Review: Fundanoodle 2nd Grade Cursive

Mayda had a lot of fun trying out the I Can Write Cursive! activity book from Fundanoodle.

This book is 70 pages and for ages 7 and up. It is designed for second grade, when you begin to teach cursive, and retails for $8.99.


This book is similar to any classic handwriting book, but different in that it is designed by occupational therapists and educators with the idea of developing motor skills in a very intentional way.

The first few pages are introductory information, followed by some pre-writing exercises. Starting on the 7th page, it begins going through the lowercase alphabet, in order of difficulty (easy to hard), one page for each letter. It begins by having the child write the letter by tracing, and then writing it on their own, followed by simple cursive word using that letter.

Each page has a phrase at the top verbally describing how to write the letter. For example, on the letter "i" it says: "Zoom up. Zoom down. Swing out. Dot the top." Also on each page is a "Did you know" little bit of trivia, somewhat related to the letter. For instance, with the letter "m" it says: "Did you know? A moth has feathery or thick antennae."

The lowercase section finishes out around page 33, where it reviews letters with "swoops." Page 34 is an introduction to uppercase, and it goes through each uppercase letter (again, in order of easy letters to hard) through page 61. The next three pages have the student writing the names of the days of the week, the months of the year, and the names of the planets. As a side note: I love that they included "Dwarf Planet" Pluto on the list. ;) The following three pages include writing prompts, and the last two pages are just lined for extra practice.

How we used it:
Mayda used this daily with her other school work. She was apprehensive at first about writing cursive, but the movement exercises at the beginning of the book helped her build confidence. She really enjoyed the pages, and would do one a day, easily. The lines were just the right size for her to have room to learn, but not too large either. As she worked through the book her cursive handwriting improved quite a bit. We found the little cartoon illustrations to be entertaining and the writing prompts to be just enough. At age 7, I didn't think it was too hard for her to start cursive, and she picked up the motions very quickly.

Mayda's thoughts on Fundanoodle, I Can Write Cursive! : "My favorite part is that the pictures go well with the letter that I'm learning. It's really cool. It has fun facts."

Bottom Line:
I have purchased other handwriting books for similar prices, but none were as colorful and delightful as this. Mayda loved the book, and was happy to use it daily. We really liked the spiral binding at the top and the perforated pages if we wanted to tear them out. At $8.99, I found this to be a decent value and a good supplemental handwriting book for second grade.

Be sure to read all the other Fundanoodle reviews (several of each product) by clicking the banner below:

 where you will find reviews for all of these Fundanoodle products:

• Orange (Age 3+/Preschool): I Can Pound Activity Block
• Orange (Age 3+/Preschool): I Can Bead, Lace, Rip and Trace
• Orange (Age 3+/Preschool): I Can Doodle, AND I Can Do Fun Activities (Floor Pads),
• Orange (Age 3+/Preschool): I Can Cut, AND I Can Do Math Level 1AND Max & Alphie's Adventure Level 1
•   Blue (Pre K to K): I Can Build Uppercase Letter Kit
•  Blue (Pre K to K): Muscle Movers: Uppercase Gross Motor Cards
• Blue (Pre K to K): I Can Write Uppercase Letters AND Magnetic Dry Erase Lettering Practice Board
•  Blue (Pre K to K):I Can Do Math Level 2, AND Max & Alphie's Adventures Level 2
• Green (K to 1st): I Can Build Lowercase Letters
• Green (K to 1st):Muscle Movers: Lowercase Motor Cards
• Green (K to 1st):I Can Write Lowercase Letters, AND I Can Write My Own Stories
• Green (K to 1st):I Can Do Math Level 3, AND Max & Alphie's Adventures Level 3

So, be sure to visit the crew post for reviews of all of the above mentioned products!
©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

*Prices and links are accurate at the time this is published, and are subject to change

Locusts have no king

Proverbs 30: 24-28
Four things are small on the earth,
But they are exceedingly wise:
The ants are not a strong people,
But they prepare their food in the summer;
shephanim are not mighty people,
Yet they make their houses in the rocks;
The locusts have no king,
Yet all of them go out in ranks;
The lizard you may grasp with the hands,
Yet it is in kings’ palaces.

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©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

Review: VideoText Interactive, Algebra: A Complete Course (Modules A and B)

When I investigated VideoText Ineractive for review, I was sure Tyler (my oldest) was in no way ready to begin Algebra. He is in 6th grade, and was doing pretty well with math, but not really advanced in any way. But as I watched this video (below), I became convinced that he could do it. So here we are, doing Algebra: A Complete Course, and really getting into it!

Since Tyler is in 6th grade, I knew this would be a bit of s stretch for him. While researching this curriculum I found that you could customize the pace, so that a younger student could ease into it. I chose to follow the "Three Year Plan" doing a lesson a week. We only move forward when that lesson is mastered. We actually ended up doing about 6 lessons in 4 weeks, so we are catching on faster than I had expected.

Some of the crew reviewed the online program, but we asked for the physical books. Here's what we received, Modules A and B, each composed of:

• 3 DVDs
• Course Notes 
• Teacher's Guide and Detailed Solutions Manual for Progress Tests
• Student WorkText
• Solutions Manual
• Progress Tests

Each Module can be purchased for $99.95, and there are actually modules from A through F, but we only received these two. This is indicated for any age that is ready for pre-algebra, grades 8 and up. But truly, 6th and up can do it with the flexible pacing. Love that. I plan to use it for grade 6 to 8, and then hope to do the Geometry for after that. Tyler's personality would be a perfect fit for becoming an engineer like his grandpa, but I know how much math that requires. This is why I was looking into a new approach for him. I am thrilled to have found it.

How We Used It:

Using the three year pacing plan, we still used the program as anyone would, but a little more paced with a little more review.  On the first day Tyler would watch the video lesson. Module A has 27 lessons and Module B has 22 lessons. They came on 6 DVDs total (3 for each module).  The lesson is 5-10 minutes long, and takes only a little bit longer to view because they recommend that you use the pause button frequently to stop and discuss the concepts with your student. Because of our slow pacing and repeating of the video, we didn't have to pause much, but we did if there was anything that didn't "click". I imagine as we hit the meatier stuff we will use the pause button more and more.

Here is a sample video lesson:

Another aspect of the video lesson is that they recommend that you don't take notes. There are course notes provided in a book for reference after the video, but they don't want any distraction from the video lesson. The video lessons are simple yet very well done, with an instructor explaining the concepts in simple terms, and lots of on-screen examples. As he talks about a problem, the numbers light up, so you know exactly what he's referring to. It is like a text book comes alive on screen. This really worked well for my son, who is very much an audio oriented learner.

I think that brings up a huge point of this curriculum. This format is very purposefully created to appeal to all kinds of learners: audio, visual, and tactile, with greatest emphasis on the first two. The other main point is that this is a mastery based program, moving forward in a very thorough way, but not spiraling back over the material as some programs do. I'll explain more about how that worked for us.

So after the video lesson, Tyler would take out the Course Notes and the Student WorkText. With the notes open for reference, he would work several problems in the WorkText, on a separate sheet of paper. Although there are about 20 problems, they suggest only doing 5 before checking their work, so we aren't repeating the mistakes over and over. After Tyler checks his work, he finds his mistakes and fixes them, earning back some of his lost points.  It was amazing how much we learned right in this part of the process, sometimes returning to the video lesson for more information.

The next day we did the quiz that corresponded with the lesson, and he would (again) check his work, make corrections, etc. There are 2 versions of each quiz, so if you need to take it again, you have fresh questions.  Basically for the next two days we repeat this process, until we have mastery and can move forward. Sometimes we could do it in a two day cycle, sometimes we would need a repeat and in that case we only accomplished one lesson in that week. If we needed more practice there were extra practice problems on the website. Once we felt we had mastered a concept, he proceeded to take the test and I would record his score and move on (or repeat the lesson again if needed). There are also two versions of each progress test, and detailed answers as well.

Bottom Line:
Having done spiraling style math curriculum for quite some time, we found the mastery approach really refreshing. No shortcuts or memory tricks, just logical and well explained concepts, building one upon another. With the different pacing plans we were able to approach it with a relaxed attitude, and Tyler was really excited to learn that he could understand this perfectly, without lots of repetitive written work. I have seen his understanding of numbers and their relationships (algebra!) increase exponentially, pardon the pun.  We were thrilled with his progress and intend to keep using this for the rest of the year. Also, because of the non-consumable  nature of the program, we plan to use it again and again. I highly recommend VideoText Interactive: Algebra. 

Pricing details: At $529 for the complete Algebra program ($299 for the online) of all 6 modules (A through F), it is a substantial investment. Most of the books can be used again and again. For myself, I can use this for three years of math, repeating for my 4 students, spreading out the cost to less than $45 per year, per student, plus extra test books. The only books intended to be written in are the progress tests, and they can be purchased for $19.95. Other extras can be purchased separately here. 

Be sure you read all the other reviews of this product, it's online version, and also of the online Geography course:


©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

*Prices and links are accurate at the time this is published, and are subject to change

WW: Homeschool PE: "Wipeout!"

Ok, almost wordless: Can I just say how much I LOVE my homeschool group?!?!?! One of the moms (Mrs. Andrews, you rock!) had the awesome idea to host a "Wipeout" themed obstacle course. My kids had a wonderful time, and I hope we do it again soon!

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©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

Breakfast To Go: single serve yogurts!

We recently went on a quick road trip, sadly to attend a funeral for hubby's great grandmother. Long story short, we never made the funeral because, 350 miles into the trip, our van died. We spent a day stranded in a city we were towed to, and then were able to stay in a hotel with hubby's folks as they returned from the funeral (150 miles further down the road). It was a crazy trip, and we ended up buying a new vehicle there, but we started it out with the best of intentions.

Knowing we'd have to leave really early that morning, I had prepared a cooler full of quick and healthy foods for the trip. Little did I know what a life-saver these would be while waiting for the tow-truck in 100 degree weather! God was really watching out for us that day.



So here's the quick recipe... in a mason jelly jar, layer:

• 3/4 full of plain homemade yogurt
• 1 Tbs. of your favorite jelly or jam
• and top off with home made granola.

...be sure to pack a spoon!

It is a wonderful thing to have all the convenient protein and pro-biotics, without all the sugar and preservatives of commercial yogurt.

Here are the recipes for the home-made goodness you use to assemble this. We make this all the time!

~~~~~~

Yogurt:
I've been making yogurt for our family for a couple of years now, and my kids LOVE it. If your kids are accustomed to Go-gurts, this may not be for you. But if you've been paying $4 per quart for plain Greek yogurt to go with your granola and blueberries... It's time to make yogurt! It's a huge savings for us. I usually make a batch of 5-6 quarts and my total cost is $4 for the milk plus $1 for the yogurt starter. This is a potential savings of $19 for each batch!

When buying the milk, look for milk produced closer to you and from more local type dairy names. The farther the milk has to travel, the more it was homogenized. The more processed your milk is, the less likely your yogurt will turn out. I could go into all kinds of facts about Organic, non-processed, raw milk, but I'll leave it at this: Try different kinds and see what you like. If you heat your milk as we will in the first step, it should turn out fine even if you started with raw.

Moving on... For the yogurt starter, buy some at the grocery store. I've made yogurt with ultra-cheap strawberry yogurt from the mini-mart, but by far the best results came from a good plain Greek yogurt with live active cultures (the more the better! check the label to see what cultures are in it.) a 4 oz container will make 4 quarts of yogurt, so get two if you're doing more.

Here are the tools you'll need: jar tongs, mini whisk, thermometer (that at least ranges from 90 degrees to 180F), and a tablespoon.

Yes, that's a Pampered Chef Mini Whisk, and a candy thermometer.

To start with, make sure your jars are nice and clean and fill them with fresh milk. Put them in a pot with water around them up to about an inch from the tops. Heat over med-high heat to bring the milk up to temp. I put a lid on the pot to get there faster, but you won't want to put caps on the jars so you can check the temps. Just be sure you don't spill water into them. (don't mind the hard water lines on my canning pot. It's clean, we just have VERY hard water here.)

Heat until the milk reaches 175F. This ensures you've killed any bacteria that may have been in the milk, or your jars. We want to be sure we are only growing the cultures we add, not anything else. :) This is a great time to dip all of your tools in the boiling water as well to sterilize them.

175F

Use the jar tongs to set the jars out onto a towel to cool a bit. They will take a while come come down to our target temp of 95-108F, so be patient... or set them in an ice water bath, like I do. But do not skip the 10 minutes of cooling on the counter before your hit the ice bath, or your jars may crack.  This time I had one crack, so don't be surprised if it does. Just keep going with what you have.

10 minutes of rest before the ice bath

bring down to 95 to 108F range

Watch them closely, once the temp starts dropping it can drop fast and go right past your target temp, and then you may have to warm them up. It's not as complicated as it sounds. :)

Once they are in the 95-108F range, add 2 tablespoons of the store bought yogurt to each jar and mix well. I've heard you shouldn't mix too much, but when I did that I had a jar that was solid on the bottom and liquid on the top. So mix well, but don't get crazy. :) This is where I love my mini whisk!

Then quickly cap all of the jars and put them in a picnic cooler lined with a clean bath towel. Add jars filled with hot water from your pot (no caps) all around them, or in a staggered pattern, until the cooler is filled. My cooler holds 8 jars, so this batch was 5 jars of yogurt and 3 hot water jars. Cover with the towel and close up the cooler. Set it someplace it won't be disturbed overnight.

In the morning, check your jars by tipping them to the side and seeing if they "slosh". If they haven't set up yet, add more hot water  to your water jars and close it up for another couple of hours. It's not hard to do, and you will get the hang of it quite quickly!

set up nicely, with a little whey to pour off

Granola:

my granola for sale

I make my own (special recipe!) and sell it at the local farmer's market. It was actually recently featured in the newspaper! 
But here's a great recipe for another granola.

Jelly:
We used our favorite, Chokecherry Jelly. :)


Linked:

©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

Booksneeze Review: Love No Matter What by Brenda Garrison and Katie Garrison (non-fiction)

*I received a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest and un-biased review*

A while back I received a copy of Love No Matter What by Brenda Garrison (with insights from her daughter, Katie Garrison).

After going through a tumultuous time with her own daughter, author and speaker, Brenda Garrison, realized that there are right and wrong ways for a parent to deal with their child's rebellion. In response to the exodus of young people leaving the church, Brenda wants to share timely advice about how to "Love your child, no matter what" even "when your kids make decisions you don't agree with." This book follows the natural process a parent goes through as they work from grief to coping with their children's actions and decisions. She includes insights from her own daughter, Katie, as they both reflect on what they've been through.

My thoughts on the book:
I found the book initially interesting because I am approaching the teen years with my own children. Families very close to us have gone through this kind of grief with their own children and each family deals with it in a very different way. I've seen everything from ex-communication  to ignoring the problems and empowering the child to continue, and I have seen how much damage a parent can do. I take my role in my children's lives very seriously, and as a result, wanted a fresh perspective.

I must confess that this book struggled to hold my attention. I'm not sure if it is because my children aren't yet in this situation (no urgency on my part) or because the author tends to re-rash the same information over and over, but I really struggled to read this book. I received it in February, and read it off and on over the months. I'd pick it up and push onward, but honestly wouldn't have finished but that I had committed to give my honest opinion. I usually finish a review book in about 4 weeks, I'm not the fastest reader in the world, but 6 months is a length record for me.

I really did appreciate how Brenda points out that we need to get our egos out of the way and instead point our children to Christ. We can't do that if we react in anger and push them away. Keeping the lines of relationship open can be the only way we can show Christ to our children through a difficult time. She touched on the fine line between loving your child and enabling them. Although I will admit some of the examples she gave about her own daughter seemed like enabling to me.

One great asset of the book is the discussion questions at the end of the book for each chapter. I could see this being used as a discussion jumping off point for a parenting support group. In fact, I'd recommend this book in that way very heartily. It would be a wonderful thing to use this book, with Bibles open, as a way to encourage each-other as parents in a group setting.

Bottom Line:
So, while I don't think that she ever conveyed Biblical truth improperly, I'd say that application in these kinds of situations is really something we need to lean on the Spirit to lead. I could find a little, but not much Biblical ground for her points. She relies heavily on her own experiences. This book could have been more concise, and while I'd recommend the viewpoint to parents who are hurting for their children, I'm not sure I'd call this this book a "must read". Overall, I'd give it 3.5 stars.

-Laura

©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

A Farm Field Trip

Last week we visited a local organic farm and CSA, which also has a biodynamic seed operation. The kids had a great time (ok, I did too!) seeing what goes into the seed collection process. We often don't think much past going to the store, buying a pack of seeds, and ripping it open.

We first looked at biennial seeds, such as carrots. The kids never thought much about planting actual carrots back into the ground to get a flowing plant in the fall.

After that we helped harvest potatoes, some of which can be seed potatoes for next year. They had the most beautiful purple potatoes! Inside they were almost as purple as beets. Crazy! At our house we save the "too small" potatoes from the garden to plant again. I believe the potatoes in my garden are 3rd generation replants. :)

While harvesting potatoes, the kids found several "woolly bear" caterpillars.  Wyatt said this one liked his belly button. Silly boy.

Next we harvested bean seeds. It was fun collecting the pods into dry buckets. We were able to help them harvest the entire crop with all the little hands to help.

At the end the showed us the wet process of harvesting the tomato seeds. We found out that fermenting the tomato pulp is a very important part of the process, leading to good germination rates in the tomato seed. It was truly amazing!

We were so thankful to Nathan and Beth for showing us around (again). :)


©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

Review: The Presidential Game

This was a fun benefit to being on the Review Crew: getting to play a new game for the benefit of my readers! It was a blast to get to review The Presidential Game: "a fun and exciting game of strategy where two teams, republicans and democrats, battle for control of each state to ultimately gain 270 electoral votes or more."

This game comes with:

• 1 20" x 30" Game Board, 
• 1 Score Pad, 
• 3 Blue Dice, 
• 3 Red Dice, 
• 80 Politics Cards, 
• 40 "Write-Your-Own" Politics Cards, 150 Republican Votes (red chips), 
• 150 Democrat Votes (blue chips), 
• 1 Electoral WebMap Calculator Access Code

The kids couldn't wait to get it out of the box to play it. So, as soon as the chores were out of the way and the table cleared and ready, we got it out. After one reading through the rules, we were playing. I am usually anxious about new games being complicated and hard to learn, but this one really wasn't hard at all.

We divided into teams of republicans and democrats and rolled the dice to see who had the first turn. For each turn we had to choose between going campaigning or fundraising. The fundraising turn gives them the opportunity to place votes on more states than the campaigning option, so they often chose that one. The fundraising turns also end with picking up a Politics Card, which has a random chance type script and gives them extra votes, or helps their opponent. The cards are more positive than negative, so the kids always want to draw them. I loved the funny scenarios on the cards, with lines like "Your VP candidate just blurted that they can see Russia from their back door. Your opponent gets 2 extra votes on New York" (my paraphrase). There are also blank Politics Cards, so you can write your own. When campaigning, the kids had to choose 3 states to put their votes on, but they could roll three dice instead of two, earning more votes. You can download the entire rule book (updated) here.

We quickly discovered that there are certain "battleground states" where the control can swing the entire election. The kids battled hard over New York, Texas, and California. The roll of the dice and the lines on the cards brought giggles from all, and it became the new favorite game. They played many times over the past few weeks, almost daily for the first week. They are telling their friends about it too!

I played for a while with them, but they preferred me to keep score. We used the paper score pad only to keep tally of the vote totals at the end of each "week", but it is intended for score keeping if you don't have a computer, tablet or smartphone nearby to use the WebMap Calculator. We did most of the scoring or my smartphone, or on my sister's laptop. It was easy to use on both, and quickly calculated the electoral votes. We would then write the number of votes at the end of each round on the weekly totals, so we knew how many weeks had been played. You can also track your "weeks" on the WebMap Calculator, but we wanted to track how the scores went up and down, usually as California changed hands.

Each week is a round, one turn for each side. We only played 15 week elections, and it took about an hour. I would think a 30 week election game would take well over two hours. We found that is was less interesting after an hour, but less than that and you couldn't really play on all the states. The kids really got to understanding why a long drawn out election season could be so complicated. They really learned a lot about the election process.

All in all, we really liked The Presidential Game. At $35 it is a bit pricey for our board game budget, but it all was quality material, It's very educational and really helped the kids understand the electoral process. I think this game is perfect for kids ages 11 and up, especially kids who are studying civics, American history, and U.S. States in geography.

The video below shows the game contents more closely:


 Be sure you read all the reviews of this game, by visiting the Crew Blog, or follow the link below:



©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

*Prices and links are accurate at the time this is published, and are subject to change

School Outside the Lines

So, this week I was chatting with a homeschool mom friend about our boys who struggle with writing. And we were talking about how her son doesn't like to write, but he's going to illustrate a story he's working on, with paint and everything.

And there's those days when you "do school" from 8:30 till 5 and it's still not all done. And then there's those days when you see a day like that coming, and you take a break before you go bonkers.

My youngest is struggling with sitting still for school, but if I let him jump and run outside before reading time, he's just fine.

These are the joys of homeschooling. You can color outside the lines! If your child needs a new approach to learning, you can lock yourself in the bathroom and have a parent-teacher conference with yourself (and sneak a snickers bar for sanity), and come out ready to change it up. Yes, my kids have figured out why the bathroom trash can has a lid... mom hides candy wrappers in there.

And you realize this homeschool stuff isn't about doing the same routine, or finding the perfect schedule. It's not about getting the perfect curriculum or the best advice. It's about flexibility, and "snuggle days", and lightbulb moments. It's about finding a new way to look at the problem. And it might just be about mom learning it with the kids.

I want my kids to see learning as an adventure, not something that you find in a desk and a chair. My sister recently moved in with us, and she's attending college. When I toured her school with her,  I was impressed that they had remodeled the classrooms and gotten rid of the desks. The students all sit around tables. All I could think was: "This is just like kitchen table homeschooling."

So how do you school outside the lines?

• Follow your interests. Getting kids to study what interests them is much easier, and following their curiosity always comes around to the good stuff anyway.
• Get the wiggles out. Some days we just have to stop and go run around the house 3 times, just to get the blood flowing. 
• Change your point of view, literally. Get up and find a new school location. Outside, on the trampoline, at a coffee shop, at the library... just move. You'll also find what places don't work too. 
• Do more group subjects, including all grades. My kids love learning together. They also learn a lot while relating the material to their younger siblings. Who knew, right?!

So what are your tips? I'm all ears. If I've learned anything this year, it's that I have a LOT to learn about homeschooling. 

©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork,
and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com

WW: Camping at the Lake

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©2012-2013 Loving and Learning on the High Plains. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://www.homeschoolhighplains.blogspot.com