Category: Homeschool

Yesterday I shared some books from Abrams Books for Young Readers that were geared towards autumn and back to school.  Today I’m going to share a few from Abrams that are cute and educational for young girls (well boys might enjoy them too, but the content is more for girls!).

Dotty – It’s the first day of school – gulp. Ida brings her nice new lunch box……and Dotty.

A couple of weeks ago I received a set of DVDs to review from Rock ‘N Learn.  Phonics Volumes I & II.  With these DVDs children learn the rules of phonics and word families by engaging in the songs presented by the animated rock band on the DVD.

Putting rules and sounds to song and rhyme is a good way for students to practice and retain these building blocks of reading.  that is actually how Amber learned to read in her Kindergarten class.  The program they used wasn’t nearly as hip, catchy or as animated as Rock ‘N Learn though!

I write The Switched-On Schoolhouse Series twice a month to share our family’s experience using this software based curriculum in our home.

On one of my earlier posts where I was sharing how a typical lesson in Switched-On Schoolhouse works, one of my readers left a comment saying “Looks like diagramming sentences is out now thanks to computers!”.

And I would have agreed with her, until

BraveMouse Books presents an original  Recipe for adventure!

Ingredients:

• 1 mouse named Benjamin
• 1 small elephant named Bumper

Combine with:

• The mysterious disappearance of Benjamin’s mother

Toss In:

A Calculator for High School…and Beyond

The new TI-Nspire from Texas Instruments, has a unique feature to it, a touchpad which allows you to navigate on the calculator.  With so many of this generation’s children having technology given to them almost right out of their cribs, this powerful computing device will take their math to the next level.  It is essentially a mini math computer.

Amber is currently two full years ahead of herself in math.  A freshman by age, she is nearly finished with her Algebra II credit and has her sights on working on Pre-Cal or Trig when she is done.  That makes this mathphobic homeschooling mom just a bit nervous.  I mean, how am I going to help her with that?!

My family and I are self professed geeks.  The “why” and the “how” behind the object or activity needs to be discovered.  So a book entitled, Cooking For Geeks is right up our alley.  Jeff Potter, speaks geek in this science book about the kitchen and your food, and not only do you not have to go back to school to learn and be surprised on nearly every page, it includes many tasty recipes too.

The book features seven chapters (with my opinion of chapter highlights below):

Summer is over and school’s back in, but that doesn’t mean your kids can’t continue having fun, and do some learning too.  National Geographic Kids has three new fun and educational books for your children; National Geographic Kids Almanac 2011, The Big Book of Fun and Weird But True!

Your kids will love the interesting facts inside these books, and they’ll be itching to

The Travels of Wiglington and Wenks is a story written by John Bittleston that tells the adventure of two brave water rats that travel the world and now your kids can play with them in their virtual world.

This online game for kids is a safe, educational place to play.

Let me give you a little background on Wiglington and Wenks if you’re not already familiar with them.  In their travels they are searching for

Title: Heart of a Samurai

Author: Margi Preues

Publisher: Amulet Books ©2010

Summary: In 1841, a Japanese fishing vessel sinks. Its crew is forced to swim to a small, unknown island, where they are rescued by a passing American ship. Japan’s borders remain closed to all Western nations, so the crew sets off to America, learning English on the way.

Manjiro, a fourteen-year-old boy, is curious and eager to learn everything he can about this new culture. Eventually the captain adopts Manjiro and takes him to his home in New England. The boy lives for some time in New England, and then heads to San Francisco to pan for gold. After many years, he makes it back to Japan, only to be

I write the Switched-On Schoolhouse Series twice a month to share our family’s experience using this software based curriculum in our home.

The beauty of homeschooling is that we can meet our children’s learning needs in a way that makes them look forward to school, not dread it.

English/Language Arts is a subject that has been