Jean Welles’ Worship Guitar Class for Kids is an excellent program for children and adults to learn to play guitar. Being a non-guitar playing person I was surprised by my own ability to follow through and successfully duplicate her fingering. After I gave it a try I introduced the streaming videos to the girls and they are starting to get the hang of how it works. We were so excited about our ability to make a few sounds that we went out to see how much a proper guitar would cost. (For this review I had to borrow a friend’s guitar.)
Although the title of this course is “Worship Guitar” secular homeschooling families should not feel that by purchasing this product that they are subjecting their children to any form of indoctrination. The lessons start off with a quick prayer and the songs are dedicated to God and the values that everyone needs to be successful in life. People from all faiths should be comfortable with the songs and the spirit in which they were created.
One thing that my girls really enjoyed was the feeling that they were in a personal lesson with Ms. Welles. Ms. Welles has a cat that is present during her instruction and for my cat loving girls this was a giant plus. I think that showing parts of the live lesson with the adorable little girl was also a brilliant touch because it gives the little ones confidence seeing another student receiving corrections and praise for a job well done. As a parent I felt that she had a genuine love of her students and of God. This quiet and loving confidence made the lessons special and enjoyable (for us at least) than many that we have experienced with music teachers that we’ve encountered in real life.
The Worship Guitar Class for Kids is also incredibly affordable for any family. You can get the nine streaming video lessons for $28. If you would like to have the children practice without tying up the computer, you can also request the lessons on DVD for an additional $5 for a total of $33. The course covers:
How to hold down a note to get a clear tone on the guitar.
A couple worship songs with the melody plucked to strengthen their hands.
MathTutor has created one of the most beautiful math programs for young children that I have ever experienced. I find it difficult to describe the visual and auditory beauty that you experience in “Young Minds Number and Counting.” I have a three year old son and although we all found the cover intriguing with the tree frog, Michael hasn’t expressed any real interest in “formal” learning. We don’t have cable (hence we have not television) so he hasn’t been exposed to much Sesame Street and the usual suspects.
But once the video began, he was entranced. I mean, the perpetual motion boy just sat and watched the entire presentation without a word. On the next pass (he insisted on it being played again) he kept jumping up to make sure that we were watching the many animals that were being counted while beautiful classical music played in the background. The music chosen were selections from Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Vivaldi, Brahms, Pachelbel and Chopin. (Sometimes I just put it on to listen to the music!)
This is a basic counting DVD, but because of the extraordinary images and music it is more of a feast of numbers than I would have thought possible. I mean, how interesting can you make counting to 15? If you really want to know you need to watch this video.
The Basic Math Word Problem Tutor
While not as colorful or musically inspired, this eight hour video course is very thorough and an excellent way to explain word problems to your children. The instructor begins at the beginning and builds on each foundation. My oldest daughter has trouble with word problems (as it seems a lot of kids do), but she really enjoyed watching the video and working alongside the instructor. Actually, I was surprised that she wasn’t goofing around while the DVD was playing. Instead she ran upstairs got her notebook and took notes on what the instructor said and did. Her word problem skills still need work, but she seemed to really appreciate the way that the teacher explained things.
I personally found his explanations and illustrations to be quite clear. And he went through the entire strategy for tackling a problem. If there were more than one way to arrive at the correct answer he explained each of them while helping the student to focus on key words that supply the clues to what you’re supposed to accomplish. Overall, I was quite impressed and even re-learned a few things that I had forgotten about. I know that these three DVDs will hold a prominent place in our bag of math tricks.
AVKO is a non-profit organization dedicated to helping parents, teachers and researcher to find the best ways to educate children in literacy. There is a plethora of free and low cost resources for families to use to help the children in a variety of ways learn how to read and spell better. One thing that I liked about the program was that it addresses educational challenges in a variety of ways. This is not a one-size fits all grouping of tools.
Recognizing that children have dominant learning styles, they’ve provided auditory, visual and kinesthetic ideas and materials to help parents use whatever works best for their children. There is also a ton of research that is stored on the website, so if you have a question about why something is working (or how to get it to work better) you don’t have far to look.
I think that this is one of the first places parents who are new to homeschooling should visit and sign up for a membership. Although there are lots of free places to get information for developing a homeschooling curriculum, AVKO has the most comprehensive material that I’ve seen since I began this homeschooling journey with my kids. And I was surprised to learn that many of the resources that are sold in curriculum packs from company’s such as Sonlight and other major companies originated from AVKO.
One of the benefits of membership is that you get additional freebies and access to information that are not available to the general public. The basic membership package is only $25 and you more than get your money’s worth from the free e-books that are available to members. If you have a variety of ages to work with, I think that the $100 membership is well worth the cost because not only do you get the basic member perks, you also get to view all of the AVKO curriculum materials (with the exception of Sequential Spelling and Engaging Language Kits). I mean, economically speaking, it’s kind of tough to get purchase all of the materials that you might want. This way you can still read through the information and use it in your homeschool.
I wish that I had known about this resource earlier in the game, but I’m definitely going to avail myself of all the things that it has to offer from this point forward.
abcTeach is an easy way for parents to begin the homeschooling journey without breaking the bank. The focus of this website is to help children to grasp the fundamentals and run with them. There are thousands of worksheets to choose from which allows parents to customize their children’s educational experience.
One of the traps that most homeschoolers fall into during the elementary years is spending a mint trying to buy the “perfect curriculum” for their little ones. But, as experienced home educators know, their needs can be met by resources such as abcTeach for as little as $40/year (or $70 for two years) for individual families. This is an exceptional value, especially when you have multiple children since you can have access to multiple grade levels.
So what do you get for your money? There are over 35,000 worksheets to choose from ranging from the basics (math, time, spelling, and handwriting) to the cool (suduko, shapebooks, and art work). They also offer unit study themes, research tools, clip art, language studies and more!
The site owners are very creative, and since some of their offerings might be new to parents, they provide tutorial videos to help you make the most of each resource they offer. I found that to be exceptional since I have belonged to other elementary level programs that pretty much just make you it out on your own.
*****
So, how did abcTeach work out for me and my crew? Well, I enjoyed creating the different worksheets. It was quick and easy. There are also ways to customize the worksheets beyond the original offerings which worked really well to make sure that girls weren’t peeking at each other’s work. So, I had a lot of fun. The downside for my family is that they don’t really enjoy doing worksheets very much. My kids are on the kinesthetic side of town, so we do a lot of physical activities while studying, so being made to sit down and fill out papers didn’t really thrill them.
I, however, think that abcTeach is a wonderful tool to add to whatever your homeschooling style happens to be. It’s perfect for those days when the parents are involved in other things, but they still want their children to do some unsupervised schoolwork. I plan on using the suduko and crossword pages for our many driving excursions as a way to keep their minds active without the use of their handheld games. I am glad that abcTeach was kind enough to give me a test drive to really discover the hidden treasures they’ve created.
*****
They also generous enough to giveaway thousands of free worksheets so that parents can try them out on their kids before they purchase the full subscription. You can also sign up for the newsletter which fills you in on the new worksheets available and other teaching tips. These resources were created for teachers, parents and homeschoolers so be sure to tell your friends that if they have a child who needs more practice in a particular subject that abcTeach should be their first stop.
I use PACE curriculum for my 6th grader but I have one that I am going to be doing preschool with next year & then kindergarten. The PACE system doesn’t look that great for children just starting out with no reading skills. To the experienced homeschooling parents, what do you recommend?
girls want to learn to write their names, the alphabet, name their shapes and colors and take a stab at reading her favorite books with you..
boys, are not ready for any formal schooling, and are best served by having blocks, legos, playdough and other kinetic (touching) materials
at hand.
typically, not ready unitl age eight for stiff, scheduled training…but will pick up a lot as he is ready ,
and will acclimate right into classes at 3rd or
4th grade level…
please don’t spend money on preK and K materials…
Learn about teaching methods for home schooling with expert tips from an experienced teacher and home school authority in this free homeschooling video clip.
Expert: Jennifer Miller
Bio: Jennifer Miller has a degree in elementary education and has worked extensively within the home school community. She provides educational consulting, evaluations, and educational plans.
Filmmaker: Bryan Powers
I have recently started being homeschooled, and need a curriculum for the rest of the year. A semester-long curriculum would be great, if possible. I’m in 9th grade, but in mostly advanced classes, so it would also be good to be able to pick out individual courses I can take. It doesn’t matter if it’s computerized or on paper/books, as long as it’s not incredibly expensive. If you’re homeschooled, feel free to just say the program/curriculum you’re using, and your thoughts about it.
Tons of homeschool information can be found at this website:
Great news! Nature Friend Magazine has a few surprises up their sleeves since my review and I wanted to let you in on it. First and most important are those coupon codes that you add at the time of checkout. This is a limited time offer, so be sure to place your orders before November 30, 2009.
Magazine Subscription Savings: BLOG93
30% off Hardbound Volumes: Coupon Code: HBV30P
Now for the other exciting news for the kids. Nature Friend Magazine is having a story contest that’s open for the kids. Here are the details:
We are announcing a story contest in the December issue of Nature Friend. The contest will be open to families that subscribe to Nature Friend, and will appear in the May 2010 issue. The complete rules will be in the December issue, but here are a couple of notes. Three entries will be selected from each of four age groups, 6-8, 9-11, 12-14, and 15-17. From the three stories selected in each group, we will randomly draw a name and give that writer a pair of binoculars or $35, winner’s choice. The other two writers will also receive something.
Secondly, Judy Kauffman, the writer of our Creative Writing lesson in each Study Guide, has recently lost her house in a fire. No one in the family was injured, but most things are gone, including her writings. Those of us that have been following her lessons know how important it is to her that a nature journal be kept. We want to get her new nature journal off to a running start. We need your help to do this. We invite you to send two photocopies of the pages in your journal. We will forward one copy on to Judy to jump-start her new journal, and the other copy we will keep for consideration in the story contest. See the details in the December issue concerning how to submit your stories.
Submissions that are not selected for the story contest will automatically be considered for the June Readers’ Issue.
Download N Go is an exciting new series from TOS that you’re sure to love. Every homeschooling family approaches education differently. Some like unit studies, some prefer traditional textbooks and some prefer lap booking and other creative ways to get their children to embrace new ideas and concepts.
Amanda Bennett had this great idea to combine two of the more popular educational systems (unit studies and lapbooks) and came up with Download N Go. Here are some of the features (taken straight from my email):
Units are theme based and full of exciting discoveries and motivation to develop lifelong learners.
Each study is one week in length, having five daily lessons with lapbook components for each day.
Each student creates a complete lapbook–a finished capsule of learning.
All the research and preparation have been done!
Hyperlinks are embedded right in the study–saving you time!
Integrated studies include history, geography, reading, science, spelling,
vocabulary, writing, art, and more.
Units are reusable year after year–nothing is consumed.
There are no expensive resources required!
Includes a great list of books that you can use to enrich your study, but
they are not required.
And here’s the best part — TOS is offering Download and Go in two different flavors. You can purchase the series based upon a semester or a year of lessons. Since this is just being launched, the semester (19 weekly lessons) is at a discounted introductory rate that you can see here. And you can get a whole year’s worth of lessons (38 in total) by clicking here.
I just got a chance to download my free introduction to Download N Go™ Autumn Treasures. After a quick look around it definitely looks like something my girls will enjoy doing. think you’ll love the way it turns homeschooling into a multi-sensory adventure.
As a member of the TOS Crew I get lots of great products to review. And now it’s your turn! This week TOS has given non-TOS Crew members a great autumn gift. Autumn Treasures is now available for free download. This is a lapbooking project that highlights the beauty, science and cooking that occurs during the autumnal season.
A few weeks ago I told you about my new love of lapbooking. If you haven’t tried lapbooking yet or are looking for a new one to start, be sure to click on the Autumn Treasures picture on the right side of this page (or click here). That will take you directly to your download.
I'm a homeschooling mom with seven children: 3 human, 2 feline and 2 canine. I'm also the wife of one very patient husband who seems to like the role of ringmaster to our circus. I am a virtual assistant who enjoys writing, crafts, music and laughter. I hope you'll visit often. Please be aware that this blog is supported by affiliate links, although every link isn't necessarily an affiliate program.
Jean Welles’ Worship Guitar Class for Kids is an excellent program for children and adults to learn to play guitar. Being a non-guitar playing person I was surprised by my own ability to follow through and successfully duplicate her fingering. After I gave it a try I introduced the streaming videos to the girls and they are starting to get the hang of how it works. We were so excited about our ability to make a few sounds that we went out to see how much a proper guitar would cost. (For this review I had to borrow a friend’s guitar.)
Learn about teaching methods for home schooling with expert tips from an experienced teacher and home school authority in this free homeschooling video clip.
