Golden Prairie Press--TOS Review

Golden Prairie Press is an online business started by Amy Puetz. Her first book was a historical costume book and then later she wrote other historical books with a Christian worldview. Amy Puez, the author, enjoys telling stories of people who impacted their generation.

Amy Puetz is a homeschool graduate who loves history. Here's a little background written by Amy herself: "When I was a teenager if anyone had told me that one day I would write books I would have laughed in their face. Me a writer? You’ve got to be kidding! But sometime God opens up a door that we would never have imagined going through on our own. That’s what happened to me in writing. My ambition was to be an archeologist but during my high school years I began experiencing unbearable fatigue and pain. As I approached graduation I realized that I needed to rethink my plans for the future. The Lord led me to take a correspondence course to become a computer graphic designer. After completing the course I was hit with a most sensational idea--write a historical costume book! This book combined several of my passions--history, sewing, designing, and photography. Since then I’ve built up a business selling historical items and writing historical books."

We were able to review Ten girls From History e-book and I have to say that my 12 year old, history loving, love-to-read daughter absolutely adored this book! This book was written in a way that is very engaging for the reader and captivates the audience while going through the accounts of ten, brave girls throughout history. When previewing this book for my daughter, I immediately noticed that I'd only heard of a few of these girls or remembered their stories. That fact alone made me very aware that I didn't love history when I was in school. My own curiosity was peaked so I read this e-book as well as my daughter. We were both captivated by the stories, the way it was written kept us coming back for more.

See if you recognize any of these girls from history:

1. Cofachiqui
2. Madeleine De Vercheres
3. Dorothy Quincy
4. Molly Pitcher
5. Elizabeth Van Lew
6. Ida Lewis
7. Clara Barton
8. Virginia Reed
9. Louisa May Alcott
10. Clara Morris

For any girl who loves history, I highly recommend this book. I also recommend it for people like me...I didn't enjoy history in school, therefore I'm curious about the things I missed out on. This was an intriguing (and informative) read!

 

If any (or ALL!) of these books look interesting to you, you can still get in on the back-to-school sale. Be sure to go over to Golden Prairie Press by tomorrow (9/1/12) and take advantage of the sale prices.

To see what my fellow Crew Mates had to say about Golden Prairie Press visit the Homeschool Crew Blog to read more.

**Disclosure: My review and opinion written in this post is entirely my own. This product was provided to me for free in exchange for my review as a member of the 2012 The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Homeschool Crew.

Apologia, I Don't Have Enough Faith To Be An Athiest--TOS Review

Apologia is a familiar name to most homeschooling families. I personally enjoy their curriculum because their science and worldview curriculum are written from a Christian perspective. I was able to review their newest product, I Don't Have Enough Faith To Be An Atheist. This book can be used as a curriculum for high school but I reviewed it personally as an "adult student." You can read a sample of the book here to determine the voice in which it's written.

 

Here's a little background on the authors (taken from the website):

"Norman Geisler and Frank Turek (the authors) argue that Christianity is not only more reasonable than all other belief systems, but is indeed more rational than unbelief itself. With conviction and clear thinking, Geisler and Turek guide readers through some of the traditional, tested arguments for the existence of a creator God. They move into an examination of the source of morality and the reliability of the New Testament accounts concerning Jesus. The final section of the book deals with a detailed investigation of the claims of Christ. This volume will be an interesting read for those skeptical about Christianity, as well as a helpful resource for Christians seeking to articulate a more sophisticated defense of their faith." 

I found this to be a fascinating read. I was a bit skeptical and unsure at first on what to expect, mostly because of the title. But, I learned long ago not to judge a book by its cover. The topics in this book discussed questions or uncertainties I've had for many years. Even though I grew up going to church, the older I got the more questions I seemed to have about my own personal faith and why I believed the things I said I believed. 

If your curious about this book and if it's right for you and your family, check out the Table of Contents.  I really did enjoy the book in it's entirety but the chapters "Why Should Anyone Believe Anything At All" and "The Top 10 Reasons We Know The New Testament Writers Told The Truth" were my favorites. I feel these topics (among others discussed) have helped me to to become more confident in how I approach and talk to non-Christians.

 

Along with the book to review, I also received a workbook companion. This is where things became a curriculum and not just a good book to add to one's collection. The workbook is extremely comprehensive in nature and made each chapter "sink in" at a deeper level. 

 

The sections involved in working through each chapter include examples such as: key topics, key terms used, questions that grab your mind, famous people in Christian history, and much more.  When using this as a course, you or your student will "tackle the question of absolute truth, demolish the follies of postmodernism, debunk moral relativism, and march logically and surely toward the inescapable truths of the Christian faith."

The book costs $16.00, and the workbook costs $33.00. This set seems to be a popular item (I can see why!) so be sure to check back if you find it unavailable. 

To see what my fellow Crew Mates had to say about Apologia, I Don't Have Enough Faith To Be An Athiest visit the Homeschool Crew Blog to read more.

**Disclosure: My review and opinion written in this post is entirely my own. This product was provided to me for free in exchange for my review as a member of the 2012 The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Homeschool Crew.

Vocabulary Spelling City--TOS Review

 

Vocabulary SpellingCITY.com is an interactive game-based website that will help your Elementary, Middle, and High School Student with their Vocabulary, Spelling, Writing, Parts of Speech, Handwriting, Alphabetical Order. I was all about this review, the kids on the other hand weren't so sure. Even though they were skeptical, they actually enjoyed using this program. Anything to help in this area and make it fun is a huge bonus for this family!

The creators of Vocabulary SpellingCITY.com offered us a one year premium membership to use in our homeschool for the review. I'm super grateful for this because now we can continue on and use this throughout our school year. I have 2 kiddos who have had a hard time with alphabetical order so I'm excited to continually use this resource. Another child has a hard time with the parts of speech and yet another child despises handwriting. I think Vocabulary SpellingCITY was made for us!

Another thing I enjoyed in this program were the training videos. These videos help to explain things in a video format, this is customer service at its finest. Talk about user friendly!

Visit the Vocabulary SpellingCITY website for information on Classroom or School pricing. Premium Memberships for homeschooling families is available for $29.99 a year and can be used for up to 5 children.

To see what my fellow Crew Mates had to say about Vocabulary Spelling City, visit the Homeschool Crew Blog to read more.

**Disclosure: My review and opinion written in this post is entirely my own. This product was provided to me for free in exchange for my review as a member of the 2012 The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Homeschool Crew.

Vocab Videos--TOS Review

 

Vocab Videos uses short videos to illustrate the meanings of 500 high value, frequently tested (SAT, ACT and junior high/high school) vocabulary words. In addition to vocabulary videos featuring entertaining characters and outrageous plot lines, the website also has extensive review material found in the form of digital quizzes (as well as other forms explained below).

We were set up with the Small Educators Subscription to review, this subscription offered us the ability to monitor student progress, access all videos and study material, and the ability to create individual student accounts. Our teacher's account allowed me to register my kiddos for their own individual Vocab Videos accounts, I was able to monitor their progress by viewing the student quiz scores and completed worksheets. Below is an example of the teacher's dashboard:

Vocab Videos also uses a flashcard maker and digital worksheets to enhance sentence writing and practice the use of synonyms and mnemonics. Crossword puzzles, an extensive glossary and teacher tracking tools all combine to further student success. Below is an example of a flashcard you might see when using this program:

Student Subscriptions are available in 6-month and 12-month subscriptions. If you were to purchase a yearly subscription it is available for $74.99.  A single student subscription is available for $39.99 a year. Please visit the VocabVideos.com for more information and details. Vocab Videos offers a one month free trial so be sure to check that out.

One thing that didn't work well for our family was the content of the videos. While the information and form was good (and made sense), we had a hard time with phrases used such as "Oh my God" and "Oh God" when the actors were playing out the scene. Also in the videos that showcased co-workers and their interaction with a female co-worker, we found to be inappropriate according to our family's belief system. The men were "eyeing up" the female co-worker and calling her "fine." We are trying to raise our children with Godly character traits and we found these videos to not portray such traits. After watching a few and allowing my older children to see some "tamed down" videos to get the point across of how this program was designed, we stopped watching the videos and focused on the other things within the program.

To see what my fellow Crew Mates had to say about Vocab Videos, visit the Homeschool Crew Blog to read more.

**Disclosure: My review and opinion written in this post is entirely my own. This product was provided to me for free in exchange for my review as a member of the 2012 The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Homeschool Crew.

Thomas Jefferson Education--TOS Review

We were able to review A Thomas Jefferson Education, an amazing and comprehensive resource! A Thomas Jefferson Education wants you, the parent, to experience the joy of helping each student discover, develop and polish his/her genius. This is the essence and very definition of great education.
A Thomas Jefferson Education encourages parents to apply the 7 keys of Teaching:

1. Classics, Not Textbooks
2. Mentors, Not Professors
3. Inspire, Not Require
4. Structure Time, Not Content
5. Simplicity, Not Complexity
6. Quality, Not Conformity
7. You, Not Them

to help you educate your children to their fullest potential. To read more about the 7 Keys to Great Teaching, click here. Getting to know the ins and out of this resource honestly blew me away. I was amazed at what was offered. The website not only gave me tons of background on the founders but also what I needed to do to get started and work my way around the site.

 

This Week In History, the Thomas Jefferson Education’s subscription program (one of my favorite features!), delivers new lessons to your email inbox each week. Each week full of pictures, links and videos to help you educate your child to their full potential. The program costs $9.99 a month and delivers the following benefits to you the homeschooling parent:

• relieves fear, stress and burnout
• energizes your kid-school
• fills in the gaps
• cultivates cultural literacy
• facilitates state or provincial compliance
• correlates resources for co-ops, classrooms and family learning
• harnesses the power of technology in a classical leadership education
• harmonizes with Unschooling, Charlotte Mason, Montessori, Trivium/Quadrivium, IEW, eclectic, etc.
• delivers new ideas and areas of learning to you and your child
• instigates discussions and projects that expand wisdom and understanding
• connects the subject areas–from music to math, from geography to world religions, from hobbies to science projects, etc.
• motivates you and your students to greater excellence

This Week In History was one of my favorite features, by far! The two words that come to mind are comprehensive and FUN! As an example of this week in history (August 9-15, 2012), the construction of the Leaning Tower of Pisa began in the year 1173.  The site gave me pictures, background information, resource links to learn more about the Tower, activity ideas and suggestions for writing and discussion. All of the work was done for me and left my family with FUN and time to explore! More dates/facts were given for this week, each one complete with pictures, background information and lists of resources.

The cost of the program may seem a bit steep but from what we've used during this review period, it is WORTH EVERY PENNY! I am pleased to say we will be incorporating this resource into our school year this year. Thank you Thomas Jefferson Education for helping me to make learning fun in our homeschool!

 

To view a sample week click here. To see what my fellow Crew Mates had to say about Thomas Jefferson Education, visit the Homeschool Crew Blog to read more.

**Disclosure: My review and opinion written in this post is entirely my own. This product was provided to me for free in exchange for my review as a member of the 2011-2012 The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Homeschool Crew.

Math Made Easy--TOS Review

 

Math Made Easy is a simple workbook set designed to help your kids master the basics of addition, without using their fingers, in just six short weeks. We reviewed the addition package and it's primarily for children in the 1st-2nd grade range (but has been used with successfully with some kindergartners and special needs kids of various ages).

 

Each set sells for $24.95 and the addition book includes the following:

• Philosophy
• Lesson Plans
• Pre and Post Tests
• Zeroes and Ones
• Addition Table
• Weekly Guide Sheet
• Six Weeks of Daily Activity Sheets
• Addition Reviews
• Games
• Flash Cards

The activities in this book are fun and like a "project" My 1st grader is all about projects so she didn't mind doing these math worksheets at all! Each week included addition drills, matching up the question with the correct answer, coloring sheets (after finding the answer, the correct color was indicated). There were cut and paste puzzle type activities and "break the code" type activities. This book was the perfect level for my first grader and she enjoyed every day's activity.

The back of the book provided the games (printed on cardstock) as well as the flash cards. We had fun "laminating" these with contact paper so they would stay in good shape for the next child. Everything was presented in a simple yet effective way, we REALLY enjoyed using Math Made Easy!
 

To see what my fellow Crew Mates had to say about Math Made Easy, visit the Homeschool Crew Blog to read more.

**Disclosure: My review and opinion written in this post is entirely my own. This product was provided to me for free in exchange for my review as a member of the 2011-2012 The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Homeschool Crew.

King Alfred's English--TOS Review

 King Alfred’s English: A History of the Language We Speak and Why We Should Be Glad We Do was written by Laurie J. White as a way to bring the history of our language to students in grades 7 through 12 in a fun and engaging manner.

Laurie fell in love with the history of the English language after taking it as a college course; it made the study of key parts of history, English and even foreign language come alive.  King Alfred’s English looks at how the growth of the English language through four key invasions, or as Laurie puts it “language altering tsunamis,” both broadened and simplified English into the language we speak today.

My oldest daughter (going into 7th grade) was my helper for this review. She is very interested in history so she was excited to dig in and start reading about the evolution of the English language. There are 15 total chapters in this book, LOTS of  material was covered. To give you an idea of what we read about, see below:

Pre-English Britain (The Romans, King Arthur) 55 BC-500 AD

Old English (Language Background, The Invasion of the Church & on Latin, The Vikings) 500-1066

Middle English (Invasion of Normans, Middle English background, Introduction of print) 1066-1500

Transition from Middle to Modern English (Invasion of the Greek, Martin Luther) 1400-1600

The Making of the English Bible 1526-1611

Shakespeare and Modern English 1500-Present

 

As a recap, the book discusses how the advent of the printing press was not only a boon to language, but helped with the dissemination of the Bible to the common people aiding the Protestant Reformation and molding the vernacular.  She explores the work of Wycliffe (pre-printing press), Martin Luther and Tyndale.

As you march through history, the reader learns that many of the words with the SK sound come from the Old Norse, ph comes from Greek, how the advent of printing solidified spelling, why the Great Vowel Shift changed pronunciation and the lasting effect of Greek and Latin on the “roots” of English.  Answers to why we spell knight with a kn and other mysteries of spelling are illuminated.  My daughter had quite a few A-HA! moments as to why our spelling can be so strange!

Overall we enjoyed the material, I will be saving it with our curriculum and will pull it out in years to come as my kiddos get a little older and have a deeper understanding. What we gleaned out of the information at this level was still very interesting and useful!

Visit Laurie’s website, The Shorter Word.com, to find both Student and Teacher resources.  Using her suggested minimum requirements, the book and free supplemental material she provides can be used as a 1/2 credit high school history course, or a combined 1/4 credit history and 1/4 credit English course.  Resources include suggested readings and links, worksheets, tests and writing activities.

 If you're interested in buying King Alfred's English at the wholesale discount (for half price at $8.47), I have a promotional code I can share with 4 of my readers. If you would like this code to purchase King Alfred's English at the wholesale discount price, please contact me at: blessedmama6@gmail.com. It will be first come first serve! This code will be available and good through the month of September.

To see what my fellow Crew Mates had to say about King Alfred's English, visit the Homeschool Crew Blog to read more.

**Disclosure: My review and opinion written in this post is entirely my own. This product was provided to me for free in exchange for my review as a member of the 2011-2012 The Old Schoolhouse Magazine Homeschool Crew.