TOS Crew

I never made an official announcement, but you have probably noticed and will continue to notice something new around here . . .

For the coming year I have been selected to join a group of homeschoolers to review products for various companies. Many vendors have great products about which they want help getting the word out. I am excited to be a part of this group and pass along information on some great products to you.

At the TOS Crew’s blog you can find links to all the companies we will do reviews for this year as well as other Crew member reviews of the products. Whenever I do a review for the Crew I will link back to their blog so you can see other’s reviews as well.

Up and coming is a review of the Grapevine Bible study curriculum. They have so many great options, and can be tailored for families or group studies. We plan to start using it this coming week and I look forward to jumping into our Old Testament Overview.

Welcome aboard!

The 2009 Schoolhouse Planner

Summer tends to be planning season in homeschooling households, and just in time for the formulating frenzy, The Old Schoolhouse has released its brand new 2009 Schoolhouse Planner.

E-Book: The 2009 Schoolhouse Planner

This planner offers far more than stability and structure for your homeschool days. As we all know, the role of mother, home manager, teacher, negotiator, etc. overlap throughout each day. And, likewise, the parameters of the 2009 Schoolhouse Planner stretch into these roles as well.

A sampling of what you will enjoy with this tool:

Calendars — including ideas appropriate for each month from July (starting in just a couple weeks!) through June 2010; yearly calendars up to 2012; along with recipes and resources appropriate for each month

Inspiration — from well known homeschool authors (including Jay Wile and Amanda Bennett), addressing topics pertinent to homeschool families.

Must-know lists and compiled charts — from presidents to cloud types to geographical terms, the periodical table as well as miracles and parables.

Record Keeping — fill in schedules (for two, three, four, and five children), grade tracking, field trip planning, activity managers, inventory sheets, goals, etc. This book offers 120 pages of homeschool related forms and schedules!

Household help — they don’t send a person, but all of these resources can help everything run more smoothly. This also gives you a place and format to compile essential information. They help you organize chores, medical information, schedules, menus, gardening, pets, parties, and budgets. Over 60 pages of these useful tools.

Each of the forms is made to either print and write on, or type right onto and print out filled in, whatever you prefer. You can save your changes for further modification, or to build on, or print and save the hard copy.

The only downside I have found is that if you want to keep more than one computer based copy of one of the forms, you would need to save the whole planner more than once on your computer. Since I plan on storing hard copies of the record sheets, this did not diminish its usefulness for me, but it was something I had to consider when printing out the various copies for each of my kids. However, if you own a copy of Adobe Acrobat (not Acrobat Reader, the free download, but a rather expensive software), it has the capability of saving individual pages in modified format.

I have big plans for organizing this summer and pulling together all the information and strategies that I need for the year ahead. This wonderful planner has given me the framework and tools to make it all a reality. I had already started before receiving the planner, but the 2009 Schoolhouse Planner has done a lot of the work for me, and now I don’t need to go searching all over the internet to get it done, making my precious planning time even more efficient.

And, since it is all in an ebook format you can print and reprint the various pages as you need to keep them visible around your home and keep your family all on the same page.

All of these resources, 375 overflowing pages, are packed into this one e-book for $39.00. You would want to purchase it soon to take full advantage of the planning and ideas available even to enrich your celebration and study of the Fourth of July, and to have all the information in place for the new school year.

Purchase the 2009 Schoolhouse Planner.

Read more reviews of the 2009 Schoolhouse Planner.

SpellQuizzer winner

Thanks to Random.org, the winner of the SpellQuizzer giveaway is . . .

Comment #2 — Jen Stanley

Congratulations! You have until  Thursday evening to get back to me and stake your claim.

If you missed my review of this great spelling software, you will find it here.

Thanks for entering, everyone, and check in next week for another exciting giveaway!

Product Review: SpellQuizzer

I have to admit that spelling settles into the category of subjects that draws less than an enthusiastic response from pretty much all of my kids. We do it, check it off,  sometimes groan in the process, and move on with life, or school.

Recently, Dan Hite of SpellQuizzer.com asked me to review his product and I fostered a little glimmer of hope that this would brighten this otherwise dull subject. I am so glad we gave it a go.

Day one

I input the spelling words, having fun making up my own original sentences like, “poetry — Blake just LOVES {insert extreme sarcasm} poetry poetry.” The kids get to hear these all week long and smile for each one. I always have fun with spelling sentences, so it added to my fun, to use this recording feature for my own tailor made sentences.

The program is quite easy to use and the process for setting up all three lists (for three different children) took me approximately 10 minutes. Of course, once I get them all in I can reuse them for younger children in subsequent years. The time required of the parent is very manageable.

The first run through I sit with my kids to answer any questions, check their initial progress, and make sure they understand expectations.My seven year old asks me to write out her words because she wants to study and make sure she earns the cheering for a perfect score next time.

Day two —

My daughters come in to my office at 7:00 a.m. to see if my computer is on so they can do their spelling. I guess I can probably take it off the school schedule if they finish it two hours before school even starts.

Days three and four —

Same story. Spelling is done before the day begins. They want more words to study.

Day five —

No doubt, all three have their spelling words down without hesitation. Talk about a painless process. We’re all hooked.

Take a few minutes to check out their website and you can . . .

– Download a free trial of this spelling program

– View some video demonstrations of SpellQuizzer

– Check out their many spelling lists

– Enjoy their special section geared just for homeschoolers

– And, of course, for just $29.95 you can own your own copy of this spelling software

With SpellQuizzer you can import and export spelling lists, compact your lists for long term storage, and use a written hint if you don’t use the audio feature (although, in my opinion, that is the most entertaining part of the process). My second child has routinely struggled with spelling and has little to no desire to study her words each week, but her enthusiasm surpassed all the others. By Wednesday she already could spell all her words correctly. SpellQuizzer had a guaranteed perfect paper waiting for her on Friday.

Now, for the best part . . . One reader will be able to win a copy of this software! Yes, Dan was gracious enough to offer a free copy to one of my readers. If you would like a chance to win, simply leave a comment on this post and you will be entered in the drawing. The contest will close on Friday, June 12. The winner will be posted that afternoon and will have until Monday evening to contact me, otherwise a new winner will be chosen.

You can even earn extra entries — blog about this contest and you can be entered yet again (make sure to leave another comment saying you did so);  Subscribe to this website (and comment again) and not only will you receive all these posts delivered right to you, but you will be entered one more time.

Happy Spelling!

I’m sure it’s obvious, but this has definitely worked for us!