homeschooling

Homeschool Curriculum Review: Middlebury Interactive Languages

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Middlebury Interactive Languages ReviewIf you’ve been reading these pages for very long at all, you know that I’m a sucker for foreign languages, especially French. For over a year now I’ve been searching for “the perfect foreign language curriculum.” The conclusion I’m coming to is that it just doesn’t exist. However, Middlebury Interactive Languages comes pretty close. For the purposes of this review, we received a six-month subscription to their Elementary French 1 (Grades 3-5). As the product title suggests, this is designed for upper elementary students – roughly grades 3 through 5.

For this review, we were given several options of Middlebury courses – French, German, Spanish, or Chinese, each available in a variety of levels. It was a really tough call for me whether to start the boys with Elementary French 1 (which has no prerequisites) or Elementary French 2, which has the prerequisite of French 1 or equivalent. You know, of course, that we’ve been doing French off and on for a long time with the boys. But I wasn’t sure if the stuff they’d learned up to this point would be enough to qualify as “or equivalent,” so we went ahead and did Level 1. [Read more…]

Reading List – October 2014

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Inspired by The Unlikely Homeschool, I’ve decided to do a post each month of what’s on our reading list. It’s a little late in the month to be doing October’s, but that’s okay; we’re still reading these books, and likely will be throughout the rest of the month.

Read-aloud – Everyone

wayside school

We have two. First, we’re reading Sideways Stories from Wayside School. This is a classic from my childhood; it was my brother’s favorite book as an elementary school student. My kids haven’t had the pleasure of hearing or reading it, so I thought it would be a fun one. Plus, it’s a quick read which makes everyone feel like we’ve accomplished something in very short order.

We started earlier this week, and are already about 10 chapters in. The kids love it! And honestly, what’s not to love? Louis the yard teacher . . . Mrs. Gorf, the teacher who turns her students into apples . . . Mrs. Jewls, the teacher who thinks her students are monkeys . . . Maurecia, the girl who keeps ice cream in her desk. Good times. [Read more…]

Book Review: The iWitness series by Apologia

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Apologia Review
We are fascinated by things like Biblical archaeology in my house. Get us (especially Will and Seahawk) going on the subject, and an hours-long conversation is sure to ensue. So when I heard that members from the Schoolhouse Review Crew would have the opportunity to review the new iWitness series from Apologia Educational Ministries, I was definitely intrigued. They asked us to review the following books:

Written by Doug Powell, each of these books takes the reader on an in-depth search of different aspects important to the Christian faith. The books aren’t a boring tome, though. Each one is designed to look like a stack of documents, using different graphics and fonts, to introduce you to the evidence that has been discovered over the years. They follow a logical progression, but the goal is not to just tell you, “This is how it is, so you have to believe it.” Instead, the idea is to push you to do your own research and (ideally) come to the conclusions that “Yeah, this is probably really true” on your own. The books are good for a variety of ages (we read them aloud with all three boys), but the reading level is roughly 11 and up. [Read more…]

Book Review: Preschoolers and Peace

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Preschoolers and Peace Review

As a mother with school age children and a little one, let me tell you: homeschooling with a toddler underfoot is hard. Don’t get me wrong; I wouldn’t change it for anything, but that doesn’t mean it’s not difficult. Small Fry, much as I love him, makes our school hours a challenge sometimes. So when I was given the opportunity to review the e-book Preschoolers and Peace: Homeschooling Older Kids with Success while Loving the Little Ones at Your Feet by Kendra Fletcher of the Preschoolers and Peace website, I was definitely interested. And let me say, I was not disappointed. This resource for moms was a wonderful addition to my e-book library.

This 50 (or so) page book is available on Kindle (currently the only format you can purchase it in) for only $2.99, and I think it would be three dollars well spent for anyone looking for ideas to incorporate your little ones in with your homeschool. Kendra offers loads of tips and tricks for both involving the toddlers in “school time” as well as recognizing the importance of (and giving more tips for) teaching them to play on their own. [Read more…]

Homeschool Curriculum Review: Fix It! Grammar

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Fix It! Grammar Review
I’m not going to beat around the bush with this review; I’m just going to come out and give it to you straight. We love this program! The Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW) has produced a fabulous grammar program for kids 3rd grade and up. We received for review the very first level of this program, Fix It! Grammar: The Nose Tree (Book 1). We received both the teacher’s manual and the student workbook. There are currently six levels of Fix It! Grammar available, and each one works with a different fairy tale.

Here’s the lowdown. When you order, you receive the softcover, spiral bound book or books. The copyright allows you to make photocopies of the student workbook for use within your own family, so even if you’re teaching multiple children the same curriculum (like I am), you only need one copy. That is definitely a selling feature in my book. You need some regular homeschooling supplies to work with the curriculum, but nothing you don’t already have (probably): a binder with four dividers, some paper, and a pencil. Other than that, it’s an open-and-go curriculum – my favorite kind! [Read more…]

Homeschool Product Review: My Student Logbook

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student logbook 1I have a really cool product to talk to you guys about today. I’ve heard it described as “the homeschool product you didn’t know you needed,” and that sentiment is pretty accurate in our experience.

My Student Logbook is a local (to me) company owned by a homeschooling couple, and they offer . . . you guessed it: student planners for homeschooling students. I received one student logbook for the purposes of this review, which was pretty great because my kids, Seahawk in particular (who was the beneficiary of this product), thrive on having a to-do list.

The way the product works is very simple. First, you “set up” the logbook. This is done by simply tearing out one of the copies of the “tasks” page (each logbook includes several copies of this page with permission to copy more as needed), folding it in half, and taping it to the back of the current week’s checklist. Now here’s the beauty of this product . . .  If your kids don’t need a new list for next week, you just turn the page to the new week and tuck it under the existing to-do list. They’re all set with a new page of check-off boxes, and you don’t have to rewrite the list. Brilliant! [Read more…]

First Week of Homeschool

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First Week Back

As I mentioned last Monday, we started school last week, and I just want to take a moment to reflect and share our progress with one week down.

A lot of homeschooling families do the “ease into it” approach at the beginning of the school year. I don’t think that would work very well for us; my kids just don’t have that personality. You give them an inch (in this case, a light day of school) and they’ll take a mile (requesting to have the entire day off instead). So last Tuesday, we just dove in head first.

I mentioned in my post last week (about our curriculum for this year) the list of subjects, so I won’t go too overkill on listing them all again. Instead, I’ll talk about how they’re working so far and how we like them. [Read more…]

Homeschool Curriculum Choices 2014-15

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curriculum choices 14-15

I know I’m a little late to the party here considering school starts tomorrow (!!), but I wanted to share what my kiddos will be learning this year.

Bible

In addition to the Bible itself (which is all you need, and I’m not suggesting otherwise), we’ll be continuing our worldview study using Apologia’s What on Earth Can I Do? We received this as a review last (school) year, and it’s really good, so after a summer off from it, we’ll be diving back in this week. Our history (which I’ll discuss in a minute) will also be very Bible-heavy this year.

[Read more…]

Keep It Up! Even When it’s Hard

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I’ve said before that homeschooling is one of my greatest joys as a mother. I truly mean that. But that doesn’t mean that it’s not hard, especially when life gets in the way. You know what I mean: one kid is sick; the toddler is drawing all over himself – or the floor or walls – instead of taking a nap; friends want to play and your kids are not shy about bribing you to let them off early . . . We’ve all been there. [Read more…]

Homeschool Curriculum Review: UberSmart Math Facts

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ubersmart header pic

Have you heard of the “unschool” method of homeschooling? It’s basically taking “delight directed learning” (teaching kids what they want to learn) to a crazy level (my apologies if that’s they way you homeschool…) and saying that that’s all you will teach them. If they don’t want to learn to read yet, that’s okay. Eventually they will, and then you can teach them. Kids not interested in adding, even though they’re 10? No problem. They’ll decide to at some point.

We do not subscribe to that philosophy in our home.

There are some things you just have to learn whether you like it or not. Math facts are on that list. And you might recall from a previous review I did that math facts are something my kids and I struggle with regularly. So when the opportunity for another approach to learning these facts came up, I hastily requested this product.

What is it? It’s called UberSmart Math Facts and is offered by UberSmart Software. [Read more…]