Enjoying the Chaos

I have been using  SchoolhouseTeachers.com  for about three years now. I recently received another  Yearly Membership  for the website. All of my kids use this for various subjects and I have really enjoyed looking over the new classes that have just been added. Recently Boo has been working on the geography course. Terri Johnson teaches this class. She is a homeschooler and also runs their family business Knowledge Quest Inc. Boo really enjoyed the course. She loves the combination of research topics, and map-work. She loves that it really focuses on learning facts about different countries in the 20th Century. The other course that we have been working with a lot is Music Theory I & II . Jam and Boo have been taking piano lessons for a long time. However, theory is something that we need to keep reviewing. Michelle Martin is the instructor for these courses she has been teaching music for over twenty years. She is also a performer, music ...

Since I work from home there are times when I need Captain America (remember this is now what we call Little J who's 5) to do something constructive if I am busy. He has his own laptop on his new school desk that we set up this year and so doesn't have to boot someone else off theirs to play.  Essential Skills Advantage is an online reading and language program for grades K-6. I was given a premium membership in exchange for this review. A premium membership costs $9.99 a month however if you use the code 'TOS50' by Oct 1 2014 you could get this program for $4.99 a month (for as long as you keep the subscription active). There is also a free version of the program available however this does contain ads and doesn't have all the features of the premium membership. Essential Skills Advantage has been around along time. Up until recently it worked mainly with traditional schools (over 20,000). Since the program was so successful in helping children in the class...

My kids LOVE to read. I have never had to bribe, trick, or talk them into picking up a book. In fact sometimes I am tempted (I have never actually done this) to ban them from reading when they get in trouble. Yes, they love it that much! So when I was offered a review from  Progeny Press which involved reading - it was a no-brainer we had to do it. Jam had been bugging me forever to read The Hunger Games (You know the drill "But Mom, everyone else has read it) so he was really excited when I finally let him read it for this review. Boo who is always game to read new books chose The Giver . I got the books from the library and introduced both of them to their Interactive PDF study guides  Hunger Games $21.99 recommended for grades 8-12 (for Jam) and  The Giver $18.99 recommended for grades 5-8 (for Boo). My kids loved the fact that they could type directly into the guide instead of having to hand write everything. My husband and I liked that we didn't have to p...