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I found this audio CD
by Vision Forum a little advanced, but I discovered that it was simply
my lack of knowledge rather than a fault in the content of the CDs.
My ten-year-old son is very much into history, war, the dynamics
of weapons and weaponry, etc.
He has listened to the CDs several times and he thoroughly enjoys
them even though they are really more like lectures.
This set would be very useful for anyone wanting to supplement
history curriculum with a study of war, weapons, strategic development,
etc. |
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Lately there have been many things heavy on my heart. The
devotions in my copy of the Daily Focus have reminded me to keep
my focus on the Rock. This book is a must-have for all homeschool
moms. You will be rejuvenated in Christ! |
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This is a fabulous, comprehensive, accurate study of
American history! The authors have included much information typically
left out of American history textbooks today. They also use quotes and
cite original sources when applicable so that the reader can make
his/her own interpretation of events. This book (and accompanying
teacher's guide) would be an asset to ANY classroom! If educators want
an accurate study of American history that hasn't been watered down with
the political and social agendas present in so many history books today,
I would suggest that they purchase Never Before in History:
America's Inspired Birth, published by the Foundation for Thought
and Ethics. |
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A few years ago, I wanted to find a more
interesting reading program for my youngest homeschooled
children so I bought some Bob Books. I sat down with my
five-year-old on my lap and my three-year-old looking
over my shoulder and to my great surprise, within a
month BOTH of my youngest sons were reading Bob Books
with great enthusiasm! They are now 9 and 7 and still
love books. I give much of the credit to a phonics
program that made reading fun from the very beginning!
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Cheryl Lowe’s Latina Christiana is an
excellent way to introduce elementary age students to
Christian Latin. In the student book, each chapter
contains a Latin saying, vocabulary words, forms (a
conjugation or declension), and exercises. There is an
opportunity to review vocabulary, translate from Latin
to English or vice versa, and practice using new
grammatical terms through a diverse array of exercises
designed to keep the student’s attention without being
overwhelming.The Teacher Manual
contains a history guide, grammar overview, lesson
plans, tests, and more. Although teachers do not need
prior experience with Latin to teach this curriculum,
they will need the Teacher Manual, which is beneficial
to everyone anyway. What an excellent way to introduce
elementary age children (and even some parents) to
Christian Latin!
You can purchase Latina Christiana
products here:
http://www.homeschoolstore.com/find/?searchType=keyword&keyword=latina+christiana&search_only=title
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When I put the CD for Classic Children's Tales in
our player to test it on my children, our non-reader listened intently
while our second grader followed along in the book. Before I knew
it, my older children had come into the room to listen to the stories as
well. With or without the read-along book, the Classic Children's Tales
are sure to hold the interest of your entire family! |
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For families that want exceptional educational
entertainment, NEST Learning offers the best on the market! The
quality of these products is amazing, from the animation to the
historical accuracy of the stories. The Animated Hero Classics,
my family's favorite series, can be used as a teaching tool to
supplement any elementary age curriculum. The biographical
sketches and historical information contained within the stories is
conveyed in such a way that children not only retain the information,
but they beg to watch them over and over! In today's world of
violence, fast action, and valueless entertainment, it is wonderful to
have an option such as NEST. |
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Since it's not required by our church-related school and
we don't believe in boring kids to death with tests every week, we only
test our children once a year and we do this through an official testing
agency. This past spring when we tested our children, my
12-year-old daughter tested post high school in many subjects, including
vocabulary. She really enjoys learning difficult words and so for
this coming school year she has been asking me to find something more
challenging for her. God always seems to know exactly when we are
going to need something and I just happened to receive a Word Master
vocabulary book (level 9) to review from EDCON Publishing Group. I
took one look at the book and some of the words on the cover include
spheroid, impervious, immure, elucidate, reversion, and progenitor.
I won't tell you which ones, but I'm not even certain what all these
words mean! Sarah took one look at the book and she was thrilled.
The exercises include looking for context clues, recognizing prefixes
and their meanings, and seeing how the words are used in sentences.
EDCON has a printed version of the book, which we will use, but there is
also a digital version. The digital version is slightly more
expensive, but if you have more than one child who will be doing the
lessons or if you think it would be beneficial to have a child repeat
exercises, then the digital version might be the best option. For
me, any book that has my child asking, "Can we start school tomorrow?!?"
gets a huge thumbs up! |
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La Clase Divertida is a fun, hands-on way to
introduce young children to Spanish. Each level focuses on
commonly used vocabulary, level-appropriate grammatical topics, and
cultural aspects of a particular area - Mexico, Spain, and Latin
America. While students receive an introduction to the language,
they can learn about the Hispanic culture through cooking activities,
songs, historical stories, and hands-on crafts. With 8 hours of
DVD video instruction, a teacher's manual, student workbooks, craft
materials, and more, these pre-packaged kits are a terrific option for
busy homeschool moms who don't have the time and energy to put together
their own supplemental hands-on activities to go along with an
elementary age Spanish program. (Kits come ready to use with two
students, but additional materials can be purchased for additional
students.) |
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Spanish is Fun, published by Amsco Publications, is an incredibly
creative Spanish curriculum that keeps the attention of students.
The student book is actually more like a workbook with fill-in-the
blank, crossword puzzles, matching, question/answer sections, and more.
Each chapter covers a particular grammatical topic and the student has
an opportunity to thoroughly learn the topic with various activities.
There is a supplemental workbook, but when I taught Spanish I with this
series a couple of years ago, we used only the student book for class
activities. Students were encouraged to do the workbook activities
only if they had difficulty mastering a particular topic or memorizing
the vocabulary for a certain chapter. I would recommend the
Spanish is Fun curriculum for ages twelve and up (including adult).
You can purchase Spanish is Fun materials at
www.amscopub.com . |
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Landmark Books
These are excellent history books that were
published by Random House from 1950 to 1970. Click here to learn
more and to see a list of all Landmark books that were published.
We have been collecting our Landmarks for about ten years and we have
about 70 of the 185 titles. Some are quite easy to find, but
others are incredibly difficult to find or very expensive if you do find
them. Occasionally you'll get lucky and find an auction on e-bay
for a reasonable price, but more often they go for quite a bit of money.
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Rooted & Grounded: A Guide for Spiritual
Growth is a Bible study guide for students in grades 10-12. It
is much more than another great Bible study. This curriculum not
only encourages spiritual growth for the maturing teen, but it achieves
the goal by focusing the study on Christ and development of a Biblical
worldview. While many Bible studies are focused on the reader and
his/her problems, the focus of this Bible study is on unreached people
groups, service toward others, and growing in Christ. Prior to
each lesson, there is information about an unreached people group,
information on prayer needs of the people, a short informational sketch
of their home country, and additional information that draws the focus
away from the reader and onto a group of people who need to hear the
gospel. Each lesson focuses on a particular theme and the Bible
study revolves around the theme for that week. There are
opportunities for students to answer thought-provoking questions,
research Bible verses, and fill in charts to help them evaluate their
own feelings on a topic. In each lesson, students are given prayer
suggestions and encouraged to journal.
I would highly recommend Rooted &
Grounded for any student in a homeschool, Christian school or even
public school setting. Howard and Bonnie Lisech and Jan Harris
have created a Bible study that can be used with any curriculum,
particularly those with a focus on missions. Additionally, I would
be at fault if I didn't mention the illustrations in these books.
Illustrator Julie Bosacker is obviously a talented artist who has made
the pencil sketches of the unreached peoples so realistic that you
really have to look closely at some of them to make sure they aren't
photographs! They are amazing and they make you really want to go
straight to the country and share the gospel!
The books are available from Deeper
Roots Publications or at
http://www.homeschoolstore.com/find/?searchType=exact&keyword=DEEPER%20ROOTS%20PUBLICATIONS%201495&search_only=publisher&sort=bestselling .
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Since I
brought home an Electric Circuits KitBook for my five children, there
has only been one problem. They argue over who gets to use the KitBook
first! This is the best packaged science curriculum for fourth to sixth
graders that I've ever seen and I would highly recommend it to teachers
in any educational environment. All the parts are right there, the kits
are well-made, and the information is shared in a manner children can
understand. I hope there will be many more KitBooks on other topics to
come!
You can purchase KitBooks at
www.kitbook.com . |
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The old saying "It's Greek to me" is no
longer an excuse with Karen Mohs' Biblical Greek curriculum.
Hey, Andrew! Teach Me Some Greek! is an excellent way for any
student - young or old - to learn Biblical Greek. With a reader,
workbook, pronunciation CD, flashcards, quizzes, exams, and more, Karen
introduces students to the Greek language and then progressively moves
the student on to more difficult material. The books are
attractive, easy to read and understand, and printed on high quality
paper. You could get by with just the workbook and the primer, but
most homeschool families will want to purchase the quizzes and exams in
order to evaluate their students properly. There are also many
extras available, such as sheet music for the Greek alphabet song, Greek
alphabet bookmarks, etc. The products in the seven levels of
Hey, Andrew! Teach Me Some Greek! are quite affordable.
You can purchase the Biblical Greek
curricula through Greek-N-Stuff at
or at
http://www.homeschoolstore.com/find/?searchType=exact&keyword=GREEK%20N%20STUFF&search_only=publisher&sort=bestselling . |
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In the footsteps of Hey, Andrew! Teach
Me Some Greek!, comes Karen Mohs' Latin's Not So Tough! - a
Latin curriculum for students whose parents have had no previous
experience with the language. While I personally would have
preferred something that moved along a little more quickly (I've had
many years of Latin experience and it was a little slow-paced for my
linguistically gifted children), I can say that if you're not familiar
with the language and you want to teach your child(ren) Latin, this
would be an ideal curriculum for you. For children who struggle
with language, this curriculum is paced to ensure that students become
familiar with the Latin alphabet, pronunciation, and vocabulary.
The higher levels introduce grammatical concepts, sentence translation,
and a deeper understanding of the Latin language.
Again, the books are primarily spiral
bound, which many homeschool parents prefer. There is also a
plethora of additional materials to supplement the workbook, including
Latin alphabet bookmarks, a pronunciation CD for the various levels,
quizzes and exams, and answer keys.
You can purchase this Classical Latin
curricula through Greek-N-Stuff at
or at
http://www.homeschoolstore.com/find/?searchType=exact&keyword=GREEK%20N%20STUFF&search_only=publisher&sort=bestselling . |
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The Learnables, published by the
International Linguistics Corporation, is a simple, economical foreign
language curriculum. The principle behind The Learnables is
that if you hear the foreign vocabulary word and associate it with
pictures showing what the word means, you will learn the language.
Linguistically, children think in "pictures" until about puberty, at
which time they switch over to translation mode. Before puberty,
they will hear "ball" and see a ball. After puberty, they will
hear "ball" and think "ball" or "ball - that's 'pelota'
in Spanish." The Learnables forces students who have already
passed the age of puberty to think pictorially again and it is much
easier to learn foreign vocabulary when you are not also trying to
translate. Thinking pictorially is always best.
You might also have more success with this program
with a visual/auditory learner. There is no hands-on application
(activities) with
The Learnables and this makes it difficult for some students to
retain the information, but an auditory learner can repeat the
information out loud and will gain much benefit from it. The
visual learner will not be distracted by hands-on activities because
they will be able to focus on looking at the page and then repeating the
vocabulary.
One drawback to this program is that
you have to actually be looking at the book while you're listening to
the audio CDs. You cannot learn languages with this program while
you're driving or doing other activities.
On a last positive note, even very young
children can use this program completely independently and learn
vocabulary and later sentences. I believe many youngsters ages six
to ten would find this program quite challenging (in a positive way) and
they would consider it fun to listen to the audio CD in order to try to
determine which words are which. Older students most certainly
will find it easy, but quick to learn.
Click
here to order The Learnables. |
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With weekly lessons that are uniquely
designed to tap into the energy and interests of early elementary age
children, Song School Latin is terrific! From the very beginning,
the lively illustrated lessons include vocabulary, songs, handwriting,
hands-on activities, and an opportunity for the young students to review
what they've learned. The emphasis on grammar is subtle, as it
should be for this age group, and the emphasis on the fact that learning
Latin is fun is obvious. I would highly recommend Amy Rehn's
introduction to classical Latin to any homeschool parent, but this
material could just as easily be used in public or private schools with
the best results. The workbook and
teacher's manual for Song School Latin is available at
http://www.homeschoolstore.com/find/?searchType=exact&keyword=CLASSICAL%20ACADEMIC%20PRESS&search_only=publisher&sort=bestselling
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Normally I do all the product reviews on
this website, but occasionally I will include one from another trusted
homeschool mom. This one is from my friend Lori. I saw these
books and they are amazing. Here's her review:
"Balancing the Sword is one of the most
comprehensive and intensive Bible Studies available to homeschoolers.
Parents who want the Scriptures and Holy Spirit to speak will appreciate
the objective questions that allow for personal application versus
subjective questions that allow for interpretation by the author,
parents, leader, etc. Totally scripturally-based, the text is enhanced
with beautiful illustrations, life-enhancing quotes on every page, and
an answer key. The large hardcover book may prove too heavy and bulky
for younger children, but permission is given for reproducibles within
the family. Given the quality and intensity of Balancing the Sword,
families will not want to miss the opportunity to use it during family
worship as a devotional and study guide for the WHOLE family." Lori
Keck, homeschool mom
You can purchase Balancing the Sword
products at
http://www.homeschoolstore.com/find/?searchType=keyword&keyword=balancing+the+sword&search_only=title . |
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