Maridel Willer

www.All-About-Homophones.com

I recently received an ebook copy of a new curriculum supplement that helps your children learn the common homophones. Do you remember what homophones are? They are those words that sound alike but have different spellings and meanings (You know, the ones that look really cute in a 5 year old’s scrawled card to Grandma, but start to get embarassing if they haven’t learned to tell them apart a few years later.)

All About Homophones, written by Marie Rippel of All About Spelling, covers all you need to teach over 100 homophones to your children, including worksheets, graphic organizers, games, and puzzles. We found that it only takes a few minutes to cover each lesson and we plan on completing one or two lessons per month until we have covered the whole book.

The regular price for AAH is $29.95 for a softcover and $27.95 for an ebook, which is economical if you have more than one child. Marie is running a great special this month for $10 off on these items. Just type the discount code “FUN” when completing your order to receive the $10 credit by 2/2/09.

You can find free samples of the book at www.All-About-Homophones.com.

Aye no ewe will learn too use the write word after using AAH!

We have had an exciting journey over the past couple of months as we have received a myriad of different educational products to review for the TOS (The Old Schoolhouse Magazine) Crew. The opportunity to evaluate different types of curriculum is helping us further define our homeschooling goals and methods.

Several of the items that have come our way so far have been computer based programs. I thought it would be a good idea to share some of my personal thoughts regarding computer use in a separate post, rather than in the reviews for individual products.

There are a couple of concerns with online curriculum and computer software programs that I believe parents need to evaluate before they make a decision to use these in their home. I realize that every family will have a unique set of requirements when they are choosing educational materials, but here are some things to consider.

The first is the fact that too much time spent in front of a screen takes away from time that could be spent building relationships, reading great books and having real life learning experiences. Computer time can contribute to physical stresses on their body such as eye strain, and back, neck and wrist pain. We live in an age where computer use is integral to adult lives, but we must be careful to set appropriate limits or we will reap negative consequences. For example, research has demonstrated that the use of computer games affects the chemistry of the brain, may prevent dull the ability to experience pleasure from normal human interaction and can even be addictive.

The second thing that you need to consider when evaluating computer or any type of curriculum is whether the content of the product meets the standards of your family value system. For this reason, Christian homeschooling families may prefer to choose education material that is written from the perspective of a Biblical worldview over those that were written for the public school environment.

Because of these considerations, my family has decided to greatly limit computer use for our children, who are in the elementary grades. At this time we allow occasional use of the computer for creative and productive uses, such as writing and illustrating a story, but do not allow it for entertainment or educational games. Sometimes we help them research a topic on the computer with our supervision, but prefer to use the library and our own book collections for most investigative learning.

For us, the greatest benefits of homeschooling are the ability to tailor our children’s education to equip them for the unique purposes that the Lord has for them and the ability to choose the influences in their lives as they are forming their character and establishing core beliefs.

Where our children will be in the future will be affected by how they spend their time now and the habits they develop in their youth. Real learning is best done within the context of relationship – with the teacher and the material to be learned. We believe that a loving parent is the person best equipped to mentor and disciple their child both spiritually and academically.

www.Time4Learning.com
As a TOS Crew Member, I have had the opportunity to test homeschooling products that I would not normally have tried. The Time4Learning interactive on-line curriculum is one of these “outside of my teaching style box” programs.

Time4Learning is a program originally developed for school use that is also available to families for summer enrichment or home education. This curriculum includes math, language arts, science and social studies, all designed to meet educational standards.

When I looked through the program with my children, it was obvious that extensive development went into this product. It is simple to use, keeps track of the student’s progress and informs the parent of the progress made. Another feature is a parent forum where you can ask questions and share ideas with other families.

My second grade son tried the language arts, social studies and math areas of Time4Learning. We felt that the video game style of the program took more time that necessary to cover the information presented. My son enjoyed using the site, but I found that some areas included humor and attitudes that I would prefer not to be repeated around our house. We did not try the science portion of the site as we knew that it was evolution based to comply with public school standards.

I would recommend that parents supervise their children while using a free trial of this product before making a purchasing decision. The cost for using Time4Learning is $19.95 per month and $14.95 per month for each additional child.

There are many factors to consider when deciding if an on line curriculum is right for you. For my opinion on things that you may want to consider, see my next post, “Computer Based Curriculum Concerns”.

www.Kinderbach.com

Kinderbach is a music program for young children that helps them learn basic music principles and beginning piano instruction. The lessons are on video and can be accessed on line with a membership or purchased in a DVD format. The website membership is $14.95 per month for access to all lessons, or you can get a greater than 50% discount if purchasing a whole year membership in advance.

My 8 and 10 year old children watched several of these lessons and thought that they were cute. The subject matter was too young for them as they are already beginning to read music and play the piano and guitar. My husband is very talented in music and has been teaching them a little at a time as they are interested. (Checkout the awesome guitars and mandolins that he builds at www.WillerCustom.com.)

In order to write a more thorough review, I asked the Kinderbach folks if I could have a family with younger children use it for a couple of weeks and they graciously agreed to let me share my trial membership.

Here is what my dear friend Carmen reports about her children’s experience with Kinderbach.

Dylan (age 5) loved it. Samantha (age 3) wanted to do it, but needed help. Jacob (age 2) was too little. Dylan did several (10) sessions at a time. They seemed a little slowly explained for his understanding, and the pauses between asking questions and then giving answers seemed delayed. He really enjoyed being able to go back and repeat a session, that was one of his favorite features. He also really enjoyed getting out the pots and pans and playing along, being encouraged to do things personally along with watching the explanation. I enjoyed knowing he was learning music, and he was thrilled to get to do it on the computer. All in all, we were very blessed to have the opportunity to try these online lessons. I think Dylan would like to continue.

(Read Carmen’s thought provoking blog at:
www.studentofmychildren.blogspot.com)

One thing that I really appreciate about the Kinderbach company is that the business is a family affair. Here is a description of how the Gregor family shares the responsibilities of running their company, from an article posted on HomeEducatingFamily.com:

Karri is definitely the most visible member (her face is the one you see on the website, and she appears in the instructional DVDs), but Kinderbach provides each Gregor family member an opportunity to exercise their talents, and learn new skills. “I have an art and music background,” Karri says, when asked to explain each family member’s contribution. Her expertise is behind the graphics files, songs, activity books, scripts, and associated segment maps and shoot sequences for the DVDs.

“Christina is our extraordinary marketing and sales person. She is also part of the production crew for the videos, and she sings and provides support during the video production.”

“Brock’s skills have grown in leaps and bounds as we have grown our video and music capabilities. He is our chief video editor and producer. There isn’t much he can’t do with video and manipulating sound and producing our music CDs and DVDs. He’s fast becoming a great audio engineer.”

You can try a free trial of Kinderbach music lessons at www.Kinderbach.com

The new year is here and I am excited about the possibilites - are you? Our new year’s tradition is to write down an overview of our year and a few goals or desires for the next year. We also enjoy reading what was written the year before. Each year our family grows closer to the Lord and to each other as we learn and live out our life at home.

Tonight we watched “Inherit the Land”, a video by Franklin Springs Media that shows how several homeschool families have left the pressure of the modern lifestyle for a more self sufficient life in the country. It definitely added to our desire for land and a more peaceful life. I wanted to just fast forward ahead to the end result of living in a pefect farmhouse with a garden full of ready to pick produce and the smell of sweet hay in the clean barn full of well trained horses. When I think of all the work required to get to that point (and consider that I am not getting any younger), it is a little overwhelming. Then I remembered that anything worthwhile is the sum of many small decisions and steps along the way… and that nothing is impossible with God.

Warning – your family will never look at a map of the USA the same way again after reading this book, because the little Man in the Map (MIM) will jump right out at them!

This book uses visual mnemonic devices with a cute story to help you memorize the locations of the 50 states. At first I thought the story and rhymes were a little corny and some of the memory clues a bit too right brained for my analytical mind. After we spent time looking at and reviewing the clues on each of the colorful pages, even I could remember some of those states in the middle that I always used to get confused.

This would be a good book to include in a beginning study of US geography and is simple enough for any age (including mom) to memorize the names and locations of the United States.

The publisher of the Little Man in the Map is Schoolside Press (www.SchoolsidePress.com).