Teenage conflict, a marriage that needs work, God blurring out of focus. These create the backdrop for a family ripe for renewal.

Nothing brings a family together like manual labor in stressful situations. Working side by side, the individuals in this fractured family begin to remember what they liked about each other and what they lost sight of in the pressures of everyday life.

Ernest Otto challenges Matthew to just ask himself one question before acting, “What would Jesus do?” And, Matthew finds that the answer sometimes surprises him, and his change of heart surprises everyone else in the process. He continues to learn from Ernest as his family is pieced back together along with the wood he had destroyed in an act of vandalism.

I appreciate that the film does not make it out that trusting God will make your life hunky-dorey. Otto lost his wife to cancer in the past, but did not lose his confidence in the power of prayer.  The story kept the attention of our whole family and had enough ups and downs and unexpected challenges to keep us on our toes.

The only disappointment to me was the ending. Poor Otto sitting by his wife’s grave crying over how much he misses her. I would have preferred him expressing his sorrow but remembering that he doesn’t mourn as those that have no hope. But, I guess they were just keeping it real.

Overall, a great film that might make you reconsider some of your own priorities and brush the dust of that well worn question, “What would Jesus do?”

The Woodcarver DVD

(releases Tuesday, March 13th)

Christian Cinema: http://www.christiancinema.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=4094

About the Movie:

Matthew Stevenson is a troubled kid from a broken home. When he vandalizes the local church to get back at his parents, Matthew has to repair the damage to the church to avoid criminal charges. While working at the church, he meets Ernest (John Ratzenberger), an accomplished wood carver who created the intricate woodwork decoration that Matthew destroyed. Ernest has become something of a hermit, but reluctantly comes out of reclusion to help repair the church. Now Ernest and Matthew must work together to preserve the church’s beautiful antiquity, and along the way, they also manage to restore their faith in God and in life.

If you would like a chance to win a copy of this movie please leave a comment on this post. You can earn a second entry by sharing about this giveaway on facebook, twitter, etc. and leaving a second comment. The drawing will be open until Friday March 16th in the evening. Make sure to leave an email address that I can reach you at when you win!

“Disclosure of Material Connection: I received one or more of the products or

services mentioned above for free in the hope that I would mention it

on my blog. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally

and believe will be good for my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance

with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the

Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

If you enjoy checking these reviews of “hot off the presses” items, this movie will sound a bit familiar.

When this first hit the screens we had the opportunity to give out tickets to the screening, but now we have the actual DVD to giveaway!

Same great story, just the in-home version. We absolutely love finding family friendly films that we can enjoy together and re-enjoy together, so I was thrilled to add this to our movie collection.

This story line appealed to each member of our family and stayed clean enough to earn a “G” rating. Love that!

The triumphant underdog is a story that simply doesn’t get old. Seeing people come together as a team despite the odds stacked against them is an inspiring conversation starter and an encouragement on a personal level as well. The Mighty Macs does that and will easily draw your family together to cheer on this team of determined athletes.

About the Movie:

It’s 1971. Cathy Rush is a woman ahead of her time … and she’s about to embark on an adventure for the ages. A new era is dawning in the country and in collegiate athletics, where a national champion will be crowned for the first time in women’s basketball.

In the lead up to this historical season, major universities are preparing their game plans to win that first title. Meanwhile a tiny all-women’s Catholic college in Philadelphia has a more modest goal: find a coach before the season begins. Providentially, Cathy Rush is about to find Immaculata College.

Recently married, Cathy is dealing with the aftermath of a truncated playing career. While cultural norms would have her staying at home, she’s willing to do the hard work necessary to help her new team reach their goals—or perhaps she’s just trying to achieve her unfulfilled dreams through them.

From the beginning, her challenges are as imposing as the big-school teams Immaculata will face on the court. Cathy learns there is no gymnasium on campus, she receives little support from the school’s Mother Superior, and the school is in dire financial straits. To top it off, she may not even have enough players to field a team!

While it appears the Macs don’t have a prayer, all hope is not lost. With the help of Sister Sunday—a spunky assistant coach—and the support of a booster club of elderly nuns, Coach Rush creates a new game plan that just might bring the team—and the school—together.

Will this pioneer buck cultural norms and spur her rag-tag team to unexpected heights? Or will her hard-driving ways create a wedge between the coach and everyone around her? One thing’s for certain: there’s never been anyone like Cathy Rush at Immaculata!

My friend, Nicole, passed this along to me and thought you might all be interested as well:

You can receive a FREE dvd through this site. She received Helen Keller but not sure if it changes. You have to respond to the email they send you and then enter the free code they give you in the email on the right of the page for the discount and free shipping to be applied. You do not need to enter any payment info as the balance will be $0
Here’s the website: http://www.nestlearning.com/t-email_signup.aspx

Starting in November we begin to rewatch our favorite Christmas movies. We have a new one to add to the mix from now on — Christmas Lodge.

LOVED it!

A movie you can watch with your preschooler  in the room  and your teenager across the couch and all enjoy it, and not have to fast forward any parts. I highly recommend this film for its fast paced story line and family friendliness.

It lays out the importance of family values and keeping faith alive. Even when struggles and obstacles pile up, this team pulls together and works toward their goal from day one: We will be #1.

It is in theaters starting today, and you will want to jump at this chance to see a movie that is rated ‘G’ and isn’t just a light-hearted kids’ movie. This is a true family film that adults will enjoy, will keep kids’ attention, provide a few laughs, and will offer some great talking points on the ride home.

Don’t miss it!

More info on the film:

Great books and great movies need to be savored. A quick viewing, or a quick read through might be enjoyable, but you will get far more out of a book or movie if you take some time to discuss the contents and participate in activities intended to draw out the meaning and experiences in the story.

Zeezok has taken films with educational value and created movie guides to accompany them. These can easily fill a week of activities or be spread out over a few weeks. Students should view the movie, and possibly even read or listen to the book as well before or during the completion of the other suggested activities.  We did choose to listen to the audio book during our car rides so we could all have a good comparison of both the book and movie, although the guide is based on the movie.

The movie and book that we studied was My Side of the Mountain. It tells the story of a boy, Sam Gribley who went out into the mountains to try to prove himself as an outdoorsman. He lives on his own, relying on his naturalist know-how to survive. We loved how he trained a falcon to help him hunt food. He made clothes of deer skin and stored up provisions for the long, cold winter that would come to the mountains. The story tells of the challenges of living away from civilization and modern day conveniences and prompted lots of conversation in our house about what it would be like to live on your own like that. Some of my kids would jump at the chance (but probably be home by dinner), and others had no desire to prove anything by leaving the comforts of home. Either way, we enjoyed learning from Sam Gribley’s experiences.

Product: My Side of the Mountain Movie Guide

Details: A downloadable 32 page teacher’s guide to lead students through a middle-school unit study based on the movie My Side of the Mountain.

Price: $12.99

What we loved . . .

• Movie day! I don’t use videos or movies as part of my teaching day very often, so for my kids to watch a movie as part of class was pretty exciting. Brought back memories of junior high science and the thrill of a period “off” when you saw the tell-tale movie or slide projector in the back of the room. Well before the day of DVDs, of course.
• Interactive. After viewing the movie we got to dig into the guide and the suggested activities. While many of the activities were discussions of various aspects of the movie and related topics, they did also have a good representation of activities that required internet research, drawing, creative writing, outdoor observation, and other related tasks.
• Great for the whole family. While this is geared toward middle school kids, we watched the movie together and read the book together. We also enjoyed some of the discussions in the movie guide together. Some of the topics obviously got a little over the younger one’s heads, but they all participated at some point. The young ones definitely enjoyed the nature walk and discussion of wilderness survival.
• Summaries and answer keys. No good teacher’s guide could be without an answer key and summaries to jog your memory. They had helpful recaps of sections of the movie and had all the answers so I knew if my kids were on the right track.
• Well designed. The movie guide gives you the activities and one option for going through the activities. Families could easily tweak the topics and cover them in a different order or more slowly if desired. Using all the activities would definitely give the viewer a good background to the various issues, animals, and characters in the movie, and book
• Worldview discussion. We are really big on worldview discussion in our house, so I was excited to see a discussion outline centered specifically around worldview. This took the movie to a personal level and helps draw out some of the philosophical undertones in the film and book. I would have liked to see even more in this area including exploration of the worldview of Thoreau and possibly the movie director.

Some considerations . . .

• You will need other materials. Obviously, if you are doing a movie guide you will need to get your hands on the movie as the whole basis for the study. We easily found a copy at our library.
• This book/movie talks about Thoreau. They focus mostly on his naturalist abilities, but in the movie guide it has an activity which involves memorizing a passage from Thoreau’s book, Civil Disobedience. While it is an interesting passage to discuss (focusing on the responsibility of the individual over the government), I would have rather read and discussed it and left the memory work to Psalm 19 or some passage of Scripture recognizing God’s handiwork in nature.

These movie guides (there are many others available) would add a little pop to many topics of study. Using these guides and the corresponding movies, families can enjoy a change of pace and some interesting conversation. We found it easy to incorporate into our other lessons and enjoyable for each of the kids to participate and learn. Check out their other movie guides as well to see if one might fit a subject you currently have in your studies. And, check out the other reviews since many different movie guides were received and reviewed by other crew members.

For more TOS Crew reviews on this product, check out the TOS Crew blog.

Disclaimer: This product was provided to me free of charge through Zeezok as part of my participation in The Old Schoolhouse Homeschool Crew. I received no additional compensation and the opinions expressed here come from my personal experiences and sincere thoughts.

Tweet