TOS Homeschool Crew Review: EDUDPS
As part of the TOS Homeschool Crew I have received for free two books written by Jill J. Dixon for Educational Diagnostic Prescription Services.
This year, I have been wanting to try to find a way to teach my kids various Greek and Latin roots without an expensive time-consuming curriculum. Needless to say I was thrilled to find out our family was going to get to review the book Roots and Fruits from Educational Diagnostic Prescription Services.
Roots and Fruits is a Greek and Latin roots based vocabulary program. Students who complete this program learn the English forms of 673 roots and prefixes with their meanings plus 1716 vocabulary words. It contains various games and activities in which to learn the materials. Since Roots and Fruits can be used for all age groups, the materials identify the roots and root groups which are appropriate for elementary age as well as those vocabulary words which are for older students. The book has a bonus in that it teaches those commonly tested words on the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) and other standardized tests. Most programs suggest that you start a program like this at a later age but Roots and Fruits is designed so that it can be began at a lower elementary age.
Both my 6 and 11 year old have started working through this program together. They each take turns creating note cards to use as flashcards so that they can learn the roots and associated vocabulary words. Roots and Fruits has an easy to follow plan for learning the roots in order to improve and establish a good vocabulary base. It only takes about 15 minutes a day for the lessons to be added to your homeschooling plans. Also, Roots and Fruits has suggested guidelines for using it for the various age groups. A weekly schedule is included as part of this program as well as a list of games and activities to use in order to enhance and reinforce learning the various roots and vocabulary words. This is a bonus for us because we generally like to be able to be flexible in our scheduling. Since we had been looking at a way to teach the various Greek and Latin words, this book has been a blessing to us. It has a complete list of roots and associated words as well as encouraging the students to find additional words using a dictionary. Since it is inexpensive and only takes a short time each day, it fulfilled what our family was looking for in learning Latin and Greek roots. Check it out for yourself at their website to see if it might be for your family too. At their website you can choose to download samples of their books here.
Pricing for this book is as follows:
E-Book: $14.98 On sale a limited time for $11.25 (25% off)
Printed book – Pages Only – No Binding: $17.48
Printed Book: Comb-binding: $19.98
Before purchasing an e-book I would highly suggest reading EDUDPS’s special notes for e-book purchasers since EDUDPS uses File Secure Pro which has very high security features that may change whether or not you choose to purchase an e-book versus a printed version of their books.
Another book we received from Educational Diagnostic Prescription Services. is called Write With The Best Vol 1. I really like the approach taken in this writing program. In order to teach how to write well creatively, it follows a type of Charlotte Mason approach where the book uses passages from what I considier to be “good” literary prose in order to have the students learn from writing that is done well already. Like the Roots and Fruits book we reviewed, it also has small daily lessons which range from 15 minutes up to 45 minutes. Much depends on the student and how long he or she needs to master the current lesson plan. As always. as homeschoolers, you can break down the time to fit into your own schedules. Write With The Best Vol. 1 has already done all the work for you as far as selecting literature that your child can benefit from when learning how to write better. We use copy work in our homeschooling in order for my kids to pick up good style, grammar and techniques from experienced, well established authors. Write with The Best Vol. 1 takes this step further and uses it to teach my kids how to write more effectively from various genres. We have not completed going through the entire book but I have already noticed a difference in my daughter’s writing. We had been focusing more on grammar and this book as allowed my daughter to move forward and work on using what she has learned while developing better writing skills.
Pricing for this book is as follows:
E-book $19.95 On sale a limited time for $14.95 (25% off)
Printed book- Pages Only – No Binder $22.45
Printed book- 3-Ring Binder $24.95
All the materials I have reviewed from Educational Diagnostic Prescription Services have been excellent. The only thing I would consider would be whether or not to get their e-book or a printed version. Since Educational Diagnostic Prescription Services uses File Secure Pro to allow viewing and printing of their e-books, you need to check out EDUDPS’s special notes for e-book purchasers in order to determine whether or not you choose to purchase an e-book versus a printed version of their books. I know the publisher has serious reasons for using File Secure Pro versus PDF. For the way I use e-books for our family, in the future with any publisher who uses File Secure Pro, I plan on going with the printed material version versus e-book because of the restrictions with File Secure Pro.
Check out EDUDPS’s products for yourself at their website to see if it might be for your family too. At their website you can choose to download samples of their books here.
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