Opinions and Reviews Archives - Page 12 of 34

We Choose Virtues Character Building Tools ~ Review

Oct252011

October 25, 2011 by Jolanthe 55 Comments

As parents we all realize the magnitude of a job that we have to instill values in our children. I am often overwhelmed thinking of the many things that there are to cover and appreciate the wisdom and insight that parents who have ‘been there and done that’ offer to me.

My biggest struggle? Being positive ~ instead of approaching discipline or other issues from a negative aspect. When we received some of the We Choose Virtues program to use with our kids, I was immediately drawn to the colorful characters and the positive approach to character building that is the core of the program. Not only has it been a great for our kids, it is a constant encouragement and reminder to me as well!

The We Choose Virtues program is a character-based education program that provides you tools to help build Biblical virtues and character traits in your children. It covers the following character traits, all starting with the phrase “I am” ~ …Attentive, Content, Diligent, Forgiving, Gentle, Helpful, Honest, Kind, Obedient, Patient, Perseverant, and Self-Controlled.

My FAVORITE Part of We Choose Virtues

My favorite part of the program are the full-color Teacher’s Virtue Cards {$34.99}. There are 12 full-color cards {8 1/2” x 5 1/2”} that feature one of the Virtue Kids along with the virtue/character trait that they represent. Everything your child needs is on the front of the card and everything the teacher needs is on the back of the card.

Each card provides a visual from the story help trigger kid’s memories when they see the characters. On the above card you see Cake Jake ~ he wants MORE choices than the 20 cake flavors in the bakery and needs to get his ‘wanter’ under control!

The front of the card shows the short “I am” catchphrase with the and the go-along antonym {I am NOT}. Along the bottom of the card is a tie-in Scripture verse {NIrV} that you can learn together during the week. The trigger picture {above you see Cake Jake} also starts with the same letter as the virtue that child represents ~ content/cake.

The back of the Teacher’s Virtue Cards go into more detail for teaching. Each card includes:

teachable moment ideas
a challenge for the day {or week}
what would be appropriate to say if you are wrong in the situation
a short story about the Virtue Kid

The Kids Virtue Poster {$14.99} is a great daily reminder, or a snapshot, of all of the virtues represented in the program. It shows a small picture of the Virtue kid, the catchphrase for the virtue and the antonyms to go along. The poster is 11” x 17” in size and would fit on the front of your refrigerator or in a smaller space.

How We’re Using We Choose Virtues

Over the last few weeks since receiving the We Choose Virtues Teacher’s Virtue Cards and Kids Virtue Poster, we have been talking about one virtue a week, and adding a new virtue each week as we review the past ones. We’ve incorporated it as part of our morning calendar time.

I cut a page protector in half and added it onto our board so that I can slide in the weekly virtue for the kid’s to see and review. At the beginning of the week we talk in detail about the virtue and throughout the week we do some fun activities to go along with it.

Next to our morning board, I hung the Kids Virtue Poster so that we can review the virtues that we’ve already studied. It is a great way to see all the virtues at a glance.

There are quite a few different package options for purchasing the We Choose Virtues program, including sets for classroom and home use. We are using the Teacher’s Virtue Cards and the Kids Virtue Poster and I’m really happy with them. The only other thing that I might add to it is the pdf Virtue Kids Coloring book, since our kids enjoying coloring and it would be fun to add it to our ‘learning’ time.

The catch phrases are definitely sticking with the kids and I can hear them reminding themselves {and others} of the different virtues we have talked about ~ but in an encouraging and helpful way because of the “I am” starts to all of the traits. This has been a great addition to our day and we are excited to continue using it with our family.

I received the Teacher’s Virtue Cards and poster to review in exchange for my honest opinion. All thoughts and opinions in this post are mine. I do not have to return the products and was not paid for this post. Also linked to Hip Homeschool Moms giveaway post!

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The Tuneables Music DVD ~ Review

Oct42011

October 4, 2011 by Jolanthe 26 Comments

Music is something that our kids have always enjoyed and it is constantly playing in our house. We are fortunate to have a wonderful music teacher in our co-op that works with our children on the basics of music, but many families don’t have nearby classes to attend or aren’t even sure where to begin teaching their children.

The Tuneables: I Love Music DVD introduces children to a wonderful world, full of colors and engaging characters that will encourage them to participate and learn more about music. Many of the characters in Tuneville represents a musical instrument and throughout the video ~ Clara the clarinet, Pete the trumpet, Sunny the cymbal, Snare the drum, Gloria the piano, and last but not least, Mo the violin. Through the video, children learn the basics of tonal patterns {do, re, mi…}, improve their rhythm and move in time to music and just have FUN in the process.

“The Tuneables story starts with Annie and Max arriving at the local music shop for their first music lesson. Once the kids arrive, they notice an unusual Music Box playing beautiful music. Curious, Max reaches out to touch the box. All of a sudden, Annie and Max see the Music Box spring open and magically the room transforms! The kids find themselves in the middle of Mo’s Music Shop, in the magical world of Tuneville…”

Email subscribers click here to view The Tuneables video clip.

The program is intended for children ages 3-8, but I had all of our kids sit down to watch it with me {and although our 10 year old supposedly wasn’t watching, she was tapping her foot along and singing too…shh!}. The younger two boys {ages 4 – 6} really enjoyed the video and were tapping along to the beat and participating with The Tuneables. I love that it also includes real video clips along to show kids examples. When talking about the beat in music, there are video clips of children participating with the song and also an example of a ballet dancer moving to a slower beat.

The The Tuneables: “I Love Music” is the first in a series that will teach children music fundamentals. It retails for $29.99 and is available for purchase from the Tuneables website. The DVD also includes a companion CD with 19 songs to reinforce what your child has seen and heard on the DVD {listen to song samples here}.

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The Adventures of Munford ~ Review

Sep262011

September 26, 2011 by Jolanthe 24 Comments

Have you ever looked at a droplet of rain and wondered where that tiny droplet has been or come from? Maybe it was a local stream, a river far away or somewhere across the ocean. What if you could see and hear what that water droplet had seen?

Meet Munford. He’s two parts hydrogen and one part oxygen ~ a water molecule. He has traveled the world as rain, sleet, steam and has seen some amazing things in his lifetime. Munford brings your child along on his travels, teaching geography, history, science and more in The Adventures of Munford book series by Jamie Aramini.

When we received the set of books in the mail, McKenna walked off with the books and started reading them right away. She is currently reading the third book in the series and really enjoying them! We know she is absorbing the info, because we constantly hear about Munford during the day.

One night at dinner {and in the midst of reading The American Revolution}, McKenna shouted out ~ “Watch out! You might be drinking Munford!”…which then started everyone giggling and laughing. I love the creative twist on history that the series offers along with an imaginative narrator. So far McKenna has learned about The American Revolution, learned about an inventor in Munford Meets Robert Fulton, and is currently exploring with Munford Meets Lewis and Clark. The last book on her list is The Klondike Gold Rush.

Find Out More

Each of the books is published by Geography Matters and sells for $8.95. From now until the end of October, you can get 4 books for the price of 3 with the coupon code 4MUNFORD43. The books are written for all ages, but reading level is around a 3rd – 5th grade level. We could definitely use these as read-alouds for our younger boys {and most likely will!}.

The Giveaway

I received four books from Geography Matters to review and provide my honest opinion, and in this case, my daughter’s too. I do not have to return the products and I was not paid for this post.

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Filed Under: Giveaways, Opinions and Reviews 24 Comments

The Life of Joseph ~ Grapevine Bible Studies

Sep132011

September 13, 2011 by Jolanthe 9 Comments

Who knew that stick figures and the Bible could go so well together! Maybe the thoughts running through your head were the same as mine when I first heard about Grapevine Studies, but let me tell you ~ we LOVE the time that we are spending drawing little stick people and especially the Bible learning that goes hand-in-hand with it!

Bible was truly the one area that I struggled trying to find something for our family to use this year. While we’ve been reading the Bible together, I hadn’t found anything that we could all sit down and study together. When Grapevine Studies contacted me and asked if I would be willing to review their newly revised Life of Joseph Bible study, I quickly replied ‘yes’! I knew it was a shorter study and would give us a good look at the program and a chance to see if it would ‘fit’ with our family.

Short answer ~ I can’t wait to start our next study!!

Take 20% any non-sale item until September 30th with code BLOG55.

What’s included in the Life of Joseph study?

In this 14 week study, students learn all about Joseph from the time he was a young boy {and the favorite of his father} in Canaan until the time of his death in Egypt.

The teacher’s manual has lesson notes, timelines, full-color stick figure drawings, vocabulary terms, a map, lesson goals & key points, memory verses, as well as review questions & answers {ebook $16.95, 3 ring punched $20.95}.
The student book includes lesson pages, timelines, a map, verse memorization and more {ebook $11.95, printed $13.95}.

In addition to the teacher and student books, you will also need a Bible, colored pencils, a whiteboard {or large paper} and colored dry erase markers.

What We Loved About the Life of Joseph Study

All four our our kids were able to sit down and draw along as we went through the Life of Joseph lessons together. Granted, Kaleb’s drawings were a little less involved, but he enjoyed being able to sit down with us and participate ~ because the stick figures were much simpler for him!

In a typical lesson we would do a timeline review and then work through the rest of the lesson. We would read a passage from the Bible {we use the NIrV Discover’s Bible} and then complete the drawing to go along with that passage.

We have a large whiteboard easel that I would draw on using our BIG colorful pack of Expo dry erase markers so all the kids could see the pictures. As I read and we talked about it, they would copy the pictures onto their lesson pages.

The only thing that we did not do with the lessons was the Bible memory verses because we are working on our Awana verses now and other verse memorization. I do appreciate that it is included in the study, but we just opted not to include it at this point.

Here are a few things that we liked specifically about the study:

Four-square layout for the studies ~ saving lots of room and printing!
Multi-colored stick figures ~ the variety keeps the kids really involved in the details of the drawings, even though the drawings are based on stick figures
The ebook works PERFECTLY on my iPad ~ I didn’t have to print it out! I can honestly say that this has changed my opinion of ebooks!! {and yes, it would work well on my laptop too, but I have a tendency to get distracted, so the laptop if off during school time!}.
It IS multi-aged focused ~ the fact that Kaleb can draw his cute little stick people along with us makes my heart so happy {you have to love those big eyes on the stick figures!}.

We will definitely be continuing on with Grapevine Studies throughout the rest of our year. This is another curriculum that has gotten two thumbs up from all of our kids and will be a part of our school time for awhile!

If you’re interested in any of the other studies and levels from Grapevine, you can download sample lessons from many of their other studies here. They have a variety of studies including Old and New Testament, Esther, the Birth of Jesus, the Resurrection, and Biblical Feasts.

I was provided this product free of charge in exchange for my honest opinion and review. Any opinions expressed in this review are solely mine.

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Betty Lukens Learning Fun With Felt

Sep62011

September 6, 2011 by Jolanthe 491 Comments

Our kids have always enjoyed any felt set that I attempted to put together for them. I say ‘attempted’ because these were really basic and pretty boring felt sets. Nothing like the full-color fun designs that are a part of the sets from Betty Lukens.

We were sent four different felt learning sets to have fun with. Here’s what we chose…Forest Camping Adventure, Days of the Dinosaurs, Under the Sea and Adventures in Space.

All of the felt learning sets include a 13″ x 15″ Felt Play Board, over 20 pre-cut felt pieces and a handy plastic storage bags with handles. I absolutely love that the pieces have already been cut out for you. The sets are ready to play with the moment you pull them out of the bag! The storage bag has been WONDERFUL for keeping track of all the pieces and also is a slim case for storing.

The first time I pulled them out with the intention of distracting the kids ~ and they ended up playing for hours! Kaleb even pulled out his toy dinosaurs to interact with the felt set. :)

I was planning to use the space themed felt set a little later for Kaleb {and we still will}, but McKenna has pulled this one out several times to play with already.

The biggest hit so far has been the camping felt set. All of the animals included are much loved especially because we’ve seen the majority of them in our own backyard.

All the sets are ones that we will be using throughout the year as part of our learning time and just for fun! The website has a variety of felt sets to choose from, including felt activity books, Bible felt sets, educational sets and more. The Carville felt set is one that I am sure our boys would love…and is on our Christmas list for them.

Betty Lukens has also offered my readers a 15% off coupon code ~ use Creations during checkout and you’ll save a bit on any order you place!

I received four felt sets from Betty Lukens at no charge to use with my family in exchange for my honest opinion and review. I do not have to return the products and I was not paid for this post. All opinions expressed in this post are mine…or my kids.

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WordBuild® Foundations ~ Dynamic Literacy {Review}

Aug302011

August 30, 2011 by Jolanthe Leave a Comment

We received this product at no cost in exchange for our honest review. All opinions expressed are solely mine.

At our homeschool convention this year I had a chance to talk to the people at the Dynamic Literacy booth about one of their vocabulary programs called WordBuild® Foundations. I left with an armful of product and was so excited to start using it this year during our school time.

The program does not focus on drilling words and vocabulary into children but teaches them HOW words are built and put together. Just because a child can read and sound out a word {phonics} doesn’t mean that they can understand and interpret what it means {morphonics}.

The WordBuild program is divided into two series: Foundations and Elements. Foundations does exactly what the name implies ~ builds a vocabulary foundation with prefixes and suffixes. Elements then takes what children have learned in Foundations and builds on it, including more complex root families.

Based on the simple formula WORD = (prefix) + root + (suffix), WordBuild® is fun, easy, and effective.

The biggest question for me ~ “Would it work and would our children enjoy it?” For the last two months we’ve been using WordBuild® Foundations and can honestly say that we are enjoying it! Want to know why?

~ Ease of use: One of the things that really attracted me to the WordBuild® vocabulary program was how easy it would be for me to implement it with the kids. I didn’t need to carve out a huge chunk of time from our already full day. All I needed was the teacher’s manual, activity books for the kids, and 15 minutes a day ~ tops.

Some days we work right up to the 15 minutes and other days take much less. Even if we have a word or two left to do, we stop and move on to the next section the next day. This is something that the publisher recommends ~ stop at 15 minutes!!

~ Fun exercises and variety: Each of the units follows the same format so once the girls became familiar with the layout, they jumped right into the routine. The word search and magic square are favorites in this house {and sneaking in some other learning too!}.

Here’s a look at what each day looks like in a week’s plans {you can view a sample lesson here}:

Prefix square ~ build new words by putting the center prefix word in front of each of the words surrounding it
Affix adder ~ create new words using the affix, write what you think the word means and use it in a sentence
Magic Square ~ match the words to their definitions and they all add up to a magic number
Word Search ~ find and circle words within the grid
Review ~ a review of the words/concepts from the week

~ Solid lesson plans: Nothing makes me happier than well-laid out plans. Each unit gives objectives, hints, materials needed, week-at-a-glance, discussion ideas and more. View a sample lesson here.

~ It’s working! The kids are carrying over what they are learning into everyday life. When we were talking about compound words in the introduction booklet, they made up games for us to play in the car together…and the learning spilled over into everyday life.

~ Humor: As we were talking about compound words and I was trying to help Zachary come up with words that started with the word ‘head’, I pointed to my head and said “This is something that Mommy gets a lot.” His eyes got big and he said, “OH! That’s right! Head lice!” More like headaches…but he did get a new word, right?

~ A great guarantee {and discount}: If you aren’t completely satisfied, the company will refund your money {including s/h}, no questions asked.

As an added bonus, Dynamic Literacy is offering Homeschool Creation readers a 25% discount until 12/31/2011 when using the code HSC2011.

Recommended Ages

If you aren’t sure where to start, Dynamic Literacy has a great placement chart to use. Their rule of thumb ~ always start with Foundations Level 1 or Elements level 1 regardless of age {and I agree!}. You can also view samples of both the Foundations and Elements levels here on their website.

At first I thought we would be able to pull Zachary {Grade 2} into this with us. While he did understand the concept behind much of what we were doing and was able to complete the introductory booklet for Foundations Level 1, once we started into the actual student workbook, he was really in over his head. His reading and writing comprehension level are definitely not at the same level as the either of the girls {4th and 5th grade}, so we will be holding off on the workbook for him at this point.

Find Out More

Visit the Dynamic Literacy Homeschool site to find out more information about the program. I’ve also included a few more links for you to check out.

~ Informational video about the WordBuild® program

~ Scope and Sequence and State Standards information

~ Purchase information {don’t forget to use the code HSC2011 for 25% off your order!!}

I was provided this curriculum by Dynamic Literacy in exchange for my honest review and opinion from our family’s use. All opinions expressed in this review are my own {and my kid’s}.

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