Making Literature Fun - Review

Ever wish you could get your kids to reach for a book instead of the remote?  Susan Evans' one hour audio workshop, Making Literature Fun, is bursting at the seams with ideas to:

- make literature come alive for your children 

- improve your child's reading level

- quiet your children for reading

Raised in Guatemala, Susan earned her Bachelor's degree in English in the United States, and has taught in public schools here and in London, England, where she was also a middle school Drama director.  In this live recording, Susan describes how to evaluate and choose good books; how to create experiences to help children internalize what they've read; gives examples from her own homeschool experiences with her four children.

Ms. Evans discusses the pros and cons of "watching the movie" versus "reading the book".  She encourages regular reading aloud by both parents and students.  I was reminded to change my tone of voice to indicate different characters in the book I'm reading from, and to remember to read with more dramatic effect.  When I began to do this during our current reading of "War Horse", my 9 year old son suddenly started really listening, and would beg for another chapter.  As suggested, I felt perfectly comfortable making him wait for the next day, and sure enough, his anticipation was peaked and he sat and listened attentively.  A number of books are recommended by name in the course of Susan's presentation.  She supports re-enacting as an enriching supplement to good reading and she shows how to link the great books your children are reading to the other subjects they are studying.

In everything she does, Evans gives praise and glory to her Creator, and emphasizes and encourages a close, personal relationship with God as the foundation to excellent parenting and homeschooling.  I love the relaxed, refreshing style in which she presents her information.  Her voice has a pleasant tone and unhurried cadence.  I came away from the audio with the feeling of having just had an uplifting discussion with a friend, rather than a talking down from a stuffy professional.  I immediately began applying many of her suggestions in my own homeschool, with happy results.

In addition to Making Literature Fun $5.50, Susan Evans has a number of other excellent audio and video products available for download.  All of her products are backed by a 60 day money-back guarantee.  The MP3 files were a snap to download and add to my Ipod.  For less than the price of a Teacher's Manual, you can breathe new life into your homeschool and equip your children with a love of reading for life.  Now go out and make literature fun!

I received a free copy of Making Literature Fun to listen to and post my thoughts.  No other compensation was received for this review.

Lessons from the Hen House - Review

You can count your chickens before they're hatched! Lessons From The Hen House is all about hands on learning. Even if you don't have a back yard coop, there are plenty of lesson ideas in this clever e-booklet to keep your students engaged. I wish I had thought of this years ago, when I was homeschooling my older children. Carol Alexander seamlessly incorporates math, science, language, literature, geography, art, home economics, business, and research skills into 17 pages of lesson plans, PLUS over 30 vocabulary words, creating a curriculum that can be used with all your students, for a day, a week, or a month, depending on how in-depth you want to go with it.

A few of the ideas will be perfect for homesteading families who have chickens, but most of the lessons are ideal for city-dwellers, too. Pick up a few free hatchery catalogs, or do a quick web search for information. Lots of links are included to other online resources and suggested books to read.

Intermediate and advanced lessons include starting up a related business (real or hypothetical), writing ad copy, designing a poultry catalog, various aspects of running a poultry business, disease, dissection and egg hatching.

Lessons are arranged for easy reference. Elementary lessons come first, then intermediate, then high school, and are grouped according to subject: math, language, science, etc.

This is an awesome resource for 4H or FFA leaders and participants.

All necessary materials are included or linked, with suggested research resources also listed. Plenty of room is left for the parent to add in their own preferred research materials. The booklet can be printed out, or used on the computer or an e-reader that supports PDF. It works great on my iPod with iBooks.

Other materials that might be helpful are: 3x5 cards, pencils, paper, storybooks and reference books on poultry, a magnifying glass and/or microscope for some of the science experiments, eggs, bowl of water, food coloring. I would also recommend visiting the hatchery links and requesting catalogs before beginning the study, especially if your family does not have their own chickens, as they make most of the lessons much easier.

My son was especially interested in the science experiments. He took great pains to examine several feathers under his microscope and sketch his findings. Then he had to test all our eggs for freshness, by seeing if they floated or sank in a bowl of water. We are saving the egg-coloring and crushed eggshell collages for the Easter eggs.

For roughly ten years, Carol and her family have endeavored to ‘live off the land.’ On their modest acreage, they grow extensive gardens and raise various animals for milk and meat. Carol has been homeschooling her 6 children since 1993. 3 have graduated.

Lessons from the Homestead is also a “book in process.” Coming out one section at a time, Carol is producing a full-fledged “learning by living” curriculum centered around life on the homestead. The first section, Lessons from the Seed Catalog has been released and is available at the Lessons From The Homestead website. Lessons From The Henhouse, part 2, is also now available for immediate download at the same site, for only $3.99. Subsequent parts will cover different areas of the farm/homestead. Ms. Alexander offers a 10 day money back guarantee if you are not satisfied with the lesson plans.

I received a free copy of Lessons From The Henhouse to try out and share my thoughts. No other compensation was received for this review.

Digital Frog - Luring Children Into Science

Digital Frog is a Canada based company that produces award winning CD's using virtual reality software.  The name derives from their first project, a virtual frog dissection.  We received their Digital Field Trip series to review and were, words fail me, delighted.  According to Digital Frog, "Our computer-based LEARNing tools:  •Lure the user into the subject
                                                   •Encourage inquiry, exploration and discovery
                                                   •Actively involve students in meaningful learning
                                                   •Reinforce with positive feedback
                                                   •Nourish a lifelong love of the subject." and they sure do a good job of it. 

We tried running the programs off the CD, but the pictures were very pixellated and we did not get the audio.  So we installed the CD on our hard drive and then proceeded to run the program and were quite pleased.  The program is user friendly and full of features.

Our first virtual Field Trip was to "The Wetlands".  This fit right into our Tour of the Continents, as we are currently studying North America, and the wetlands we toured was at Cloud Lake, in Algonquin Park, Ontario, Canada.  We were able to study the maps and geographically locate first Canada, then Ontario, the park, and Cloud Lake.  Once at the site, there were numerous "posts" to navigate and explore.  We could click on almost any word in the "field notes" for definition, and on blue highlighted words for expanded information.  Some screens have snapshots of plants, wildlife and landscape to click through, others have videos to watch.  The part with the wolf had a wolf howl audio that had us howling with delight!  We clicked on pictures to see larger versions.  In addition to each field trip, there are games and other activities.  We played the "Bog Food Game", which reinforced learning about the food chain and interdependence.  My second grader was able to come back and review his favorite parts of the field trips independently, so I venture to say that an average seven year old could enjoy each field trip with very little assisstance.  I found them so interesting that I really enjoyed sitting and doing some navigation myself. 

The Digital Frog Website also offers a FREE "Frogger Club", whose members can get free demos, discounts and extra printables, in addition to other goodies.  The Frog Blog, also freely available at the website, features additional pictures, posts, videos and more.

At $60 each or $125 for all three field trips on CD, this series is a bargain.  Each field trip can be a Unit Study in itself, with a little math supplementation.  They can be adapted for all ages kindergarten through high school, using more of the features for older children and less for younger.  Each field trip has loads of pictures, descriptions, videos, animation, interactive games and field notes.  They can be used year after year to add depth and breadth to your student's studies.

Other products available from Digital Frog are the frog dissection CD, Digital Frog 2.5 for $85, and Science Matrix: Cell Structure and Function CD for $40.  Keeping their focus on biology and ecology,  it's likely that Digital Frog will continue to make science addicting for students for years to come.


We received one CD with all 3 field trips for no charge, in exchange for publishing our opinions.  No other compensation was received.

See what other Homeschool Crewmates are saying about this product:  Digital Frog - Homeschool Crew

Review: Travel the World!

What better way to spend the long, hot summer than to "Travel the World"?!

We're still on summer break, but as we gather things together for our school year, we can't resist taking a peek inside.  This is my first review as a member of The Old Schoolhouse Homeschool Crew, and luckily, I am familiar with the format of this unit study, having used one in this same style last year.

  This is an excellent mini-unit study that provides an introduction to world geography. It starts with basic information about maps and the globe, explanations of longitude and latitude and compass orientation. Next the student is oriented to the continents and oceans, and finally there is a brief study of each of the continents in turn. This mini-unit study comes at a timely moment, as my second grader will be "touring" the continents this year as part of his geography/social studies curriculum. We had just started experimenting with lapbooking at the end of last year, so we are looking forward to the lapbooking activities included and exploring new ideas for our lapbook for this study.


Designed for grades 1-8, Travel the World also includes an additional high-school expansion section, to make it suitable for all ages. Links in the text connect to websites for further explanation of new terms and concepts, such as equator, axis, Australia, Africa as well as games and activities related to the content. Printable activities include a Word Scramble, Fill in the Blanks, puzzles, and acrostic. Two printable lapbooking activities are included, with links to helpful info on completing a lapbook, even if you've never made one before. Numerous coloring and copywork pages are built in, both manuscript and cursive. Recipes are included for kitchen learning, also answer keys and additional resources.

Although this can be used as a "print and plop" unit study, we have found in using other works by this publisher, that the internet links, which include videos and various educational websites, can be quite helpful and enriching, providing a break from typical seatwork.


Travel the World can be used as a stand-alone substitute for your regular curriculum, as it covers nearly all the required subjects. You may still need to use your regular math book, unless you are particularly talented at putting together related math activities for your student. Also, music and foreign language are not built into this particular unit study. Bible quotes are liberally dispersed throughout the pages, but aside from that, there is no specific religious objective, so parents can tailor further religious connections to their own beliefs. Reading, spelling, writing, and language arts are covered through the text, links, and printable worksheets. Science and history are fulfilled in the text and links, and art in the printables and lapbooking activities. Needless to say, this is primarily a geography study, so the social studies/geography requirements encompass the entire unit.

This e-book can be purchased on it's own to supplement the Old Schoolhouse Planner.  The planner is not necessary to use this unit study.  Other modules available include Let Freedom Ring-June 2009 module, Let's be Scientists-December 2008 module, and many more.
 Read the Homeschool Crew's blog on Travel the World

The Old Schoolhouse Magazine, LLC

The SchoolHouse Planner - Travel the World! (June 2010 Module)
http://www.thehomeschoolmagazine.com/

$7.95 per module

Disclaimer:  This product was received free of charge for review purposes.  No other compensation was received for this review.

Expedition Australia!

"Expedition Australia"
Download n Go Series
by Amanda Bennett and The Old Schoolhouse
P.O. Box 8426, Gray, TN 37615
1-888-718-HOME
http://www.thehomeschoolmagazine.com/

Just download this ebook and head for Australia because everything's ready to go. Laid out in a five-day format, all links and activities are included for lapbooking, videos, suggested books and worksheets. Reading, spelling, vocabulary, science, geography, art, math and social studies are incorporated each day, along with a little music and fun and games. Did I mention FUN?! This Unit Study is best employed using the PDF to access all the links, an internet connection, and a printout of the ebook for student activities.

Designed for ages 4-10, older students can use it as a basis for a more detailed study, taking the science and research a bit further and supplementing grade level math. Minimal supplies are required for the lapbooking activities - glue, scissors, pencils and markers or crayons. We used staples instead of the brads for making the mini-books. I wanted to try loading it on the Itouch, to make it even more portable, but didn't get to it.

My six year old son is not very fussy with his artwork, but he did enjoy mapping out the Great Barrier reef, Canberra, Perth, the Great Victorian Desert and the Oceans surrounding the continent. Uluru Rock in particular made an impression on him, maybe because he liked to draw it. Koalas were, by far, his favorite animal of the week, and he now understands words like marsupial, aborigine, outback and constellation. He enjoyed learning how to read the thermometer and more clock-reading practice as we researched and compared times and temperatures in Australia with our own town. We also marvelled at the different stars visible in the Australian night sky as compared to what we see here in Arizona. Our nature walks took on new meaning as we compared our high-desert land with parts of the Australian outback.

The Download and Go series is the most user-friendly of the Unit Studies we have tried to date. There are links on each page for activities included in the back of the ebook, with a link from the activity back to the page you were on. There are also family fun/party ideas for an end-of-unit celebration, as well as a Certificate of Exploration. Extra study links are also included at the end of the unit. At only $7.95 for over 70 pages of fun learning, we are looking forward to trying out some of the other 15 titles in the series.

I Wanna Be a Firefighter!

This past month at the Homestead School we've been changing things up a bit.  We've taken a break from our normal classroom routine to do some in-depth studies on individual topics.  This is called the Unit Study method, and incoporating the 3R's, science and religion into a Unit Study is quite a challenge.  Luckily, we had some help from our friends at The Old Schoolhouse, and we would like to share our experience with the curriculum we obtained from them for our adventure.

"When I Grow Up, I Want to be a Firefighter"

Wanna Be Series - Ebook, PDF

The Old Schoolhouse Magazine
P.O. Box 8426, Gray, TN 37615
1-888-718-HOME
http://www.thehomeschoolmagazine.com/

Being a newbie at the unit study method, I printed out this colorful Ebook and just started right in with my 6 year old son. There is a LOT of reading at the beginning, which I now realize I should have broken up into several daily sections and interspersed with the other subjects and internet activities. Needless to say, our first run was not as fun as it could have been. After I took a better look at the table of contents, I began marking different pages to do each day for math, science, copywork, etc., and the unit proceeded more smoothly. The text provides a balance of reading, vocabulary, spelling, ASL finger spelling, math, science, social studies, geography, handwriting and scripture verses.

We learned the history of firefighting from bucket brigades to the early days of fire insurance.  A firefighter tells what it's like to work an average shift, as well as how to become a firefighter and how much firefighters get paid in different parts of the United States.  We also learned about Wilshire the Firehouse Dog, and the role dogs play in helping firefighters.  We learned more about robots and robotic arms, which we had opportunity to work with on a previous field trip.  We did not have a chance to build our own robotic arm model, but the supplies were simple and we did have them on hand.

I am also a newbie at lapbooking, and did not think to make a lapbook to go with this unit. It does not include suggestions or activities for lapbooking, but it would be easy enough to modify for that activity and I definitely recommend it. Especially for active, curious 6 year old boys. It breaks up the tedium of reading and worksheets and gets them cutting, pasting, coloring, drawing, and creating, thereby more actively participating in the learning process.

Although this series is written for ages 4-10, it contains so much detailed information that it could be easily modified for older students. We felt the need to supplement this particular unit with extra math, grade level reading with some of the suggested books, and searching you-tube or elsewhere for appropriate videos.

All basic materials are included with "I Want to be a Firefighter". If desired, additional materials can be gathered together for suggested science projects, activities and lapbooking. Quizzes, puzzles, coloring pages, worksheets and answer keys are included. The internet is not necessary to get the full benefit of this unit study, but makes it more interesting. Useful websites are listed in the back of the ebook; one could also search for additional sites, videos and activities to liven up the presentation. Parents will want to acquire appropriate supplementary books from library, arrange a possible field trip to a fire station, or a visit with firefighters.

With over 70 pages of detailed information, this Unit Study is well worth the price of $8.95.

Other titles in the series:
Veterinarian, Chef, Military, Pilot, Doctor, Police Officer, Missionary, Artist, Farmer