A love of literature?

During recess The Homeschooled Young Man was playing with Lego's and made this sign. It says "I LOVE LIT" he is really enjoying his literature class. He set up the picture and took it himself. You can see his Lego bags handing under the kitchen table, he is in the process of sorting all his Lego pieces into bags while I read his literature to him.

I LOVE LIT

Ah, the blessings of homeschooling, never a dull or boring moment in learning. Learning is for a lifetime and is not a time of loathing. We are reading through the Abeka Of People Literature book.

How are things going this week in your homeschool? What are the kids enjoying? What needs some work? Have you done any tweaking this year?

Have a wonderful week!

Duet 11:19

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May contain Christian content and may contain affiliate links that generate a small amount of income to keep this blog running.

Will It Be The Big Yellow Bus or Homeschooling this year??

A while back, I was with the Homeschooled Young Man at a Civil War Re-Enactment that he was re-enacting in and my cell phone rang. It was one of my doctors calling me with a report. Of course, it was VERY loud on my end with all excitement and cannons being fired that goes on with a re-enactment. The doctor asked me where I was and I explained we had taken the day off from homeschool to participate in the re-enactment. My doctor looked out his office window and he could see the general area that we were in and he said "Wow, your son gets to do the coolest things!"

As parents, we can all offer up cool opportunities for our children to experience, but it's so much easier to just put them on that big yellow bus and let someone else handle it all for 8+ hours a day. No worries and no responsibility for our kids. Sometimes the Easy Button is not the right button to push.

Are you considering home education for your child this coming school year? It is not too late, even if you have already registered them for the big yellow school bus to take them away each day. You can do it!! Let me know how I can help you.

What School Supply Item Are You Addicted To?

STICKY NOTES!!!

I must have them in all shapes and sizes, 

not to mention all colors...lol.

LOL...this is just my secret stash in my school supplies, I've got sticky note pads in my car, date book, living room, media room, kitchen and dining room...lol.

I asked the child what school supplies we need for the school year, he says "NONE." I say "I think we need some sticky notes." (they are my weakness!!!). He yells out "With all the sticky notes we have, I think we are preparing for Sticky Note Y2K!" lol...Maybe we can just bypass my sticky note obsession and move on to the question at hand? "How on earth does the child know about Y2K?"

 

 

An Easier Homeschool Day? How Can It Be?

Another great blog post 10 Ways to Make your Homeschool Day Run Smoothly

I am stealing several of these ideas!!

No reason to reinvent the wheel!

Which of these 10 ways speaks to your heart? Post below in the comments.

What are we teaching our pre-teens & teens about SEX??

This picture says it all, I had never really thought of it this way. What have you used to teach your children about abstinence? In our home we have talked about it since the very beginning. With our son being adopted, his birthparents were college students and that helped with explaining a lot of things. Our son had a pretty good understanding of single parenting and just how difficult life is for single parents and their children. We have used God's word in the book of Proverbs and the Song of Solomon. We have also talked about King David and his sin. 

Another of my favorites is called A Chickens Guide To Talking Turkey With Your Kids About Sex. I heard an interview on Focus On The Family with the authors and liked. Got it free from the library...check it out!

What have use used in your home regarding this topic?

VideoText Interactive Review-Homeschool Math Program

Please note that prices and offers may change after this blog post is published.
OK, so I have been just itching to tell you all about the VideoText Interactive review that we have done for the TOS Review Crew...I mean so many times I have started to brag about it in a blog post only to remember "I CAN'T SAY ANYTHING ABOUT VideoText Interactive TIL July!!" ARGH!! Sometimes being a reviewer is hard!! I just wanted to shout from the roof tops about VideoText Interactive. For all of our homeschool years we have used the spiral method for math, know what that is? Boring worktext pages with tons of math problems that you do each and every day. VideoText Interactive uses the mastery method so you keep moving forward as you learn the material. We were blessed to receive the use of VideoText Interactive Algebra A Complete Course for 3 years for the use of 2 students. Online Programs have a full 30-day money back guarantee. You can also request a FREE DVD sample (it's really nice, I got one).

VideoText Interactive is not new to our family, we have seen their booth many times over the years at homeschool conventions, but the price was totally out of reach for our family. $529 for the complete DVD set with textbooks was way out of our price range. BUT!!!! Now VideoText Interactive is available at a reasonable price for the online version, you get 3 full year courses for one price! You will get Pre-Algebra, Algebra 1 and Algebra 2 and you can use it with 2 students! Now if you want to add additional students, it's small added fee per student. Did I mention that you can try the full online program at no risk? VideoText Interactive offers a FULL 30 DAY MONEY BACK GUARANTEE! WOW!!  VideoText Interactive is for any ages from 6th grade student through adult, for more information on if your child is ready for this excellent math program click here to read the FAQ section VideoText Interactive FAQ #3. There are 170 lessons, course notes, student work text, solutions manuals, and progress tests all included and don't forget that you can use this for 2 students! Need to add on a 3rd or 4th student?

Don't laugh but I am hearing that age old slogan being yelled... 

"CALL NOW!! OPERATORS ARE STANDING BY,

CALL NOW!!"

Scope & Sequence Rational pdf has a lot of great information that can explain in detail better than I can about the actual program contents. The Algebra Schematic pdf is a very nice chart that explains in detail when and where each type of lesson is taught. For example when polynomials are taught (Unit 5) and when quadratic equations (Unit 8) are taught. Very nice set up and easy to follow.

I knew this program was for us when I read this on the website...
Remember, “It doesn’t have to be that hard when you use a video textbook!”

If you know me, you know I am a total math phobic! lol. To say the least! My thoughts are going crazy and around 90 mph about VideoText Interactive. This math program is the BOMB! The author Tom Clark has 46 years of experience teaching math and science, VideoText Interactive is a family affair with Tom's children, his brother and sister helping to bring the whole curriculum together. You can read more about the Clark family here on the About The Author page.

What this homeschool Momma liked about VideoText Interactive Algebra A Complete Course:

1) 3 full high school math classes for 1 money! You get Pre-Algebra, Algebra 1 and Algebra 2.
2) You can follow a 1 year, 2 year or 3 year program. So depending on the ability and needs of your student they can work at a faster or slower rate to make sure that they have the materials mastered.
3) EASY on the homeschool Momma (what more can I say about that  :O)
4) Tom Clark the author is AWESOME! He spent time talking me down off the cliff of homeschool Momma terrors! lol. What a man is all I can say!
5) Easy grading, no hoops to jump through.
6) Pretty much hands off for homeschool Momma, besides grading.
7) Wonderful people at the help line.
8) We had started out with our normal math company we had been using from the beginning and had a few struggles with me teaching it along the way. So I was really scared when we started Algebra A Complete Course from VideoText Interactive, but our homeschool young man picked right up on it and has been going strong since.
9) Our homeschool young man did 6 lessons per week (yeah, he wanted to work on Saturday too!) What on earth? lol.
10) No wasted printer paper, just print out daily worksheet, quizzes and tests. Easy on the printing budget!
11) I love that the guy on the video NEVER gets upset when the homeschool young man needs a repeat lesson or does not quite understand the lesson and needs to hear it again. That guy never sounds like a grouchy homeschool Momma who has to repeat herself! That guy is cheerful the first time he explains it and he is still cheerful the 3rd and 4th time if we have to repeat the video...lol.
12) I learned a very interesting fact from talking to Tom Clark on the phone, he told us that story problems are actually Algebra problems. No wonder the Homeschool young man struggled with story problems in the lower grades, he had not yet had Algebra. Now he is understanding them and actually likes the challenge of a good story problem. AMEN!!

What this homeschool Momma did not like about VideoText Interactive Algebra A Complete Course:

1) I love this program so much, but I did find a few things that needed tweaked. Nothing at all wrong with any of the teaching, it's high quality, laid out nicely and easy to learn.
2) The video looks a bit dated, there also needs to be more light shed on the subject. The video is very dim.
3) The solution manual seems to be in very small print, I can enlarge them, but then it's hard to scroll around the pages. If anyone knows a homeschool Momma, ya know she has bi-focals by homeschool year #3 and really needs tri-focals by homeschool year #6, but she ain't buyin' them! lol. But seriously the exponent numbers were really hard to see and sometimes I could not tell a division sign from a minus sign.
4) I would like to see the Progress Checklist be online instead of printed out, I don't know how many times we had to turn the house upside down to find that crazy sheet of paper that should have been in the homeschool Young Man's FOLDER!! But instead was nowhere to be found. lol.

What this homeschool Young Man liked about VideoText Interactive Algebra A Complete Course:

1) I liked how I could do 3 years of math in 1 year if I worked hard.
2) Made math fun!
3) Made math my favorite subject! Before we used the Spiral Method and I did not like having pages of boring math problems to do.
4) Wish homeschool Momma had bought this years ago at convention when she first saw it!
5) Glad that they have reduced the price so more homeschool kids can enjoy math.
6) I liked how the teacher made reducing fractions so much easier than the old way I learned.
7) Liked how easy it was to figure out how the program works, I just watch the video (pause to answer questions out loud/then listen to answers on video), read the course notes, do my assignment, grade it using the solutions manual, then usually a quiz the next day, after so many days a test. They even include graph paper to print out if needed.
8) Mr. Clark the author was fun to talk to on the phone.
9) Thanks to Mr. Clark I now like story problems, and the more complicated the better! I can understand them now. I use to cry in the younger grades when I struggled with them.
10) I am looking forward to the Geometry course.

What this homeschool Young Man did not like about VideoText Interactive Algebra A Complete Course:

1) I did not like the old look on the video screen.
2) I wish I could access the quizzes myself, since if Homeschool Momma was not home, Homeschool Daddy did not know the password.

So there you have it folks! An endorsement for VideoText Interactive Algebra A Complete Course, we are loving it and wish we had done this much sooner.

If you are done with Algebra and ready for Geometry, come on and check out the other TOS Crew Reviews as many received the VideoText Interactive Geometry A Complete Course that includes Geometry, Trigonometry and Pre-Calculus, 3 full high school math credits all in 1 affordable package! Just click the box below.

 

COVID-19 Emergency Schooling to Full-Time Homeschooling...

Thinking of homeschooling your child now that you got a taste of it? Don't wait until August, pull them out of school today! Here are some ideas to get you started.

1. Find out from HSLDA what the homeschooling laws are in your state and move on it today by following them. 
2. Read up on deschooling your child and work on that from now until the fall.
3. Attend a homeschool conference in your area once things return to normal (contact your state homeschool association for info). Some are holding these online right now due to the virus.
4. Limit your child/children's use of media to 1 hour per day (DVD, Texting, Internet, gaming, TV, music etc). It is very easy to fall into the trap of the electronic babysitter during times of crisis and stress.
5. Work on getting chores assigned and teaching child/children how to do them correctly.
6. Work on building relationships through games (taking turns, being polite, losing is OK).
7. Teach siblings to get along and to rely on each other.
8. Break the 'parents are dumb and friends are everything thing' mind set.
9. Work on subject matter your child struggles in (times tables, math facts, spelling, writing).
10. Teach home-ec skills (cooking, baking, laundry, cleaning, grocery shopping, making menus).
11. Teach finances (bill paying, credit card use, student loan debt, budgeting). Listen to the Dave Ramsey or Money Matters podcasts.
12. Teach your values and convictions, discuss why you are home educating.
13. Have family Bible devotions each day start with 10 minutes if this is new for your family (if you are a secular homeschool family find something to read together that adds value to your family).
14. Volunteer and have fun with it! (once the Shelter at Home is lifted)
15. This should be number #1, but it is so important I put it last. STAY HOME ALL BUT 1 DAY PER WEEK once the virus restraints are lifted. (well, you can leave for church on Sunday/Wednesday hahaha). This concept can be hard for current homeschool parents to understand, however when your children are new to homeschooling, you need to deschool which includes unlearning bad habits and stereotypes that children learned in school. Bring the family back together as a whole.
This time of deschooling is to help you get your child's heart and mind back. Kids may sleep more, getting up to catch that bus by 6:30am and not getting home until 4:30pm plus evening sports and then homework etc is VERY tiring on growing bodies. Family time helps with the transition from peer dependency to family dependency, life is not all about texting friends and hanging out at the mall. There will be time for all the other stuff as time progresses and you have your kids hearts back.

Think about how crazy EVERY PLACE will be once everyone is off of the Shelter in Place time. Help your kids learn to enjoy spending time as a family, learning to rely on one another for life long relationships. Before you know it, you will learn to Car School and will be involved in all sorts of things if you desire.

These are all suggestions you can try throughout the next 5-6 months depending on when you decide it's time to look into the academics of homeschooling and how you plan to proceed with this (unschooling, textbooks, Charlotte Mason, Eclectic etc) in a way that works best for your family. This will help you to find your groove and help your kids to settle into homeschooling.

There will be time for co-ops, homeschool groups and all that as you move along between now and the fall. Right now is the time to bring your relationship back as a family. This time also helps remove the peer group dependency and the past peer pressure issues. You may even learn a thing or two from your children about good and bad experiences that they had in their former school setting.

This is a time for you to reconnect with your children, for siblings to love each other again and to learn to look out for each other. There will be times for field trips and the library etc, but you need this time to deprogram your children from their years of sitting all day at a desk, having to raise their hand to use the restroom, throw away trash, or sharpen a pencil. Think about how your kids are hungry and thirsty all the time now that they are home due to the virus. Now think about how they must feel when they are at school all day hungry and thirsty and can't eat or drink until lunch time.

Last but not least, keep in mind that homeschooling is NOT school at home, it is not recreating the classroom in your house. We already know that classroom settings fails many children, classrooms do not work for most children. Our children are not little cookie cutter children, they are created as unique individuals by God. So, once a week during this deschooling time, head out during the school day when everyone else is trapped in their seats at school, and enjoy the park, the library, children's museum and you may just meet other homeschool families that can help you along your new journey (of course wait until the order is lifted saying that we can leave our homes first).

Remember this golden nugget, each homeschool will look different, you don't need the magic curriculum and some days, learning does not come through textbooks.

Homeschool Rooms & Homeschool Spaces

I love to look at other home educator’s schoolrooms to get ideas for our school space.

This one is from Ikea and very COOL! You can see more pictures on Confessions of a homeschooler blog at  http://www.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/blog/2011/08/our-schoolroom-on-ikea.html#comment-32408

Look how neat and orderly this is. WOW!!

Now, I will post a picture of our humble little home school area,
we use workboxes.

The Adoptive Mom Homeschooling An Only Child's version of the Workboxes, decorated using my Circut machine (love that thing!) and the Locker Talk cartridge. My Circut is my must have homeschool tool.

Using stacking drawers/bins from Hobby Lobby bought using my 40% off coupon of course!

Above is my built-in workbox from our home remodel. This space was two large windows in our dining room. Our contractor thought I was crazy when I ask him to do this, until he saw how many books we had! lol. Once he finished it and I had all the books and the drawers up there, he was pretty impressed by my idea.

This is our DREAM schoolroom! hahaha.. Yes, it is a dream, especially since our homeschooling days are numbered, might be something for a Veteran Homeschool Mom to enjoy.

I could not leave out my favorite home education sign that hangs in my dining room, the homeschool room. It’s from my friend and fellow homeschooling mom Sue. She gave it to me for Christmas a few years back, as she knows I love snowmen and I like to keep them up year round. I just love this! lol.

Moreover, yes, for those of you that don't homeschool or are new to the concept, we do take snow days off here and there. However, most often the subject matter or the conversations are just too exciting to stop for a snow day. Nevertheless, if the public school kids are outside playing or if they come knock on our front door, we do head outside for some playtime.

Homeschooling Saves Tax Dollars

A mom in your neighborhood is preparing lessons to teach her children. In the minute it takes you to read this, moms all over the USA are using their "freedoms" and investing their own money in their child's literacy, prosperity, and future. This mom does this because she knows government run schools are not working anymore. She is saving millions in tax dollars by homeschooling her child.

Pray for a homeschool mom, love on a homeschool mom, and appreciate a homeschool mom!

I love this sign!!

Schoolhouse Teachers Homeschool

http://schoolhouseteachers.com/dap/a/?a=1054&p=https://schoolhouseteachers.com/member-resources/all-courses/ (The Old Schoolhouse Magazine, owner). Yet another useful home education tool provided by http://thehomeschoolmagazine.com/.  SchoolhouseTeachers.com is set up by graded sections, pre/K & elementary, middle school and high school with drop down menus for all. You will find everything for homeschooling with topics such as logic, math, science, history, fine arts, Bible and many more electives as well as helps for the homeschool mom.

http://schoolhouseteachers.com/dap/a/?a=1054&p=https://schoolhouseteachers.com/member-resources/all-courses/ is a must for all homeschoolers, whether you are a boxed curriculum homeschooler, eclectic or unschooler this site has something for your student with 400+ classses. Our homeschool has tended towards the boxed curriculum (we have started branching out in recent years though) but it was always missing something. I’ve found what was missing and it was SchoolhouseTeachers.com, there are all sort of goodies to find on this site. 

It just so happens that my son was given an acoustic guitar as a gift and he has been getting library books on how to play the guitar, but they have been either way over his head or contained music that does not fit our family values. As we are reviewing the Old Schoolhouse magazines website SchoolhouseTeachers.com we came across the guitar lessons.

Mom & Dad have no trouble with reminding our son to practice his guitar because SchoolhouseTeachers.com is so much fun to use!

Our son has only been using the guitar lessons from Schoolhouseteachers.com for about a week and a half and by no means is he jammin’ out on the guitar, but he is making music and not just noise anymore. LOL! 

The videos are AWESOME! It's great to go back and watch them again to get the finger movements down pat.

A great feature of SchoolhouseTeachers.com site has unit for parents, it has a monthly menu feature.

Another area that I liked was the logic section. We have always struggled with teaching logic in our homeschool, so I was thrilled to see Logic on the drop down menu under middle school. I like how the lessons are set up so that my son can just go right in and get started. It has helped foster independence on his part. I know that we have a few years to go before college, but when I look at the SchoolhouseTeachers.com website, I’m thinking about how using this site will help our son out in the long run. Online college classes are the future for many of our children and what better way for them to be prepared than by teaching them in pre/k & elementary, middle school and high school with methods that they will continue to use down the road.

We plan to continue searching through all the goodies over the next year that SchoolhouseTeachers.com offers. Post and let me know what you think of the site and how it's enhanced your homeschool.
Have a great day!

New Year & New Curriculum Ideas

The NEW YEAR can be full of new ideas for your homeschool!!

I have been given permission to share these ideas with you from Mary Beth a fellow homeschooling mom, she says that the first 3 ideas came from Chris Davis of Home School Marketplace, but the rest are her own. Long before I read Mary Beth's list I had come up with a similar listing for our homeschool and it's helped me through the years to revisit the list to make sure we are on target.
Mary Beth was answering the following question.

What curriculum do you like best and why?

1. What things did you do or learn in school that have served you well
in your adult life? (Be sure to include them in your curriculum.)

2. What things did you do or learn in school that have proven to have
been a waste of time? (Don't bother with these.)

3. What do you wish someone had taught you? (Be sure to include them.)

4. There is a reason God put these children in your home. What do you
suppose He has in mind for them that you and only you can equip them
for? (This is why your homeschool shouldn't look like everybody
else's.)

5. Imagine that you have a daughter. What kind of man would you want
her to marry? How can you raise your boys to be that type of man?
Think ahead to the day your child leaves home, whether it be for
marriage, college, work, or missions. Answer the following questions:

6. What skills, values, character qualities and faith foundations do
you want your child to have in order for you to be confident that he
is ready to face the world on his own? What can you do now to take
steps toward those goals?

7. What do you not want to regret when your children leave home?
If you look over these lists, you will see that you are well on your
way to a custom-designed curriculum for your family.

We can have a fresh start right now, if things are not working, think about how you can get things working.
How are you going to change things up in your homeschool this new year?

New Blog Name Needed-Help Us To Name It

So the homeschooled young man would like to start a blog about Lego, teens, homeschooling, civil war re-enacting, college, medical school and general chit chat. This would be a nice clean place for kids to hang out and shoot the breeze over things that matter in life.

 

 

His blog needs a name? Got any ideas? We came up with Homeschool2MedSchool, but it seems kind of long. He wants to somehow incorporate homeschooling and medical school in the title. You could be the one that has the most awesome blog name idea for us! So come on and offer up your help. Let us see what we come up with.

Thanks,

Moe & The Homeschooled Young Man

Homeschoolers & The Law

 

As I ponder the above definition of homeschool, it saddens me to see that our legal rights are being chipped away in this country, in our state, at the county level and in our cities. When my homeschooler was a young lad, I never gave truancy laws a second glance, ya know, you see little kids out and about during the day with Mom. You never think much of it.

Now, as the Mom of a teenage boy, my mind thinks a bit differently.

What is your first thought when you see a group of teenage boys shooting hoops at the local park during the middle of a school day? Or a trio of teen boys walking through the mall, laughing and having a good time on a school day? "What are those hoodlums doing out of school?" What more or less would a truancy officer or police officer think? Think of that police officer alone, walking into a situation with a group of teen boys, he is going to be poised and ready for action if necessary.

Exactly, this is the reason why we need to be thinking about how truancy laws in our state, county and city could effect us.

 

If you don't think this is something to be concerned about in your homeschool, just do a google search for HSLDA truancy and see what you come up with. You will find many, many cases across our nation and you might think, ah, not a big deal, I just tell the police that I'm homeschooling. Read these cases and see the nightmares that these parents and childen have lived through. It may not be as easy as "We homeschool." It's not that easy anymore, an investigation can be opened up and you proceed from there.

Here is our real concern, this is about daytime curfews and truancy, this was a real case that a homeschool family went through, with the kids being arrested. HSLDA Court Report.

As homeschoolers it's easy for us to live in our own nice little bubble, but it's key for us to know what is going on, read the newspaper, find out what the different board meetings have on their agenda. Look for truancy, public school issues, student issues, curfew changes and anything that you can think of that looks child or school related. If you know any board members, ask them that as a homeschooler you want to know if there are any of these issues coming up to be voted on, because it's key that we know about these issues BEFORE a vote goes through.

It's easier to stop a pending law, than to change a law.

 

We must remain on guard, yet not be paranoid. Just in my state alone in less than 60 days we have had 3 truancy laws brought up, 2 of those were passed and are now in effect. We also need to look ahead, asking ourselves where do we want our homeschools to be in 5 years, 10 years, 15 years. You may have little ones that no one will question now, but one day soon they will be teens.

As the mom of a young man, I'm starting to think about my grandchildren, how sad would that be if our children's desire to homeschool their children is not possible because we did nothing to protect homeschooling laws.

We then have failed our children.  

 

 

PeopleKeys Review

We received the StudentKeys Student Binder Package from PeopleKeys which included a 3 ring binder to keep everything together and the following assessment workbooks geared towards ages 13-adult and or students in high school through college.

StudentKeys Student Binder Package includes the following workbooks, see the website for more details.

DISC Personality Style Workbook-Works to explain and show personality styles through "strengths, limitations and motivations".

Perceptual Learning Style Workbook-Allows students to find out if they are auditory, visual or kinesthetic learners.

Cognitive Thinking Style Workbook-Helps find out if your student is a literal, theoretical, intuitive or experiential learner.

Values Style Workbook-Helps the student identify Values Styles such as "loyalty, equality, personal freedom and justice."

Career Choice Workbook-This workbook helps to match students with career fields that match their styles.

Goal Setting Workbook- Helps students set goals regarding "education, career and personal development."
All this for just $49.00 complete. Below is a YouTube video for you to get more information.

I was a little concerned at the start of this review, because I thought this might be a bit above the thinking skills for my 13 year old son. But he jumped right in and started filling in the ovals with his personality traits in his DISC Personality Style Workbook. Sometimes stopping to look up a word in the dictionary such as pioneering, we knew what the word meant, but not how it related to personality style. He has some lofty career goals and the StudentKeys Student Binder Package was an AWESOME tool for him.

We worked on this together, he would fill in the ovals and then ask me what I thought of his answer. Most often we answered the same, so I feel that this StudentKeys Student Binder Package is pretty accurate in gauging where the student is in different areas of life. We had fun coming up with stories of how/why he does the things that he does, some of which drive this Homeschool Momma BANANAS!! So if your children have a tendency to drive you a bit batty on certain things, I highly suggest ordering the StudentKeys Student Binder Package, it showed me how some of my son's quirkiness could work for him on the job and in relationships.

What this Homeschool Momma liked about StudentKeys Student Binder Package by PeopleKeys:

1. Easy to use!
2. Fun!
3. Learned some interesting things about myself (I went through the booklets orally and learned a lot about myself that way)
4. Extra learning, by having to look up words in the dictionary to get their full meaning, we knew all the words, but were not sure exactly how to define them in terms that the workbook was looking for.
5. Not boring at all!
6. Learned some life skills.
7. Learned some new vocabulary.
8. Very nice customer service, I had a question and they were very helpful.
9. My favorite workbook of all was the Goal Setting Workbook, as I don't think many young people today have any idea how to set goals for themselves.

What this Homeschool Momma did not like about StudentKeys Student Binder Package by PeopleKeys:

1. I would have liked to have a bit more instructions. Starting on page 8 of the DISC Personality Style Workbook there were really no instructions besides to place a check mark if you agree that characteristic describes your personality, then really nothing more to go by. I was at a loss at to what to do after that in that book.
2. You all know I like color and flare! These books are all black and white, but work well. Just a personal dislike of mine  :O)
3. The assessments are timed and I know some people don't much care for that, but they were pretty simple to get done in the allotted time. Though as I said, we had to look up a few words in the dictionary to find out the meaning that went along with the assessment we were working on.

What this Homeschool Young Man liked about StudentKeys Student Binder Package by PeopleKeys:

1) I liked how it was so true.
2) I learned a lot about myself.
3) It was easy to do.
4) It was a lot of fun to learn more about myself.
5) My favorite workbook was the Perceptual Learning Style Workbook, because it helped explain to my mom the way I learn.
6) I learned some better study habits that fit my learning style, like listening and repeating information to myself.
7) My Mom figured out why I like to touch and handle things while I am learning.

What this Homeschool Young Man did not like about StudentKeys Student Binder Package by PeopleKeys:

1) There could have been more instructions.
2) I had to look up several words in the dictionary such as systematic, analytical, methodical and experiential thinker.
3) Taking the assessments was fun but made my brain tired. So I would have your student take these assessments when they are fresh and well rested.
4) In the Learning Style Workbook on page 16, there is a grammar mistake in the last paragraph (the question reads) "Was it a quiet or did you have music?" I'm a stickler for grammar errors!

This review was a real life changer for us, I was surprised by a few things and not surprised by some. Using the StudentKeys Student Binder Package helped us both learn some new ideas for the school year. Please click the bottom box below to see what other great products the TOS Review Crew got to try out from PeopleKeys.

You know you're a homeschooler when . . .

I got this in an email from Sonlight and thought I would share, it's a really good laugh!
Happy Labor Day!

Someone started a thread on a Sonlight humor forum: "You know you're a homeschooler when . . . ." I laughed out loud at some of the responses. They ring so TRUE.

You know you're a homeschooler when . . .

. . . your kids are in the kiddie pool playing Lewis and Clark, paddling down the river with lacrosse sticks. -Jen

. . . you find yourself and your guests at your birthday party, at 10pm, embroiled in a lively discussion of the heart's size and function . . . with your five year old, who just had to get out of bed and ask because she couldn't sleep until she knew! -Eddie

. . . people ask to borrow books from you because it's closer than the library with almost as varied a collection. -Christine

. . . your 6-year-old's Christmas list reads: Liquid Nitrogen, Magnets, Rock Tumbler, Soil PH meter! -corrabelle

. . . your school uniform is pajamas. -home4learning

. . . you go to the greenhouse to buy herbs and start talking to the kids about the different kinds of plants. Then one of the workers asks if you work there! -Donna

. . . your daughter's dance bag has more books than dance shoes in it. -Carla

. . . you don't think about (but your friends are all talking about) school registration next year—or how many days until you go back to school. -Carrie

. . . the doctor's/dentist's/hairdresser's office is happy to schedule your child's appointment because you don't want one after 3pm or during a school holiday. Or you can take advantage of off-season rates because you make your own school holidays. -Carla

. . . the neighbor kids come over to play with your math manipulatives. -kmsouth82

. . . your two kids are playing William Wilberforce in the backyard with their friends and they are the only ones who aren't confused. -storybook mum

. . . you suggest to your 7-year-old that he could pretend to be king and sister could be the queen and he says, "Naw, I'd rather be Alexander the Great. He had an entire empire." -SewLittleTime

Have you been homeschooling for some time? Perhaps you have a story that "explains" when you know you're a homeschooler? I'd love to hear from you. Feel free to email me at president@sonlight.com.

How American Homeschoolers Measure Up

Source: TopMastersInEducation.com

How To Make Your Homeschool Day Easier?

An easier homeschool day? How can it be?

 

Another great blog post from www.hsclassroom.net 10 Ways To Make Your Homeschooling Days Easier

I am stealing several of these ideas!!

 

Moe's Top 10 Reasons Why...

Moe's Top 10 Reasons Why...You Need To Be A Part Of Your State's Home Education Association.

 

Are you a part of your states home education association? If not you should be! Ask yourself why you are or why you are not.
As homeschoolers we like to be different and be on our own...haha...do I lie? NOT!

In the case of state home education associations we have strength in numbers. Here are just a few things that your state home education association can and should offer you.

1) Information on changing homeschool laws and what we can do about them.
2) An annual home education state convention.
3) A listing of local homeschool groups throughout your state for you to join.
4) Help and encouragement for homeschoolers at different stages (beginner, grade school, junior high, high school, special needs)
5) Information about local and state events.
6) Updates on things like Common Core, graduation requirements, drivers ed and lots more.
7) Tips for preparing for each new stage of homeschooling.
8) Ideas for passing on the baton of homeschooling from you to your children's children.
9) TONS of resources for FREE!
10) MUCH MORE!

So what are you waiting for? Do a GOOGLE search for your state's homeschool association to see what you have been missing out on!

Notgrass Company Homeschool Review

As part of the TOS Review crew we received five ebooks in the series from Notgrass Company which included the physical book Proverbs and the following Ebooks: Draw to Learn Acts, Draw to Learn Proverbs, Draw to Learn Psalms, Draw to Learn the Letters of Paul, and the Draw to Learn the Life of Jesus.

 

I must say that this was one of the toughest reviews that we have been given to do. My son is not an artsy type of person, he does not enjoy drawing or even doodling. I thought maybe this would be a review that would change those things, but it did not. When he did draw he thought his drawings looked babyish and like stick figures, he was quite embarrassed by his drawings. So please as you read my review be thinking of your own child and how they may enjoy the Draw to Learn K-8 series in your homeschool. Kids and adults would be a good fit for this product.

Here is a bit of history on the Notgrass Company, they are a family owned and operated business that started back in 1999. They are meeting the needs of homeschooling families by providing Bible based curriculum that are easy to use by homeschooling parents. My favorite quote from the website is "We are proud of you for making the choice to homeschool, and we believe that you can be successful. Why are we so confident? Because we believe in God who daily provides everything we need to do what He asks us to do. You are on a wonderful adventure. Don’t forget to enjoy the ride!" This is so true and from reading their website and using their products I can tell you that the Notgrass Company truly cares about our home educating families.

The Notgrass Company website has some fun things to check out too! Besides links to all their K-high school materials, they also have a section with articles, new product news, family activities,  and much more.

We used the Draw to Learn K-8 series as part of our daily devotions, I was very excited about reviewing the Notgrass Company products and using the sketch book, since we were going through a Proverbs devotional book during our family devotions time. I thought it would tie right in. It did tie in perfectly, but I had a reluctant drawer. The materials are spot on Biblically and are easy to read and understand. In the back of my mind I wish that we had also been given the Learn to Draw, I think that might have been helpful to my not artsy son. I think that if your child does NOT have perfectionist tendencies they will be happy just drawing away on the pages.

Using the Notgrass Company's Draw to Learn K-8 homeschool art curriculum I found that it helped our son to think more concretely about the Bible passages that we read in Proverbs through using his imagination in his drawings. Ray and Charlene Notgrass have done an awesome job at bringing the book of Proverbs alive through the Draw to Learn series.

Below are the Ebooks that we were given during this TOS review.

Ebook $9.95



Ebook $9.95

Ebook $9.95

Ebook $9.95

The instructions for use are very simple and easy to use. The authors offer up these suggestions.

WORK DILIGENTLY
Each lesson should take 45 minutes or longer. They ask that you spend time making your drawings,
add details and show the surroundings.
USE COLOR
Notgrass Company recommends purchasing Prismacolor Thick Lead brand colored pencils by Sanford (these are a bit pricey so be sure to use a 40% off coupon from your favorite craft store  :O)  I have used these myself and they are wonderful, I would put the Prismacolor pencils away after each use and let the kids use the cheap-o colored pencils for other stuff. I think sometimes it makes art time fun when we as homeschool moms bring out the "special" tools of the trade.
USE A MODEL OR A PICTURE
They recommend using real objects, people and scenery to look at while drawing, instead of just your imagination. I think this was a major issue with us in my son just wanting to use his vivid imagination.
DRAW PEOPLE
The authors tell you that you can draw "realistic" people, "cartoon style" or "stick people", this was a hard concept for my 13 year old as he was embarrassed by his drawings being so childlike.
FILL UP THE FRAME
They ask that you use the entire drawing box for your art work.
PROTECT YOUR DRAWING SURFACE
Put a piece of heavy paper behind your sketch book page so that you don't get indentations from drawing or coloring on to your next sketch page.
SKETCH FIRST
The authors explain that you should sketch your drawing in first, using a light hand, then darkened up the drawings as you go. My son was not much of a sketcher, he would just start drawing away.
PREPARE FOR TOMORROW
Look over the lesson for tomorrow to see if you need any props or pictures to guide you.
HAVE FUN
The authors tell you to "always keep a sense of wonder at God's amazing power."

You know I am always looking to see how one subject matter can lead into another subject? Well you have that right here with the Draw to Learn K-8 series, you can do further Bible study with older students, you can work on handwriting by copying the Bible verses each day, work on art skills which have been lacking in our homeschool, work on science as the authors explain "when you make drawings about crops, read a book about farming." As for history, geography and math by researching about weights and measures, of today and in Bible times. Creative writing can be worked on through writing stories or research papers on the materials being studied. You can also work on Notebooking and Unit Studies using the materials from the Notgrass Company. As well as character studies. So I am thinking that we are covering a wide variety of subject matter here with JUST ONE BOOK! The Draw to Learn K-8 series Proverbs book retails for just $14.95 for the physical book. The Ebook is just $9.95 and the exciting thing about the Ebook is that you OWN IT! You can make as many copies as you want for use in your household. So if you have 5 children, you do not need to buy 5 Ebooks, you can legally make copies of the Ebooks for each of your children.

Even though this review as not the best fit for our family I do hope that you will give the Notgrass Company a try, some good has come out of this TOS review for us, I see that we are lacking in the art department and need to work on that.
Click below to see what my buddies over on the TOS Review crew thought of the products that they had the privilege to review from the Notgrass Company.