Previously I reviewed the All About Spelling program as part of the TOS Homeschool Crew. As a follow-up from the company, I also received a free copy of their book,Beehive Reader 1 written by Marie Rippel , in order for me to provide an honest review.

My youngest took this book and immediately read it all in one sitting. She said she enjoyed the stories and was eager to read it again. The book itself corresponds with what is learned in the All About Spelling level 1 lessons. I like that this is a “real” book that your child can read while going through the All About Spelling program and not just a story that is included within a textbook. Each page is wonderfully illustrated and has just enough sentences for your child to read per page so that they are not overwhelmed by reading it.
Here are a few pages from the different stories in the book.

This makes it easy for beginning readers to have success in reading since they can focus on a small amount of words at one time.

What I liked was that, unlike most first reader books I have seen, this one contains small stories that a young reader can master without having to learn more big words. I found that my daughter could easily sound out the words in these stories and she was not frustrated at all while she read them. The stories in Beehive Reader 1 give a new reader the joy of mastering a book on their own with success.

The book itself has 10 short stories that are both fun and delightful. One of the short stories called Frank Shrank was one of our favorites. In it the boy drinks pink milk and shrinks and we follow his adventures. The pictures that go along with this story are fun too.

Whether you are using this book in conjunction with the All About Spelling program or on its own as a standalone book, I think your child will be delighted with reading Beehive Reader 1. You can purchase this hardback book at their website here for $19.95.

For other reviews on Beehive Reader 1, check out what other TOS Homeschool Crew members have to say about it at our Homeschool Blog.

We seem to be reviewing a lot of math products for the TOS Homeschool Crew this year! Of course my youngest adores math so this was not a problem for her. One of the math products we received for free was from Math Mammoth.

First of all I was very impressed by the materials offered by Math Mammoth. We had been using both Abeka and Saxon math workbooks for my two kids. My youngest was using Abeka’s second grade book. I just get the student books for my kids so I was happy to see that Math Mammoth’s light blue series books were a complete program in itself. There is a section that has an explanation of the math concept being taught and all the problems contain an example to follow that makes it virtually self-teaching. No buying expensive teacher books along with the student books. I really liked that all I had to do is have the student book for a complete curriculum. I received the books as downloads so that I could just print the pages off as I needed them. No more needing extra room on our bookcases for workbooks. It also fits nicely with how we do things because I put the pages to work on into their folders of to do stuff for the day and then when completed they get placed into their completion folders. Once I grade them, they put their finished pages into their school binders.

Both my kids really enjoyed the Math Mammoth lessons, which is good because my oldest is not very into math, as you can remember if you have been reading my blog for very long.

Math Mammoth has books that cover specific topics as well as full curriculums. Some examples of their specific topic areas are ones about fractions, money, or the one that we received which was multiplication. The various books are color-coded for you to easily find what you are looking for on their website. You can see a description of what they offer here at the Math Mammoth website.

The light Blue series books are a full curriculum for grades 1 though 5. Both my kids took the placement tests offered at their website and I selected books based on the results. Math Mammoth has convenient placement tests that you can download for free here in order to determine what grade level your child should use.

After my kids took the placement tests offered at their website, I selected books based on the results so I got the grade 2 and grade 4 light blue books.. The light blue books introduce new concepts using a well written explanation with examples and are easily recognized by being enclosed in a blue box in the student text. My daughters were able to work on each session without much assistance from me. I would step in and go through the new concepts with them using what was in the book then they proceeded to work on the problems on their own. I didn’t need to go through the entire lesson to find what information was new and what I had to go over with them before they started their math work for the day. Per the Math Mammoth website , “Each grade level in the curriculum consists of two student worktexts (A and B), and supportive materials, which include answer keys, tests, cumulative reviews, and an additional worksheet maker.”
We also received the Multiplication 1 worktext which is a blue series book that really helped to explain and help both my kids to learn about multiplication. This was an area that my oldest was having problems with and before long she was amazing my husband and I by answering questions that I had not realized she could answer.
You can check the Math Mammoth website to see what is included in each grade level as well as the other products offered.

There are various options for getting Math Mammoth’s products. You can purchase them as downloads or printed copies. The complete curriculum of Light Blue series for each grade is $29.70 (for a downloadable version). You can also purchase each of the work-texts separately or choose the printed versions available at the website.

The Blue Series book, Multiplication 1 can be purchased as a download version for $5.00.

The products at Math Mammoth are quite reasonably priced and worth checking out for yourself. You can go to the Math Mammoth website and see what they have to offer.

My fellow Crew Members also have reviewed the various products and you can see what they each have to say here at our Homeschool Crew Blog.

A year ago I had started doing a few art classes in my home for other homeschoolers. My kids are very interested in art and are fairly good at drawing and painting. However as a result of the art class I Had I was able to see kids who had varying degrees of interest and talent. I basically feel that anyone can draw as long as they have an interest and willingness to work at it. One day I received an email about a book called WordToons by Wayne Logue. I was asked if I would be interested in using this book with my kids so that I could give my opinion on it . The author gave me a copy of the book and my kids and I proceeded to try the different lessons in it. Basically you take simple words and create a cartoon-like drawing out of it. Just after doing the drawing once or twice by following the instructiosn dan examples, my kids were drawing all sorts of variations and making up entire pictures with what they learned. Kind of reminded me of the kid’s program, WordWorld, which happens to be one of our favorite PBS shows. The book itself provides visual step by step instructions to take a word such as dog and create a cartoon out of the word you printed. We really enjoyed the lessons we finished. If your kids are learning to spell and read this could have the potential to be a great help for kids with various learning styles. It also is a good tool for just showing kids that they too can draw successfully.
If you are interested you can download a free sample from their website to be able to see this for yourself at http://wordtoons.com/.

As a member of the Homeschool Crew our family received from Zeezok Publishing’s Great Musicians Series, The Young Brahms / Franz Schubert and His Merry Friends Special Offer set which includes both books and the associated study guides as well as a companion CD. I was given this for free in order to provide an honest review of these products.

Before receiving these items we had not done too much with learning about the various composers. I honestly can say we have enjoyed reading these books and going over the study guides as well as listening to the CD.

A typical day for us would be to sit down together as I read a chapter from the book we are currently going through. Each book has 4 chapters so we easily completed each one and learned about each composer. Not only do you learn a little about the life of each composer but the study guide also includes a brief time-line which sets the composers life against other historical events of that time period. Each chapter you read has an associated section for it in the study guide. You first read the time-line then go over questions pertaining to the chapter itself. The answers are also included in the study guide making it easy for you as the parent to lead a discussion. Also there are other tidbits of information that go beyond what it mentioned in the book itself so you learn a little more about the composer as well. Also there is a section which discuses the key character qualities that were displayed by the composer in that section of the book along with the information that supports it including the pages you will find the support discussed. Throughout the book itself, there are several musical scores and the track number printed beside it so that you can stop and listen to the music from the CD. This helps you to fully appreciate the composer you are studying and begin to recognize some of his works. With each CD there are also activities such as word finds that you can print out to accompany your study of each composer. There were some coloring pages by chapter but they were mainly the illustrations from the book and since they included too much black ink we did those pages sparingly.

I felt that this was an excellent series to introduce your child to the various composers. I loved how the book, study guide and CD brought everything together for my kids.

If you are interested please check out the many products that Zeezok Publishing has to offer. You can purchase this set that I reviewed for $35.80 by going here. There are also other sets that you can purchase as well as many other products brought to you by Zeezok.

My fellow Crew Members received various different products from Zeezok and you can check out what they have to say about the various products at our Homeschool Blog here.

We have had an unusually large of amount of snow dumped on us this Winter just in the month of February.
Who knew that something as light and fluffy as snow could cause so much upheaval in life. We have been stranded in our home until the other day. Not to mention how much it has disrupted our homeschool schedule. I think we ended up takings snow days just so we could keep up with keeping our steps and driveway clear. Also who feels like doing school when the “school” kids are off for the day.

Now we are slowly getting back on track for things.. getting back on track from being temporarily derailed takes a lot of work. LOL

My husband and I started thinking about homeschooling before we even had children. We did a lot of research and spent many hours going over everything we found on the subject of homeschooling. Even after many years of homeschooling, I still look for resources on homeschooling.

As a member of the TOS Homeschool Crew, Apologia Press recently sent me for a free copy of the book, The Ultimate Homeschool Guide, by Debra Bell in order to review.

You may recognize the name Apologia in relation to homeschool science curriculum. I admit that I myself did not realize they were branching out to provide more to the homeschool community. As part of this I was pleased to find that I would be receiving The Ultimate Guide to Homeschooling to review. I think it has something for both newbies and veteran homeschoolers. I have to laugh because after receiving it I realized that on one of my shelves of the many books I own, there was an older edition of this same book. The author, Debra Bell, is a former public school teacher who has also homeschooled her four children through high school. While I do not agree on everything that the author discusses in her book, overall I thought this book did a good job of covering many questions and areas from which we, as homeschoolers, can benefit. It is a fairly complete look at what you should think about and know before beginning your journey as a homeschooler as well as taking you through various stages in your homeschooling adventure.

Within this book you will find information about deciding if you should homeschool, choosing curriculum, organizing and planning, preventing burn out, knowing what to teach and when, homeschooling various age groups, assessing your homeschooling, resources and other items in between. If you are looking for another resource on homeschooling itself, I would recommend this as a book that you should check out for yourself.

You can purchase The Ultimate Guide in Homeschooling through Apologia at their website here for $20.

Check out what my fellow Crew members have said about this product at our Homeschool Blog here.

The company, Dollar Homeschool, provided me with a free download of Ray’s Arithmetic which is a complete math curriculum through high school. The material was created originally to be used by our country’s pioneers and was being used for many years. The beginning lessons of math are taught using an oral tradition where the teacher explains math concepts and teaches the child math using objects. The lessons emphasize fully learning the basics and being able to do things quickly before progressing to new concepts and ideas. I love this because that is how we teach math in our home. I feel that some of the newer math programs out there and what is often taught in our schools do not stress how important it is to fully understand and be accomplished in each concept before moving on. I suspect that is why some kids struggle so much in math nowadays. The books contain a lot of word problems which show your child how important and relevant math can be for them. It is amusing reading some of the word problems since they were written a long time ago.

Something to consider is that the material has to be printed out or used from your computer screen. It also does not have the have the bells and whistles and flashiness of newer math programs. However it is a very inexpensive and complete math curriculum.

Ray’s arithmetic comprises of 38 books which includes the teacher books and keys. Dollar Homeschool has done all the work for you by collecting all of the books in one easy location on a CD or for me as a download. Yes you can probably find these materials other places but for only $59 you don’t have the hassle searching for these books on your own. It comes with a money back guarantee for 30 days as well.

Check out what my fellow Crew members also have to say about he products that Dollar Homeschool have to offer here at our Blog.

I am in the middle of reviewing the Graphics Toolbox software and my kids have used it to make Valentine’s Day cards.
Here is what they have designed using this software program.

Another math product I had received for free to review as part of the TOS Homeschool Crew were two sets of DVDs by Math Tutor.

The first one, The Basic Math Word Problem Tutor, is an 8 hour video course which comes as 2 DVDs.

The DVDs cover instruction on word problems involving addition, subtraction, multiplication and division using whole number, fractions, percents, ratios and proportions. You can see the DVD contents from the Math Tutor website here.

I homeschool very eclectically so I do not use just one curriculum like many of my friends. I have to admit I have found most video instructions to be kind of awkward. In my limited experience with them, in the ones I have watched before, the instructor on the video tries to make the kids feel as if they are sitting in a classroom and it always seems so artificial and distracting. However I was very impressed with the instruction provided on the Math Tutor DVDs I received to review. The instructor in the Math Tutor DVDs does not act as if he is performing for the video but instead acts as a teacher would in front of a classroom. The presentation itself is very well done. He states each problem, illustrates it and walks through how to solve each one and to help your child see how to approach similar word problems so that they not only learn how to solve the exact one shown but how to approach all other ones like it. Even my daughter who does not like math was very attentive watching the instruction.

Overall I was very impressed with the quality and instruction of these DVDs. I know a lot of parents who do not like teaching math and have misgivings about their ability to do so. This is an ideal DVD for them as well as those who feel secure in teaching math.

Cost for The Basic Math Word Problem Tutor is $26.99 and can be purchased on the product page for it at the MathTutorDVD.com website.

The next DVD I received to review was for younger kids called Young Minds Numbers and Counting.

This DVD displays wonderful pictures that are used in teaching your child to count from 1 to 10. While the pictures are being displayed and the narrator counts to your child, classical music selections from composers such as Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Mozart, Pachelbel, and Vivaldi are played throughout the DVD in the background. Your child will also be exposed to the sounds that the objects make such as when a frog is shown, you will hear a rib-bit. While my children are beyond the age for this DVD, they still enjoyed the pictures and music that are a part of this DVD program. Your young child will surely benefit from the multi-sensory learning environment that this DVD has for your child.

Cost for Young Minds Numbers and Counting DVD is $19.99 and can be purchased on the product page for it at the MathTutorDVD.com website.

You can also check out what my fellow Crew members had to say about these DVDs on our Blog by going here.

Anyone reading my blog knows that I am a member of the TOS Homeschool Crew for the current school year. As you know they select about 100-200 homeschoolers to be a part of this journey. You basically provide product reviews for the various vendors that are paying for their products to get honest product reviews from the Crew. You in turn get the opportunity to try out various homeschool products and in turn get to keep these products for free. Sometimes you get a limited online subscription and other times you are given the product to keep. It has been an awesome experience for me as well as a blessing. If you are interested in becoming a Crew member for the 2010-2011 Crew year go to http://www.theoldschoolhousestore.com/homeschool/Homeschool-Crew-2010.htm to find out more about it as well as how you can try-out to be selected. If you have any questions feel free to post a question here.