolhouse crew in exchange for our review on the information there.  I have to say I was initially overwhemelmed by the amount of information that I found and quite unsure where to start!

For starters there are five e-books on various spelling and reading issues, along with one on teaching a dyslexic student.  These are not small e-books, but rather lengthy and in depth pieces of work.  For instance the one I downloaded on word families is almost 1500 pages!  It lists words by their patterns (like CVC, homophones or prefix) as well as Greek and Latin roots and so much more.  I don’t even think I can explain everything that’s in it!  It would be useful if you were devising your own spelling lists and wanting to take them from  those groupings.  The first pages of this large e-book goes through their method and philosophy of learning spelling to give you some ideas.

The book on teaching dyslexic students would also be helpful if you are thinking you may have a child who is struggling and either is or may be dyslexic.  I might mention also that there is  an audio file on, “I Think My Child Might be dyslexic, Does it Matter?”

Besides the e-books and audio’s of various convention workshops there are a variety of other stories and articles.  Some seem to be humorous, inspirational, information and some even a little goofy (like one titled, “TOP 8 MORONS.”) 

Some of the information on the site could be useful for any homeschool family but I think it would be especially useful for those using their Sequential Spelling program.  I have never used it and much of the site refers to it or is extra evaluations or worksheets to go with it.

If you’re looking for lots of information on spelling and somewhat on reading this might be for you.  For myself personally having not used their program much of the information was not particularly useful to me.  If my children were younger and I was still trying to figure out the spelling/reading thing the reading might have pertained to me more, or if I had a child struggling in that area.

The membership is $25 per year and their site lists ALL the many resources available there.

Nov. 7, 2009 - American Heritage Education

This curriculum I received on a disk free from American Heritage Education to review for the Old Schoolhouse Crew.  It comes in three levels; elementary, middle school and high school and is subtitled , “An Adventure in Liberty”, which it truly is.  Each level is about 160-180 pages in length.

The content is organized both by theme and date.  Some of theme’s are things like freedom, unity, progress and responsibility.  The dates range from 1776 to 2000.  Topics include many of the things you think of when you study liberty and American; things like the Bill of rights, the flag, the star spangled banner, declaration of independence and more.

Each unit contains a variety of items.  First it contains text teaching the subject matter then it contains discussion questions, activity and game suggestions, definitions and more.  It varies depending on the lesson.  For instance one of the activities is to learn the preamble in sign language!

As a homeschoolers we are used to adapting things made for the classroom for home use, this one will be no exception.  Some of the activities would be difficult to adapt but most could be modified with a little creativity.  This would also be a great resource for anyone who does history co-ops as well. 

Looking through the guide I had planned on trying out a game called Monarchy at our last co-op meeting but we ended up rescheduling due to illness so we’ll have to try it out next week.  In the game each student gets assigned a role like King, Queen, Noblemen, Merchant, Peasant etc…  They get pretend cash based on who they are.  As the simulation progresses things like taxes, colonization and war take place.  Money changes hands based on the event and at the end there is a suggestion of discussion and a worksheet to fill out about the role you played and how it felt.  This is in the middle school set but I think it could easily be used in a multi-age setting.

When we were in the medieval period I found something similar on-line and the kids loved it so I’m pretty sure this one will go over well too!

In our history co-op we are “almost” to 1776 so I plan on using a lot of this as supplemental material as we get into that era.  I do think most will find this a welcome addition to whatever they are already using though it could be used alone.

Nov. 6, 2009 - All American History II

I was so excited to get All American History II in the mail to review as part of the Old Schoolhouse Crew.   It’s a complete American history program that covers the Civil War through the 1990’s.  The curriculum contains 32 lessons that are easily adapted to a multi-age environment; I’d say K-12.  I probably would do something like this when your oldest is 5th or 6^th and adapt it for younger children.  The publisher states that it’s written at a Jr. High level but adaptable lower and higher.

One of the features that make this curriculum stand out in my opinion is the worksheets that go with each lesson.  They are really more like notebooking then workbooking.  By that I mean it’s not so much a fill in the blank guided answer as spaces to put down the important events, timelines, key figures etc… in your own words.  What I also like about these is that many have maps included right on them!  I get so tired of searching for maps or honestly we often leave them out and not so with this curriculum.  All American makes maps easy!

The sheets also tend to keep my kids busy as I read.  There are often photos of key figures and flags of countries to cut out and paste in.  Now I do have to say my daughters age 9 and 11 like this feature more than my boys ages 14 and 16.  The 16 year old tolerates it but I pretty much have to make the 14 year old do it.  I’m not sure if it’s an age or gender issue but I think its great reinforcement so we did/do it.

I’m not sure that a short review can really do this curriculum justice as it’s quite comprehensive!  You really do want to get the student activity book, reader and teachers guide.  The teachers guide has all your answer keys as well as suggested additional reading by age level and other recommend added activities by ages.  The student activity book has all the notepages, maps, key figure pictures and reproducibles.

There are special pages and suggestions if you want to do a Native American notebook, war battle pages (civil, WWI etc...), and president pages.

Please ask questions if there is anything I haven’t answered about this curriculum.  You may want to bookmark the blog as well as we’ll be using All American for much of our history after the 1^st of the year and I’ m sure I’ll have blogs to write as we go along!

Can I think of any negatives?  This is tough!  I really have a hard time coming up with any.  For some it may seem costly and though it is from a Christian perspective it’s not quite as apparent as for instance Mystery of History curriculum.  That’s not necessarily a negative but something some might want to know.

I highly encourage you to check this one out!  It’ available from Bright Ideas Press.   All three are $68 and they are also available priced individually.  On the website they also have sample pages so you can see for yourself.

Nov. 5, 2009 - Educaching

Did you ever go Letter boxing or heard of Geocaching?  Well this Educaching is using your GPS for educational purposes.  I'd never heard of this product that was up for review by the Old Schoolhouse Crew. 

We were sent free materials from Educaching in exchange for our reviews.   It’s a 128 pages guide which gives you lessons and instructions to use your GPS for education.

There are five sections to this manual; teacher education, lesson plans, field sheets, acquiring GPS and beyond the basics.  I spent quite a bit of time on the teacher education as this was a pretty new concept for me!

This section defines a lot of the lingo like geocaching, waypoints, educache and more.  “Basically” it boils down to using Longitude and Latitute coordinates to have students find hidden things and plot certain points. 

Once you figure out how that’s done which requires a little knowledge of your GPS (more on that farther down) you’re on your way to the lessons.

The lessons range from math, science, thought process and more.  Ideas are also given for modifying to fit your own needs.

Honestly we don’t have time for a lot of extra things beyond what we are already studying and some of lessons the kids would all need to have studied the same things so if I were to use this I’d be modifying and making my own lessons a lot.  We did find one on chemical and physical changes which we studied together last year so we decided to test that one.

You could take many of the ideas but exchange your science or history concepts but it would take more teacher preparation.  Some of activities like types of triangle, finding perimeter etc… would obviously be more suited to a group of same age rather then multi-age kids.  It would work very well in a class or co-op setting, even a co-op class specifically on Educaching would be a neat idea.

We did use the field sheet section to print the worksheet that went with the Chemical/Physical change lesson we chose.  It basically was a fill in the blank sheet to write in the coordinates and locations as you found them along with whether they where chemical or physical changes.

For the activity you place things (or I used slips of paper naming the item) that demonstrate a chemical or physical change in container (or I used zip locks.)  The book gives you the suggestions.  Things like a burnt match (chemical), rusty nail (chemical) or popped balloon (physical).  Then you go out with your GPS and find your place and write down the coordinates. 

Though this could be a very fun activity it obviously takes a lot of teacher prep time (without kids in tow) to complete. 

Well on to our experience…

My 9 year old daughter tried it out with me.  I first got all the coordinates and then I gave them to her to find.  This is where we started having a lot of problems.

Our GPS did not handle this very well.  Apparently our GPS only does street directions and won’t go “through the woods” so to speak.  By coaching her (since I knew where they were) we were able to do the exercise but it obviously wasn’t ideal and not nearly as fun as it could have been.

My recommendation is to definitely check out your GPS and know how it works.  In the manual they go over what to look for in a GPS but having ours already we obviously didn’t follow these guidelines.  We had problems with charging our GPS and keeping it off the charger for very long.  Prior to this we only used it in the car constantly (pretty much) plugged in, so battery life is an issue. 

I truly don’t know much about GPS systems but my husband though more expensive models would do the off road that ours wouldn’t.

With the frustration of our GPS aside I think this could be very useful for a homeschool family especially if you take part in co-op’s or classroom situations that could make use of it.  You would also need to consider if you have the teacher prep time.  One option could be to have one of your older children “plan” the event and do all the prep.

The price is very reasonable at $32 so if you've been wanting to check out this technology with your kids this might be your ticket!

Nov. 4, 2009 - ACT Advantage Discover program

For Old Schoolhouse Crew we received both printed material and access to online functions of the the Discover program from ACT Advantage.  Their site describes it as, “.... (a)career planning process (that) begins with a research-based assessment system that allows students to assess their interests, abilities and values—a critical step to building a career plan based on personal strengths.  Students can then explore multiple career paths using DISCOVER's up-to-date databases of occupations (including military), majors and colleges.”

 My daughter who is middle school helped me take a look at these materials though we plugged in some information for our high school boys too. 

We first received a lot of printed pdf material which actually looks like it’s free for download from their site here.  This appears to be how to use this in a classroom setting.  As typical for us at home it seems to me anyway that things for the “classroom” take much less time at home so we condensed and did some of the information from these pages orally.  We did some T/F type sheets about preconceived ideas about particular careers and used questions on worksheets to talk about ideas you’ve heard from your family and society about working.  These are obviously geared toward the typical classroom, secular environment but I just adapted as I went.

As we worked through the information (typically condensing and doing 5 or so of the “prepared”  lesson in one setting) we’d come to a point where there would be a worksheet I would print like a sheet to write out what job/chores she liked best least and why or thoughts about 1^st job she ever wanted to do and what she wants to do now.  Then it directs you to go online and check out a particular section related to what you just looked at.

Honestly, it was a bit confusing but I think we did get some good discussion and information from it.  We spent a lot of time on the paper information and I’d probably in hind site skip sooner to the information online.  Once she went online it was again a bit confusing at first but the career information was very good.  The paper parts would be a good place to spend some time if your child still needs some thinking about work, careers, values etc…  If they have some solid ideas you might benefit more from exploring specific careers online.

They use a “World-of-Work” map which confuses me a little.  It’s supposed to be a pie wedge graph that breaks up careers into segments and places the results of your interest inventory within the proper “pie”.  Maybe I’m not visual enough to appreciate this but we did better just using the selections in wording that they tell you were the highest areas.

The biggest plus to this program in my opinion is the career information.  When a particular field is recommended you then explore many choices within that area.  What I really liked is they give you extensive information about that particular career.  Often we’ve done career things that give you a list but then if you don’t know or just have vague ideas of what particular careers are you have to do further investigations.  With Discover all your choices and lengthy definitions of what those choices entail and require are just clicks away.

There was only one inventory to complete but the focus here I would say is more on investigating choices.  Once you chose a field/career it gives you majors, classes and even lengthy lists of schools that have what you want.  As you start investigating you can save your favorites to come back to later.

My boys have better ideas of what they want so we played a bit with this feature.  While they do have extensive information on Computer programming (one of my oldest son’s interests) we could not locate specifically computer “game” programming which is what he wants to specialize in.  So if you have a “specialty” it may not give everything you need but it does give a lot on the general major of computer programming.  It lists high school classes recommended for that particular field which pretty much correspond to other lists we have found. 

There are also a lot of screens and help on resume building, interviewing and job seeking as well. 

Would I go ahead and do it if I wasn’t reviewing?  Yes, I think I would if we needed some direction in that area.  Right now we seem to have been checking into a lot of career’s/majors and the kids are pretty confident of what their doing and the plan they have so at this time I wouldn’t but if you’ve got a Jr. High or High Schooler who needs some direction this may be worth checking out.   The cost is $19.95 for a three month access.  They also have a demo to view on their site.

*Free materials and trial of the site were provided me in exchange for my opinions.

Nov. 2, 2009 - ABC Teach

ABC Teach is a membership site that has a plethora of worksheets, tools, clip arts, forms and much more to use in your homeschool.  When my kids were younger I had found this site and a few other similar sites online I used once in awhile but as our ages increased and we became more eclectic and needed less busywork I found we used these type of things less.  If you find yourself wanting/needing extra worksheets/colorsheets etc… this might be a great tool for you.  One of the things we still used (today in fact) are the book report forms . 

One of the best things about ABC teach is that you can check out a lot of it for free!  Just go to abcteach.com and start searching, much of it is available without membership.

It is obviously geared toward regular school students/teachers.  For instance there are lots of bulletin board and desk card tools. If you look around however you can find many things that would lend themselves more toward the typical homeschool family.

They have many “generators” where you can create your own worksheets or puzzles.  This could be very helpful for families who are creating their own curriculum.  Since my daughter has been asking for more handwriting sheets, and I didn’t get her a workbook this year, we checked out that feature of the site. 

There is a tutorial which tells you how to use the generator that I bypassed and just went right ahead in creating.  The generator has many types of font to chose from.  You can create the cursive (or print) to copy or select “dotted lines” for your child to trace.  If you want to reinforce learning in a particular subject you can create copywork to go along with curriculum you already have.  We chose to type in some of the definitions we’re learning in Economics to help her improve on her cursive.  It does take time however for you to put in all the information rather than have a prepared copywork.  They do have a few prepared click and prints but very limited.

We don’t follow typical school scope and sequence so when I typed in some of the content of our history to see what was available I didn’t find a lot.  If you use curriculum that corresponds more with regular school curriculum you might find more already prepared options.  I did find some on Plymouth and Thanksgiving that could be extra options for us as we study that era.  One of the things I downloaded was a 7 page guide on the mayflower and pilgrims.  It had timeline, who/what/where/when sheets, etc…

Another area I check out was the literature section.  There are a lot of question and answer type worksheets for various novels.  I did save a couple that I thought we might be reading soon and though I wouldn’t give them out as worksheets as they were intended I would use the questions for discussion.

I would recommend this if you need some “extras” and especially if you have time to create using their generators to fit your existing curriculum.  I encourage you to check out their freebie’s first to get a feel for the site. 

It’s $40 for a one year membership.  Be sure to visit ABC Teach for more information and to check out their freebies!

*ABC teach provided a free one month membership to me in exchange for my review.

Oct. 30, 2009 - My Access writing program

My Access  is a web based writing program like I had never come across before.  Have you ever wanted a program that could actually show your child where to improve in the areas of focus, organization, content & development, language use and mechanics?  This program actually does that! 

Have you ever struggled with knowing what to suggest to help your child’s writing become better?  This program helps you know where they need help the most.

Most other writing programs I’ve looked at focus mostly (or even exclusively) on mechanics; things like punctuation and grammar.  This is the first I’ve looked at that is able to use a computer to measure some of those other area’s like language, focus, content etc…

Now let me just say that it obviously isn’t perfect but I’d say it’s pretty good.  Any computer is going to sometimes give you suggestions that are not correct.  Think of this like your spell check.  It usually helps you out but sometimes it gives you a word suggestion that isn’t even the word you wanted.  Just like you have to train you children to think when using spell check they do need to think when using this program. 

But with that being said, I think this could truly take loads of time and instruction off of a busy mom and put some accountability to the computer instead of the teacher.  I’m not saying it can replace the teacher but it covers a lot of ground and reiterates a lot so you don’t have to.  At our house I know sometimes it’s hard for mom to always be the one saying rework that or fix this.  When my children were working for a goal on this program they wanted to do the work without me telling them!

Each child has their own account they log into at myaccess.com.  Once in they chose from a list of prompts to get them started. They start earning point by writing, revising and completing tutorials.  You can set rewards (that you chose) for certain point levels which was hugely motivational for my girls (ages 9 and 11.)  I will say somewhere in the site I read to set your first goal low as points take awhile get and I disagree.  The lowest you can set is 250 which is what I chose since they wanted to watch the kick-off of a favorite TV show that was only a week away, they blew it away in one afternoon!

I do have to mention that my girls were thrilled with this but my boys (ages 14 and 16) were not quite as enthralled.  My 14 year old prefers to write what he wants to write and not follow any prompts (this was a hurdle for him) and honestly my 16 year old was too busy with all of his other subjects to give it much time.  I did have them each do 250 points worth and they did but not without prodding.

You can add your own writing prompts if you want to.  I did put one in on Ben & Me that we were doing with our Total Language Plus curriculum but I found the more new ones I put in the kids would rather do first before they’d revise what they’ve already got there.  If you were going to use this as a years curriculum I’m sure you’d get through their premade prompts and need some more (I would say there’s about 30-40 per level premade.)  If you use Total Language Plus many of your personal thinking questions could easily be modified into these prompts.

There is not an assignment set up, like they log in and it says do this or that today, but you could easily set that up on paper.  In fact they do have a sample calendar as a suggestion to follow or modify.  You could also only assign them one prompt instead of letting them chose from the list and set up the expectation that they complete or do a certain amount of revising on that one before you assign the next one of your choosing for the next week.

The parent or teacher can go in and see the progress and view assignments as well as set new rewards (something I need to do!)  We had not been doing it as curriculum but just for fun and when they hit their reward point level they tend to stop using the program.  This is the area where I think parents could be tempted to just let the computer take over and never give feedback themselves.  I really do think parents/teacher would still need to make a point of reading through assignments, seeing the progress themselves and make any corrections or comments.  Like I said it’s a computer program so there will be things a live teacher may need to correct or notice that a computer won’t.

They do have video demo’s on their site so I encourage you to check them out if you're considering purchasing.  This gives you some idea of the content and what the screens look like.

The program is available for 1 year for three students for $99.95 or 6 students for $129.95.  This is a substantial cost but in my opinion it could be used for a good part of your writing curriculum so it’s worth considering especially if you’re a parent who struggles in how to coach your child in their writing.

 *This program was provided to me free of charge for the purpose of my review as part of the Old Schoolhouse Crew.

Oct. 28, 2009 - The Amazing Bible World History Timeline

We love history so when the The Amazing Bible World History Timeline  came in the mail it was no chore to take a look.  This timeline of sorts was given to me as part of the Old Schoolhouse crew for review.  It’s really quite different then any timeline I’ve seen.

As you can see from the picture it’s sort of circular and colorful.  The colors represent the descendants of Shem, Ham and Japheth (Noah’s sons.)  You may not also be able to tell from the picture but it’s HUGE.  The actual measurements are 38” by 46”.  We put it up in our hallway as that’s the only spot we had (we have wall space issues, too many bookcases in the way!)  I suppose you could also put it out on a large table when you wanted to look at it as well.

You find the person or event you're interested in and follow that section to see what people or events were going on elsewhere.

Since my 14 year old’s bedroom door is right across the hall from the wall we placed it on he would often spout off little facts he’d read on the timeline.  I’ve asked him to recall some just now and he really can’t remember but he’d say things like, “…did you know so and so was alive when such and such happened.”  He loved to peruse it while brushing his teeth stalling for bedtime!

We tried to use it with our history study but found much of where we’re at not there.  It is a broad overview and we do quite an in depth study.  For instance Oliver Cromwell was on there but Elizabeth, Charles I & II were not (all in lessons of Mystery of History III.)  I think earlier in history like with Mystery of History I more of the subject/lessons would be on there.  Also, there would be a lot of relevance with an Old Testament study. 

 Because we do such in depth study we do prefer one with a lot of detail.  Of course the one we have takes up a lot more space so this one would be nice or families who just want an overview and want it out all the time.

This timeline does include an index which is nice to try to locate a particular person.

If you’re never used a timeline like this it is truly something to check out.  It’s interesting to notice what was going on at the same time in different parts of the world.  That’s certainly not something most of us got growing up with our education.  This is an especially good one if you want to keep one up on your wall.  I must say it does get more “look” time this way if you can find the space for it.

The timeline is available for $29.97 plus shipping at agards.com .  As a bonus with purchase you also get some downloadable interactive holy land maps too.

Oct. 26, 2009 - Virgina Soaps and Scents

Virginia Soaps and Scents site is like a feast for your eyes.  The soaps look so good you can almost smell them through the screen!  They truly are pretty to look at as well as fun to use!

As part of the Old Schoolhouse Crew we were sent samples of Virginia Soaps and Scents laundry detergent to make, shampoo bar and regular soap bars to try. 

Let’s start with the soap.

First of all I had to fight my daughter to use them!  She was especially attracted to the oatmeal one.  They have a good lather and are rather creamy.  The scents are pleasant and not too strong and they are very “pretty” to look at!  I do have trouble with scented soaps sometimes as they make me sneeze.  These did not leave me sneezing.  Our only problem is we are fairly accustomed to the pump type soaps and no longer own any soap dishes.  I’m not sure that we’re ready to switch back to a bar soap but if we did these would be fabulous.

We had never tried a shampoo bar so I was the first to try it.  I would love to say I had fabulous results but I did not.  My hair was very hard to brush through (I have fairly long hair) and it felt almost gummy or sticky.  The best way I can describe it is when you get too much chlorine build up.  Anyway, I had heard that a vinegar rinse can get rid of build up so I tried that then shampooed again and had very similar results.  The third time I shampooed with the bar I used my regular cream rinse after and it was tolerable but still not as silky feeling as I was used to.  After my experience I chose not to try it on my daughters hair that I already have a difficult time brushing.

Our water here is slightly hard so I don’t know if that is part of it or what.  I know many of the crew members had great results so I encourage you to read their experiences as well if you’ve been thinking of a shampoo bar.

The third product we were sent to review was a laundry soap kit.  It comes with complete instructions for “making” the laundry soap (basically add water, heat and thicken.)  I have made my own before so I was familiar with the process.  The picture shows what it looks like after thickening.  We “funneled” it into a rinsed out old detergent container.  It is sort of globular so you “pour” or glob out ½ cup per load.

Our first few loads went fine and we were happy with the results however it didn’t get the smells out of the workout clothes.  Again, don’t know if it’s an issue with our water or what?  I tried adding more soap to the next load but still the odor remained.  We love homemade laundry soap but for us this one isn’t quite strong enough for all the odors.  Again you may want to check out other crew member review as many had great results.

To check out the other crew member reviews click here.

The soaps are $4.50 per bar or 3/$12, the shampoo bar $5.50 each or 2/$10 and a laundry “kit” to try is $4.95.  I encourage you to check their site out, it’s really fun to look through. 

Oct. 19, 2009 - Sarah's Wish

Oct. 13, 2009 - Guardian Angel publishing

Oct. 6, 2009 - Nature Friend Magazine

Receiving two free magazines and study guides from Nature Friend Magazine for review was certainly fun in the mailbox!  We’ve had a lot of fun reading, doing, writing and drawing through the magazine.

Nature Friend Magazine is self described as, ”a creation-based, monthly nature magazine for children that the whole family will enjoy.”  Each monthly issue contains a “You Can Draw” art lesson, "Pictures and poems" sent in by readers, very neat photo’s in “Creation Close-ups, seasonal stories and photo’s in “Nature Trails” submitted by readers, an experiment type activity to do in “Learning by Doing” as well as puzzles, hidden pictures searches and several nature related articles.

Probably the best way to get yourself acquainted with the magazine is to visit their site and peruse the samples.  They generously have three complete issues you can “sample” to get a feel for the magazine.  The August 08 in here but visit their main site to also view the June and July of 08 issues.  Just go to the “magazine” tab and chose samples.

My daughters dug into the issues we received.  Lexie cast a footprint following the directions in the “Who Walked Here?” article from the August 09 issue.  We walked around our 5 acres but since the trails are mostly pine needle and leaf covered it was hard to find tracks.  Our dog run area proved to be the best place to get a casting. 

Ariel drew the sunflower from the August 09, “You can Draw” feature. The instructions are really quite detailed, for instance for the background it recommends, “...take your scissors and, using the one side, gently shave off blue powder from the tip of your sky blue pencil.  Then carefully rub it in to the background, creating blue sky and clouds.”  It certainly would help with your “art” curriculum if you took the time to use it.

As I write we have cups of crushed plants sitting on our dinning room table for the “Learning by Doing” from the September issue.  It’s on Plant Pigments.

All of the above mentioned articles and activities pertain to the magazine itself which is available for $36 per year.  Currently there is a blog coupon available which will take $3 off for new subscribers.  Use code BLOG93. You can order at nature friend magazine.

The second part that Nature Friend Magazine included was their study guide.  Just like the Magazine itself they have complete samples of the study guide portion.

The study guide is $2 per issue more per month and contains many more puzzles, further research suggestions, a photo taking feature and a writing lesson with nature.

We were especially intrigued with the photo feature in the August study guide.  They went through how they got their cover shot which was an owl swooping and catching a mouse in its' talons.  When the issue first came I remarked that it was an amazing shot!  The study guide section goes through how they actually set this up.  It was very interesting!  I won’t give away the details!

We really enjoyed reviewing this magazine and have a hard time finding flaws to point out!

The two things that I can say might keep us from ordering would be time and money.  It is a bit expensive probably to some for a monthly magazine, although I must say in my opinion you get a lot for your money!  The second thing is for the cost I want to make sure we have the time to use it.  There is a lot there but finding the time to do the activities some months for us would seem impossible.

To negate those concerns I would definitely consider making it part of an elementary/middle school science curriculum.  With a little creativity and a library you could certainly expand on some of the ideas/articles and have a well rounded curriculum.  Though I don’t believe this is the intention of the magazine it seems very feasible to me and then it becomes the base for quite an inexpensive curriculum!  Another possibility might be to do whatever you normally do for science 3 weeks of the month and chose to work through the magazine for the 4^th week. 

It is a great magazine and study guide all by itself but I know for us I would have to carve out the time to justify the cash outlay.

I hope you’ll take the time to go to Nature Friend and check it out for yourself!  Don’t forget the discount code!  The discount is only available till the end of November so don't delay.

Oct. 2, 2009 - College Prep Genius

College Prep Genius The No Brainer Way to SAT Success is next for review with the Old Schoolhouse Crew.  Again the timing of this one is great for us since we have a high school Junior who will probably take the SAT later this year.

We received a book, workbook, and DVD to look over.  The opening of the book states, “College Prep Genius contains hidden secrets and little-known patterns found on the SAT & PSAT/NMSQT/NNSQT tests.  By unraveling these concealed codes, students can score higher on these tests and in return receive up to full scholarship/full ride to colleges of their choice.”  That sounds good but could it be true?

We dove into the program and did as it recommends.  They suggest first to take a practice test which we found online at collegeboards.com.  Logan did this without any study or preparation.  In fact, he really had no clue what a SAT was.  He was shocked that a test could take so long!  After scoring it I was surprised he was above “average” (whatever that means!)  Not that I didn’t think he could do well but like I said he really had no idea what this test was about or what he was in for.  We don’t do very much “testing” in our homeschool.

After the practice test you’re supposed to read the book through 2-3 times.  Logan had trouble getting all the way through it once.  It is pretty repetitive.  I told him to go ahead and start working the sections with the DVD.  That helped but having already read the sections he had a hard time keeping focused as it was essentially the same information as in the book.

The information seems to be very good and somewhat different from what I’ve seen in other “prep” guides.  We definitely learned a lot about the test and how it works.  One of the key things you keep hearing is that the test is “logical”.  They focus on acronym’s that help you remember certain test taking points.  These really do help you eliminate wrong answers and narrow down the correct ones.

As you go through each section you work in the workbook with the video following along with on screen samples.  The DVD goes through each one and uses whatever acronym you’re working with to show how you apply it to actual test questions.  This part is very good and I’m quite sure it has helped Logan with his test taking skills. 

So far Logan’s done the Critical Reading section including Passage Based Reading short and dual passage sections.  He's done the text on the Math but not the DVD part yet.  The sections he has yet to do are the Essay and Writing sections.  He’s been working on this two afternoons a week (about 2 hours most days) for 3-4 weeks to get this much accomplished.

Logan felt like overall this would prepare him well for the test but it got very repetitive and some of their suggestions seem a bit over the top.  For instance the book recommends 3-4 hours study per week for Juniors and 3 months before the test at least two hours a day on weekdays and 10 hours on the weekends.  The DVD recommended the week before the test taking one practice test per day.  Now you have to realize the practice tests take about 3 hours each!  I’m sure putting in all this time would help but for most teens we know this would be difficult if not impossible to attain.

The book also contains scholarship and loan information as well as lots of forms to help track your progress on practice tests and scholarship locating.

 Logan may take the PSAT the second week of October and will probably take the SAT once if not twice later this year so keep watching the blog and I’ll let you know if the proof was in the pudding for us so to speak!

Summing it up Logan and I feel like it’s good SAT prep material but a bit tedious.  I’m not sure however how all this material could be “exciting” so take that with a grain of salt.  It’s just a lot to get through.

The DVD set which includes the text and workbook is available from College Prep Genius for a special limited time price of $79.  They have also graciously given us a code so our readers can get free shipping and handling!  Use the code HSBlog09 (it expires November 15,09.)

Sep. 30, 2009 - The Complete Career, College, and High School Guide for Homeschoolers

Boy did this come at a good time for us!  I’ve got two boys here that need to figure out what they’re going to be when they grow up soon!  One of the latest product for review with the Old Schoolhouse Crew was The Complete Career, College, and High School Guide for Homeschoolers from Educational Diagnostic Prescriptive Services (EDUDPS.)

The guide contain four assessments that your student takes and scores to give them input on what college and career path might be right for them.  These are not quick little check lists but lengthy assessments that took my boys about 1 ½ hours to complete.  Once they did this they recorded their “scores” on a “career summation form”.  This form then tells them what to do with each result and where to go to get information pertaining to that result.  Each step from there takes time to look through lists and think through the information given about each result.

If this sounds complicated it’s really not, complex yes, but not complicated.  They just followed the steps as outlined in the guide and it gave them some direction based on their result.  It doesn’t give just one career or college major but rather several ideas and lists of possibilities for them to choose from.  We started to see a lot of overlap between the results of each assessment that gave the boys some directions to look at for their future.

Once they make some choices they then fill out a Career Plan Form.  This is where the action plan comes in.  From the work they’ve already done they now form an “action plan” of sorts.  This is where they plan to do things like interview people in the careers they’re considering,  decide or consider what courses to take based on recommendations for the choices you made and consider activities from lists that also go along with your choices.  This “action” part we have not had time to complete yet.

From everything so far you can see why the author suggests this could be ½ credit on your transcript!

One of the things I appreciated about The Complete Career, College, and High School Guide for Homeschoolers was the comments about lifestyle as well as just career.  For instance it’s pointed out that boys may want to consider if what they are choosing would give them time for a family and girls are asked to consider some careers that lend themselves to part time or from home.  These are just given as things to consider but definitely are not something you’d find in a secular resource!

Besides being a great assessment tool it has many bonuses like CLEP testing formation and suggestions, SAT prep suggestions, transcript information and more.  I would not say it gives lengthy information on these “extra’s” but enough to get you going.

We look forward to working more with the information in the coming months and planning the course for my two boys.  So far for my oldest it really helped confirm a couple directions he was already headed.  This gives us more confidence in going ahead and investing more money and time into these areas.  For our younger son who is “almost” completely undecided and really wanting a direction it gave him some areas to check out and really made him think about possibilities.  We hope over the next year to follow some of the suggestions for checking out a few possibilities.

I think this would be very helpful for any homeschool family that has middle or high schoolers.  It’s on sale for a limited time in e-book form for $26.20 or $39.95 for soft bound printed.  We did work with the e-book but I would just caution on this one it’s 225 pages.  It worked for us just to print the assessments for the kids to take and the form pages to fill out which was probably about 50-60 pages.  I let them look over the lists and other things right on the computer.

Please do note how their e-books work before you make your decision.  It’s not the typical pdf type you might be used to.  Our computer worked fine with their system but I was very concerned with getting it printed as their system only allows two prints.  I was very reassured when I contacted them that they would work with me to make sure I got what I needed before my two “prints” expired.

This one also has a free sample so check it out too!

Sep. 30, 2009 - Roots and Fruits

First of all let me say Roots and Fruits was designed by Jill Dixon of Educational Diagnostic Prescriptive Services (EDUDPS) to be a comprehensive vocabulary curriculum for grades K-12.  It contains 673 Roots and 1718 vocabulary words and was designed to be done over years in only 15 minutes a day.  It’s one book for all your children K-12!  Wow!

She recommends a 5 day weekly schedule, which for those of you who know me won’t be surprised that we didn’t follow.  The guide suggests posting the words you're working on for the week on a large wall chart on the first day.  We did this.  Then you look up the meaning in the dictionary and write your words, definitions and whether they are Latin or Greek based on the cards.  The guide offers suggestions for how many words each week and exactly what information to put on cards depending on the students age.

The next day she recommends reviewing and the next day giving the words in sentences as well as choosing a game for the day.   There are 14 games to choose from, some requiring a little preparation but most don’t.  This part of the curriculum makes the learning very fun!

On the 5^th day you’re supposed to again use the word in a sentence and play one of several games to evaluate their knowledge.

What worked for us was to do this two days a week.  On the first day we put up the chart wrote out our cards and used each word out loud in a sentence.  The second day of the week we used the words in sentences again and played one of the games.  One of our favorite no prep games is 20 questions.  It’s just like the one your probably familiar with and have played in the car many times only now with your vocabulary.

The guide is designed in alphabetical order.  Since I have a high school Junior we decided to do the top 205 most common words on the SAT first (she notes those for you in italicize.)  How you go through it is up to you.  The guide also notes with an asterisk’s the words most appropriate for younger children so if that fits your family you could start there.

If there is anything I might want to add to this program is a type of periodic evaluation which the guide does recommend, “… at the end of each month or 4 week segment.”  It does recommend doing the games to evaluate but especially for older kids you may want something more concrete.  Personally, I may do crossword puzzles from a free site with the words and definitions we’ve used as additional evaluation.  This will take a little work on the teachers part.

I’m sure we will be using this for years to come and the guilt free part is that it’s supposed to take years.  There’s no pressure to “finish” the book!

It’s available at  EDUDPS   for a “limited time” pricing of $11.25 for the e-book or $19.98 for a comb bound copy.  Please note when making your choice their e-book system which is explained on the site.  It’s a different system from the typical pdf you may be familiar with.  My computer worked fine with it and I went ahead and printed this one out in it’s entirety (72 pages) and put it into my own binder.  If you don’t want to print it all out you may want to consider the bound copy instead.

If you're still not sure check out their free download of the letter A roots and give the system a try first!  On that same page are some free downloads of their other products so check it out!

Sep. 28, 2009 - Journey Through Learning

Over the past few years we’ve done many lapbooks so I’ve become well acquainted with several lapbook companies as well as how to put together our own lapbooks.  I had not however been exposed to the lapbooks by Journey Through Learning.

First off I have to say that the way their lapbook guides are laid out impressed me.  We’ve done some where you have to read the information and then go find the lap booklet that goes with it and even sometimes go to yet another page to find the instructions for it, not so with Journey Through Learning!  The study guide or “learning” pages about the subject are on the page right before the “booklet” that you’ll do on that information.  Instructions for that “booklet” are right on the page with it.  This makes it great for a child to work more independently.

They also include instructions on how to keep everything organized while completing the lapbook.  This is very helpful for beginners because kids (at least mine) tend to lose pieces before we get the project done.  We had picked up the idea of duct tape and a Ziploc along the way but the instructions are very clear and the binder idea they present is helpful as well.  I’ll let you check out those instructions fully once you get your own or if you search my site you’ll find other entries where I’ve shared similar ideas.

We were given five lapbooks for review and we chose to do the Reptiles one as my younger daughter (4^th grade) was doing some alligators and crocodiles with her science this year.  As I’ve said before what I really like is the format that makes these able to be done almost independently.  Lexie’s reading skill is not quite up to doing all the reading on her own though in a year or two she could probably even handle that.  I did the reading but she pretty much followed all the instructions on her own.

This lapbook is large.  In fact all five of the ones we were given to review; Autumn, Parables, Desert, Amphibian and Reptiles are all three folder lapbooks.  By that I mean that there are enough booklets to fill 3 complete file folders.  Now of course you could decide to not do them all and make a two folder or even pick and chose and make one but the point is you’re really getting your monies worth.

We are not completely done with the Reptile lapbook but Lexie is enjoying doing it along with our science.  You could chose to do these completely for History, Science or Bible however we’ve always done lapbooks alongside of whatever curriculum we’re already doing so we go slowly doing about 1-3 per year.  If you were doing them as curriculum you might want one per month.

I really do like the Parable one and am considering doing that for our complete Bible at some point.  It’s not just one parable but goes through all of them.

Most of their lapbooks are grades 2-7 or 8 which makes it a great multi-age choice.   I appreciate the fact that most go through the middle school years as many lapbooks often end at 6^th grade.  They do have some pre-school choices as well.

They are many choices available at Journey Through Learning so I hope you’ll check them out.  For lapbooks I highly recommend downloading them and having them on your computer but they do have printed options available as well.  Reptiles is $13 for an instant download which to me seems like a good value.

Sep. 25, 2009 - Nutrition 101: Chose Life

Sometimes do you have things in your life that are seem to come from all different angles and you know God is trying to get your attention?  Health and Eating have been one of those things for our family this fall.  One of the “angles” that it’s come from is this Nutrition Curriculum from Growing Healthy Homes.

 I attend a lot of conventions and see a lot of curriculum and I have never seen anything quite like this one!  Right off the top I like that it’s very multi-age friendly with enough depth right through high school which is unusual for a science curriculum.  I better back up a minute and explain.  It’s not exactly your typical science curriculum.  I would call if a cross between a health and science curriculum.  The authors explain it as, “…an in-depth look at how we eat, what we eat, how the body works and how these foods affect the body.  This program is not a rehash of biology or science, but a discovery of how the body systems are affected by the foods-good or bad-we eat.”

The curriculum consists of 12 main body systems that are covered in 6 units;

The Brain and Nervous System

The Digestive System

The Respiratory, Olfactory, Auditory and visual Systems

The Muscular and Skeletal Systems

The Cardiovascular and Immune Systems

The Endocrine System & Emotions

Each of the above units is then broken into chapters for a full years curriculum.

Now if it just covered these systems it would be a lovely science curriculum but it does that and so much more!

If you’re the typical homeschool mom I can guarantee you’ll learn something from this curriculum too!  It not only explains how each system works but how foods and choices affect those systems.  From there is goes on to give foods, supplements and recipes that are particularly helpful for whatever system you’ve been studying.

Probably the best way to explain it is to give you a few examples from the lessons we did.

Instead of starting at the beginning we chose to go ahead and skip to the immune system which is of particular interest to us since someone in our family has an auto-immune disorder.

For review we received an e-book so I printed out the pages for the chapter we were doing.  You could also set up a laptop on the table and read from the file directly.  It’s also available in book form, but more on that later.

As we read through the materials the kids wrote down the words and definitions in their notebooks.  These were words like leukocytes, phagocytes, macrophages, lymphatic system, interstitial fluid etc…  Obviously from these examples you can see this is an in depth course certainly appropriate for high schoolers.  With that said I also had my youngest ,a 4^th grader doing it as well.  For my 4^th grader I didn’t have her do all the definitions but only the “main” systems and broader ones.  If you were using this with just younger children you might decide to skip some paragraphs that go more in depth.

We also wrote down in our notebooks the list of good foods versus bad foods given toward the end of the chapter and had quite a discussion on those.  I was impressed that as the week went on they commented on what they were eating and reminded each other of that list. 

There are also a few discussion questions with each chapter which when discussed showed me they had been paying very good attention.  In fact my children seemed to be very interested maybe because it seems so pertinent to their life.  They can actually take the information and use it right now.  It makes it more real then just reading about the body by having information that they can incorporate into their life.

One of the big perks to this course is the activities list.  There are two levels of activities with lots of choices.  On the immune chapter my girls drew a picture of a white blood cell phagocytosing a germ.  Other choices included things like further research, writing a funny story, checking out vitamins, preparing additional meals and more.  For the secondary level there is again further research opportunities, websites to check out, checking out vaccination laws and daily meal plans using foods containing certain minerals.  My boys chose for this chapter to , “Learn more about super bugs and research the outbreak closet to your home.”

I appreciated the authors discussion on vaccines.  They have left much up to the parents and suggested researching for yourself, “there is much controversy over whether or not one should be vaccinated…this is a very personal matter.”  Many homeschool families will appreciate the authors bringing up issues like this as a chance for us to make our own informed decisions rather than giving the typical government sponsored response.

 Each chapter has a recipe to try using some ingredients that contain healthy vitamins and minerals particularly helpful to whatever “system” you’ve been studying.  For the immune system the recipe was a Mixed Berry Salad.  How can you go wrong there?  It did call for Kiefer (or yogurt) and blue agave nectar which made it unique.  Some of the other chapters do have recipes that may be a bit more unusual and may need some coaxing (and occasionally looking for unique ingredients) but after reading the materials my kids would be willing to at least “try” about anything.  The other ones in the unit we did were Heart Healthy Oatmeal with fruit and Almond Butter Chip Bars.

The recipe section also has activity choices for both elementary and secondary levels.  For the Berry Salad we chose for the elementary to answer, “Three of the four fruits in this recipe are members of the Rosoideae family.  Identify them and what this means?” In the secondary activity list it suggest locating a U-pick farm and arranging a field trip.  My brother has a blueberry field so we do this one a lot!  One of the other choices is to prepare a written or oral report on the history and diverse uses for the Blueberry.

As you can probably tell we have thoroughly enjoyed reviewing this curriculum.  I’m planning on using it primarily next year as our science and health curriculums.  Both of my boys still need their health credit for high school and my oldest will be a senior and finished with the core science requirements so this makes a perfect elective too!  We may get a few more chapters in this year, we’ll see…

It’s available at  Healthy Homes, where they also have a testimonial video.  It would be a great curriculum to use in a co-op setting as well.  They also have sample pages available here .  It’s available on CD or in book form for $79.95,  and $99.95 respectively.  You can also get both for $129.95 which gives you the best of both worlds. 

I have not yet taken mine to get printed to check the cost for printing versus buying the book.  So far I have just been printing chapter by chapter and I might continue to do that.

For me this is kind of pricey but I really have not seen anything else out there like this.  If I had found this at a convention and had the time to look through it I probably would have bought it (though I’m not sure that it’s even available at conventions.)  It’s just information that our kids need and I don’t see any other source presenting it like this.  It truly could be life changing if not life saving for your family!

Sep. 23, 2009 - STUDYPOD

Once again I was asked to review another great product for Old Schoolhouse Crew.  This one is called, “Studypod.”    It’s simply a device that holds a book for you so that you can easily see it without having to try and prop it up or hold the pages open.

My daughter really tried to test this one out placing the largest textbooks she could find on it.  It held them all! 

It’s really pretty simple to use.  First you pull the leg on the back out to the right, then open it like a book and pull down the trays and you’re now ready to place your book.  We moved the arms to the outside, placed the book and then moved the arms back to hold the pages in place.  Don’t worry there is a little instruction slip that comes with it and once you do it once you’ll see, it’s easy. There’s a lot more pictures and a video on their site to show you how it works in more detail too.

Easily I could see this useful in many places.  The first that comes to mind of course is typing at the computer.  Can’t tell you how many times I’ve placed staplers and things on top edges of books to try and hold the pages open!  This would also be great if you do studying while laying on the floor or on a blanket outside. 

It’s very portable and would easily slip into a backpack.  Some of us homeschoolers don’t do this so much but I was thinking it would be great for public high school and college students on a Christmas list.  That age can sometimes be so hard to buy for! 

Inside the Studypod is a removable mesh “pocket” which could be great for holding calculators, phones etc…  Also inside are printed some quotes like, “A ten gallon hat holds less than 1 gallon of liquid.”  My daughter liked the quotes too.

Studypod is offering a special to blog readers.  Use coupon code TOSBLOG5 and you’ll get $5 off your order.  I'm seriously thinking on a few Christmas presents, they also have a 2 for $16.95 and with the coupon code that could be very affordable!  It’s availabile in lot’s of colors for a regular price of $19.95, but don’t forget to use your coupon and save!

Sep. 10, 2009 - College Prep Genius

One of the next items we’re reviewing for TOS crew is College Prep Genius Course.

It covers the math, critical reading and writing sections found on the SAT.  In looking it over briefly it has a lot of great test taking tips that would be useful in many other testing environments as well, like CLEP testing.

There are  many articles on their site which are helpful for those with children are heading toward the college years.  It's definitely  worth a click to see the information they've got about the SAT right on the site.

One of the articles sums up how the SAT may appear to students and parents alike,” Admittedly, taking this test is daunting. The results could affect your college career and maybe even the rest of your life! This idea can easily cause anxiety and even panic. Even smart kids can do poorly on this test. What is the average student to do? The answer lies in gaining knowledge of the test structure. There are a lot of misconceptions about the SAT, and these misconceptions can damage one’s score. Hopefully, by clearing up some of these common myths, you will be better prepared to conquer SAT and PSAT/NMSQT.”  It then goes on to give “13 common myths about the SAT”. 

This is perfect timing for us since we have a high school Junior.  We’ve looked it over and are planning to take a practice test as the guide suggests then over the next few weeks use the material and learn the techniques before taking the test again.  Stay tuned to see how it works out for us!  I’ll be blogging in a few weeks with our progress.

The course is in a workbook and DVD format which right now on the site is on sale “for a limited time” for $79.  That’s 30% off retail.