SchoolHouse Review Crew: Out of the Box Games

I have been a huge fan of Out of the Box Games since The White Knight was in Iraq in 2007.

They donated to our boxes for deployed troops, they were a fantastic way to have games for in the car, and a way for me to get some non-screen board game time in with the kids in as few as ten minutes! Well, this most recent review opportunity for the Snake Oil - Party Potion game had me pretty excited as a result.

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Clued In Kids

What parent would turn down the chance to keep a whole group of kids happily and easily engaged and occupied for a half hour? You know you wouldn't - and neither did I! I was glad to have the chance to review Clued in Kids for the Schoolhouse Review Crew.

I was given two hunts to try out - Playdate Treasure Hunt Pad was the first one we did. To be honest, life has been pretty hectic here lately so I held it for a while and didn't do anything with it because I didn't feel like I would have time to set it up and give it a fair shake. How wrong I was!!

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Fortuigence Persuasive Essay Writing

In our last church in Maryland we had a more experienced homeschooling father who mentioned once that a weakness he had seen in homeschooled children was an ability to write well. I must admit that writing is a less-observed area in our home program as well. So I frequently request to do reviews of writing programs to try out when The Old Schoolhouse Review Crew offers them. This time, I had the benefit of trying out Fortuigence's Essay Rock Star Persuasive Essay Writing Course.
From the "at home" perspective, the temptation is to think, I never write 'book reports' as an adult, so why would I need to make my kid learn to write one in school? The ability to write well is one that we use frequently as adults though, and many of us could do a little better, especially in the days of technology, social media, texting, abbreviations, and so on. Maestro is in high school now and this is definitely a box we want to make sure gets extra emphasis for a while until we pass the "I hate writing" stage and move into at least grudging acceptance.

Schoolhouse Review Crew: IEW Fix It Grammar

For the first time in our homeschooling lives, our family had to do standardized tests this year. We decided to use the results as a way to determine weak spots in the boys and to guide us in our teaching efforts this year. Each of them were weak in grammar and rules of writing, so the chance to review Institute for Excellence in Writing Fix It! Grammar - The Nose Tree (book 1) teacher's manual  and the companion student book was an excellent way to begin our September schedule. 

This program had a lot of positives to start with. First, it comes from a company that is known for its excellent programs in the finer points of writing. The books are spiral-bound, so they lay flat while the kids are working, and the lessons are designed to take only fifteen minutes a day! Now, we used these first-level books for each of our oldest four children - ages 14 down to 5. They are geared towards grades 3-5. 

Schoolhouse Review Crew: 7-Minute Life Daily Planner

It has been a running theme on the blog that I need to get organized and get my time in order. I had the chance to try out The 7 Minute Life Daily Planner for a review and get to put my thoughts here. This 266-page planner is published by published by The 7 Minute Life, and offers access to additional online tools and printables as well.  Let's dive right in, shall we? One of the things this book does at the beginning is to walk the user through a series of exercises designed to clear the mind of clutter, prioritize life goals/plans and desires, and create workable steps to achieve them. I wrote my feelings at the time on a blank page in the beginning of the book so that over time I would have a measure of my journey using this program. It starts out, "I feel frustrated at my own inability/unwillingness to get it all together. I am excited by and proud of a few things ... but my own failings with respect to keeping the rules set, keeping my papers and things organized and the examples I show my kids are pretty bad and very frustrating." I then listed out things that I feel pressured by, and went to work on the steps outlined in the book. 

Schoolhouse Review Crew: A Life in Balance

I was recently given the chance to read and review the book A Life in Balance by Frank Belgau and his son, Eric Belgau, and distributed by the Learning Breakthrough Program. As a homeschooling mom, I can't help but keep watch over my children and asking: what have they missed; how could I be doing this subject better; is there something about his learning style that doesn't fit what I'm doing? And in truth, it can be a bit of an emotional roller coaster ride.

Here's the thing - our oldest learned to read with about the "normal" struggles and challenges. Our second and third took much longer to get into reading, and one still struggles a bit with longer words and books. And their spelling in the beginning was poor enough that even they can't tell what they were trying to write. And it was frustrating for them. I considered vision and tracking problems, ADD, ADHD, and so much more. What I discovered, well after they had worked out for themselves how to get around their difficulties, is that they both have pretty serious dyslexia. 

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Apologia's What On Earth Can I Do?

As we've neared the end of the school year, and it is beginning to warm up outside, the kids have been itching to get out and about. The problem is that we weren't done with our work yet and the odd, on-again, off-again winter weather had them going stir crazy in the house! There was a lot of bickering, arguing, and "me first" attitudes cropping up. Around the same time that all this began, the opportunity popped up to review the Apologia Education Ministries Program called What on Earth Can I Do? 

What we received in the mail

This program is part of the What We Believe series and helps kids gain a Christian worldview in a way that covers all the different learning types, and many different age groups. The ability to adapt this program across multiple levels is huge for a family spanning several ages, abilities and learning styles and makes it an excellent homeschooling resource to keep on hand. In all, we received the book linked above, plus What On Earth Can I Do Notebooking Journal, Junior Notebooking Journal, and Coloring Book.

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Home School Adventure Company

It will likely be no surprise that we have around 2,000+ books in our home. Every room has a bookcase filled to overflowing (and often two or three bookcases!) in addition to the full library room and storage-turned-school room! The library has a fairly comprehensive, though not complete, set of C.S. Lewis' books, which led me to request the opportunity to review Home School Adventure Co.'s Mere Christianity Journal.

I enjoy Lewis' fictional works and gain a great deal from them as spiritual allegory, but must confess that when it comes to his more "scholarly" texts, short though they are, I struggle. So I requested this review as much for 14-year-old Maestro, and 12-year-old Chef, as I did for my own edification. I also thought that working through the book (which we own, of course) together could provide some good discussion moments between the boys and the White Knight and I. The White Knight has read the book many times, so he served as a guide to our discussions within the confines of the Home School Adventure Journal.

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Victus Study Systems Review

As Maestro gets further into his high school years, and have decided that we can confidently continue to homeschool through those years, we have been considering and watching his time management, study skills and time spent online. We want to make sure he is set up to manage his time, take on the world and achieve his goals and dreams, whatever direction he moves in. One possible solution came from my faithful Schoolhouse Review Crew when they offered the chance to review the Victus Study Skills System. 

Homeschool Review Crew: Mango Languages

Today's post is a review of the program/website Mango Languages, and its program Mango Homeschool Edition courtesy of the Homeschool Review Crew. The timing is perfect for this review because the White Knight is eligible for retirement in 2015. A long-held goal has been to punctuate that retirement with a trip to France with all the kids. We really really want to travel more before Maestro leaves home in a few years. We have talked off and on about doing serious French study as part of our homeschool program before taking this journey to France, so I was excited to try a new program. 

We have tried other programs - workbooks, Rosetta Stone, etc - and they have been decent starts but have really not grabbed the kids' minds well enough for them to want to return to them. When homeschool days fill up and there is limited time to give to everything, I'm not going to be as likely to push in areas that are somewhat "extra". Math is always going to come first over foreign languages if we're running behind in a subject, in other words. 

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Science 4 Us Online

It is a heavy "review" kind of week! So today I am reviewing the Science4Us.com online subscription for the Schoolhouse Review Crew. The Square-in-the-Middles (Bruiser and Buttercup mainly) have really gotten a lot out of kids shows that are geared towards teaching science. I don't have a simple science program for them to work on so really appreciated having the chance to review Science4Us when it came around! This program is geared towards kids in Kindergarten through second grade, and can also be used as an early science review by kids in third through fifth. We used it with Buttercup (K/1) and Bruiser (3rd). The older kids didn't look at it; Mr. Magoo (2 years old) looked on while they worked. And they love this program!!

Homeschool Review Crew: KinderBach Review

So! My first homeschool review post of the year - KinderBach Online Piano Lesson Membership and Teacher Corner. My hope in applying to review this program was that I would be able to temporarily "replace" the fantastic piano teacher we had when we lived in Baltimore. 

I know that no program will likely ever replace a good live instructor, but I wanted to get something in place to keep them from losing the skills they gained while with Mrs. Diane. In Baltimore we had only an electric keyboard for the kids to practice on; once we moved to Virginia, we had space and ability to get a decent wall piano off of Craigslist… and then had no teacher.

Schoolhouse Review Crew: French Essentials

I mentioned in my last review that we are working on French this year and next as The White Knight nears retirement. We have tried workbooks, Rosetta Stone, websites, YouTube videos and other such means to get the kids involved. While a few words stick here or there, nothing of substance stays around for long. Schoolhouse Review Crew offered the chance to look at the online program French Essentials, and I was happy to get the chance to try it out - especially because I can use it with each of the older children and for the entire year. 

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Away We Go Media

We are studying French in our house this year; a long-time goal that we're determined to put into play for some future plans. A few months ago, Schoolhouse Review Crew put out word about an online French study program (coming in a review next week); at almost the same time came a chance to read the children's books about Mexico, France, South Korea, and Norway, put out by Carole P. Roman writing for Away We Go Media. I applied for (and was rewarded!) both (yay!)

Schoolhouse Review Crew: VocabularySpellingCity

I have two children with (undiagnosed) dyslexia - and pretty extreme cases. Apparently one of the big indicators of dyslexia is a profound inability to spell well because of an inability to hear the individual sounds - called "Phonemic Awareness". While I wish I had known that years ago before I tried to teach them to read, it is good to be aware of it now - and to look for tools that might help with that. 

In this case, we are using the online program VocabularySpellingCity to see if it will help increase their spelling ability, as well as to test out where Maestro is at with his spelling abilities, and to get Buttercup started on her journey to good spelling as well. In short: this Schoolhouse Review Crew program offers things to cover the entire family!

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Bridgeway Academy - Easy Essay Writing (High School Level)

I have mentioned my struggle with getting certain children to write in the past, and have tried several writing programs - all of them off-line up to now. I've tried co-op classes, in-home books, younger grade levels, older grade levels, and one in-house as part of a junior-high-level-boys-only group (which was a wonderful experience, but I have not seen where he is doing another right now.) On top of that, said now-teenager has expressed interest in going to a brick-and-mortar school for years, so I thought perhaps an online course might be a way for him to try out a classroom situation, while still being home and getting some writing instruction in. Enter the Schoolhouse Review Crew's offer to try out Easy Essay Writing with Mrs. Kimberly Kulp offered by Bridgeway Academy, an online homeschooling group.  

This program is designed for students in grades 9-12, so Maestro is the only one to fit the bill, age-wise. To be honest I wasn't sure whether he would be ready to take on the responsibilities of an online class. I've been looking at the possibility for most of this year, though and thought this would be a good opportunity to find out how he'd do. Find that part out at the end of the review. Read on to find out how our experience with online learning went!

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Diary of a Real Payne

All of my older children have enjoyed books like Wayside School is Falling Down and other such somewhat silly, zany stories that use a lot of imagination in the writing. Eleven-year-old Chef even keeps a running list of his "favorite" authors (Roald Dahl tops the list currently) and is making plans to visit their museums and where they lived some day. This is to say that reading in our house is pretty serious stuff - most especially when it's reading about the Crazy we find in life. And really: What kid doesn't like the silly, make-you-laugh stories? Well, Schoolhouse Review Crew came through again by offering the chance to read and review a book called Diary of a Real Payne Book 1: True Story by Annie Tipton. 

The first book in a still-being-written series, Real Payne is a 192-page story aimed at the 9-12 year old group. The story is built around the imagination of a young girl named EJ Payne, who lives in a small town but yearns for more. How many of us are not affected by a desire to experience life in the patch of grass on the other side of the fence? I find this is especially true with children because they really don't have as much control over their day-to-day lives as they might like.

Schoolhouse Review Crew: The Presidential Game

Chef loves board games with strategy games being the all-time favorite. When Schoolhouse Review Crew came out with a chance to review a new board game - The Presidential Game - I thought it could be a fun one to try, especially since Chef often has trouble finding people to play some of his strategy games with (Risk, etc.) Though I didn't know much about the game just from the website, it also looked like it could be a fun way to help the kids understand so much of the political goings-on when elections come up. 

Schoolhouse Review Crew: PeopleKeys Personality Style Binder

There are so many personality tests and quizzes out there that it can be hard to know which ones will work to give you information that you can really use. When The Old Schoolhouse folks put up a review opportunity for StudentKeys Binders, I thought it might be a good one to try. Maestro will be 14 in November and one of the things we are working on with him this year is taking control of his own education - helping keep track, set his own goals, etc. And PeopleKeys offered the opportunity to strengthen his knowledge of himself through their StudentKeys Personality Binder.

Maestro is a little bit younger than the stated age range for the binder - the binder is advertised for high school students, and while technically he will be 14 this year, his birthday is so late that we are having him make sure that all of his "8th grade" knowledge is sound before throwing him into the high school melting-pot of educational ability. Regardless, his reading and other skills are such that I felt it would be a good experience and help him to find his direction in doing such a course. 

Schoolhouse Review Crew: Greene bark Press: Look Left, Look Right, Look Left Again

With an absolutely fearless two-year-old in the house, it is important to re-enforce certain safety concepts as early as possible. The wonderfully illustrated, perfect-for-the-youngest-kids book Look Left, Look Right, Look Left Again, distributed by Greene Bark Press, fell into my lap for a review just as said Mr. Magoo had figured out how to open the storm doors and make his daring escape up the street!