Category: Homeschool

The Jaguar Stones Book One: Middleworld
Author: J & P Voelkel
Publisher: Egmont USA
Publication Date: Revised edition (April 27, 2010)

Action Alert!

Middleworld has been called a Percy Jackson meets Indiana Jones story.  While I’ve not ever read a Percy Jackson book, this adventure set in the Mayan jungle is somewhat reminiscent of a young Indiana Jones chronicle.

The story is

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

One of the “chores” of homeschooling on an administrative end is grading.  Amber has three subjects that we use formal text books for.  I do have answer keys to mark the assignments, but it’s rare that I get to them daily, and they tend to pile up.  Once I get around to grading them, I admit to feeling a little overwhelmed.

As the teacher, I really like the automatic grading feature of Switched-On Schoolhouse.  It makes my job much more enjoyable . 

The way automatic grading works is;

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

Each lesson in the Switched-On Schoolhouse curriculum is set up relatively the same way (at least in the three high school courses Amber is using, English I, American Literature and Family & Consumer Sciences).

The screen is split in half, with an adjustable interface so the student can make the top half or bottom half taller or shorter in height. 

Welcome back to my Switched-On Schoolhouse Series.  This week I want to share with you the ins and outs of setting up the program on your computer from a parent point of view.

As I had originally said in my first post, Switched-On Schoolhouse can be installed in one of two ways on your computer.  You can install just parts of it, and then run it off of the discs, or you if you have enough room on your hard drive, you can install the entire course right on your computer. 

Optimally you will want to install it completely on your hard drive if you can.  It’s a lot more seamless when using it, and on laptop a lot quieter too!  There’s no waiting for the computer to find the lesson on

One of the reasons we have chosen to homeschool year round is the continuity of learning it provides.  With more frequent shorter breaks throughout the year, we find Amber retains much more of the things she has learned. 

Of course continuity comes in all forms not just how many school days you have and the vacation interspersed among them.  It comes in the form of planning and curriculum too.  Assuming that you are able to keep as much as possible the same from year to year, there shouldn’t be a lot of hiccups within the student’s progress.  Once you know how your child learns, continuity is the key.

I’m noticing that more and more as Amber gets older.  She is definitely part of the ‘iGeneration’,

Post-it Craft Paper is a medium weight paper with full adhesive backing.  It’s fast and easy to use with no mess.  Simply cut, peel and stick!

Available in 20+ colors, you are only limited to your imagination with what you can do with it.

The paper is 8.5″ x 12″, all except the black have a white core, and they are acid free and lignen free.  Perfect for all your paper craft needs.

You can create beautiful cards and more with Post-it® Craft Paper. 

I love it when educational activities are also fun. When something a child finds engaging is combined with learning, they can spend hours doing it and they soak up so much without even realizing it. That’s exactly what goes on with Lafayette Puzzle Factory’s Crayola Chalkboard Floor Puzzles.  A fun way to play with sidewalk chalk inside, and easy on mom because the clean up is minimal.

COLOR YOUR OWN CLOTHES!

Check out these fun t-shirts from Wearable Art.

In the past few years that we have been homeschooling, for a lot of our subjects I have taken a bit of this and a bit of that from different resources to make up our curriculum.  Now that Amber is officially in high school though and I need to keep a transcript, I wanted a curriculum that would be easier for me to keep track of grades and know that she is covering all the basics that need to be.

That in itself is not a terribly difficult thing to find, but Amber decided she would much rather do her school work on the computer than using text books or work books.  Now our options become much more limited. 

Switched On Schoolhouse (Alpha Omega Publishers) is a complete curriculum, allowing the student to do all of their studies on the

Back in May I wrote a post about some books that were suitable for teaching Shakespeare to Children.  Amber decided that she wanted to study Romeo and Juliet, and so for a couple of weeks in our homeschool we did that.

When we were nearing the end of our study, I asked her what her favorite part was, and she said it was the Masquerade Ball.  She thought that would be a pretty fun thing to be a part of.  While it would be kind of difficult to put one on with just the two of us attending, we made it a project to plan out how we could recreate a Masquerade Ball.