Homeschool Printables from SuperTeacherWorksheets.com

by Meghan // August 19, 2022 // Comments off

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

SuperTeacherWorksheets.com is possibly the largest online worksheet resource for homeschoolers, offering over 20,000 printable PDF resource! As homeschoolers, many of us approach elementary education from a Charlotte Mason, classical, or eclectic viewpoint. I would say in any homeschool style, there is always room for a little fun review, extra practice, or a seasonal activity printable. These PDFs are going to be best for K-5th grade level students. We received the 1 year membership, and I have so many plans for using it over the next year! The unlimited year membership is only $24.95 for an individual and include *unlimited* downloads. No more searching the internet for hours, getting side tracked with 100 tabs open, and never printing off what you were looking for … (just me? ???? )

What Is It?

SuperTeacherWorksheets.com is a perfect resource for any homeschool family that needs custom printables for specific learning areas or skills.If you ever find yourself looking online for printables, look no more! Because you will find worksheets for math, reading, writing, phonics, spelling, science (and more!), all your printable-needs will be met with this one subscription. I like to use them for weaker areas where we need extra time for learning a specific skill. The worksheets are super easy to use as a supplement with manipulatives like snap cubes, real money, counting bears, and shapes for hands-0n learning!

I also like to have printables ready for our on the go clipboard work. I will print off a few sheets for each child, put them on their clipboards so they can work while we wait at the doctor, the dentist, or drive to town. Some skills just need extra time, and that’s okay! With SuperTeacherWorksheets.com we have access to all the printables we need, in one place. Woo hoo!

We often do a fun school season around Christmas, or add in extra activities for Resurrection Sunday, so I really like that they offer printouts for holidays and other seasonal activities. The autumn scarecrow letter mix-up example below includes the page to write the letters, but also has the letters students can cut (fine motor skills), and scramble around to see and build the words they are making before writing them. This adds a hands component to the worksheet; I have found many of the worksheets

Parents will find math games, cut and paste activities to encourage fine motor skills, puzzles, entire spelling units, phonics mini-books, and more! There is also a worksheet generator feature that allows you to create worksheets for math skills, games and flashcards, different kinds of puzzles, ABC order sheets, quizzes, teaching tools, and there is an area to save your generated worksheets! So you don’t have to recreate worksheets you’ve made before. Im telling you, the uses are endless and the resources are such go0d quality.

This is maybe one of my favorite reviews … ???? but also one of the most utilized in our homeschool. I can even set my 11 year old up on the website and have her search for what we need, and let her do the organizing. Delegating is the best. ????

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Math Mammoth: Homeschool Math Spotlight

by Meghan // February 25, 2022 // Comments off

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew

We’ve been using Math Mammoth in our homeschool the last several weeks. My 5th grader has been going through the Grade 6 Skills Review Book, and my 7 year old has been working on the 2nd grade Light Blue Series (also called Math Mammoth Complete Curriculum). We received the digital sets for review, but you can also purchase CDs, and physical copies. There are some pros to the Digital version- one being that you can print as many copies as you need for all your kids. But what is also cool, the PDFs can be filled out using a computer, phone, or tablet. You can find instructions for how to do that on Math Mammoth’a website.

Math Mammoth

About Math Mammoth

Maria Miller is a math teacher and homeschool mom; she created Math Mammoth out of the desire to help homeschool moms teach the why. This is a program specifically designed for homeschoolers, by a homeschool mom and math teacher by degree- Sounds pretty awesome to me!

Math Mammoth Light Blue Series is a full math curriculum program for grades 1-7. It is mastery oriented, which means that students will be mastering one skill before moving on to the next skill. Each chapter focuses on one topic and its related skill sets. Mental math is a big emphasis in this program, along with number sense.

Number sense is so important- you know, it’s that thing that most of us were never taught, because we were learning skills before we really understood what they were for. Raise your hand if you had no idea the tens place was actually just a place for groups of 10 ones, until you were teaching your first born math in kindergarten?

No?

Just me? Okay then …

The Skills Review books are just that- they cover the review of skills learned in the curriculum. They are spiral oriented, which means they cover lots of concepts at once.

These books are broken down into chapters, and those chapters correlate with that grade level’s curriculum. It can be used right along side the curriculum for added review and practice. If you’re trying to catch up a child who is moving from public school to homeschool, or maybe they need some enrichment over the summer or extra practice to keep skills fresh, this is probably a great book for that purpose.

foresee using this with my son to do some review on 4th grade math before hitting 5th grade next month.

Math Mammoth Grade 2 Light Blue Curriculum

What We Thought

Well, let me first tell you how much the Light Blue Series showed me that I needed to focus on number sense more with my 7 year old. This isn’t something that comes naturally to all children; sometimes a 5 year old may have better number sense than their older siblings… (hmm) But there are things we can do to build number sense for those that need extra practice, and Math Mammoth lays a good foundation for that!

I really liked that each lesson she went through in the 2nd grade curriculum had my daughter thinking about numbers with visuals. There is a great emphasis on visual models and this is oh. so. helpful! It helps the child understand why they’re doing what they’re doing. Which makes remembering how to get the answer much easier. It also makes self checking easier, because they understand the actual process, not just a set of procedures.

Math Mammoth Grade 2 Light Blue Curriculum

Grade 2 Math

I also love that the entire curriculum is written to the student; there is no script, or separate teacher’s manual. You can find notes for the teacher at the beginning of each chapter, but the chapters can be completed ???? independently by your child, if so you choose. The included online videos of Maria teaching are great, and simple to understand. If your child needs someone to show them vs reading instructions, then the videos are going to be your friend! (Or you can show them).

The Skills Review book was wonderful! My 5th grader is a wonderful independent learner. She enjoys figuring things out for herself and comes to me only when she needs help. The review of 6th grade (which lined up with the beginning of her current 5th grade curriculum) really gave her a different perspective for doing math. I like that she is learning a deeper context to her math skills. We will continue with the Skills Review books for her as needed.

Overall, I am so glad we finally tried Math Mammoth; it is going to be great to incorporate it into our homeschool. I love the foundation it lays for number sense and conceptual math skills for my youngers, and it’s especially going to beneficial as math concepts become more difficult for my olders. The kids enjoyed it, I think they liked the change and the way the math was explained.

If you’ve been hesitant about trying Math Mammoth, check out their samples online, the free videos and other great resources shared on the website. I didn’t know that treasure trove was there before this review, and I wish I had!

Math Mammoth

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Beginner Math with Counting Kingdom: a review

by Meghan // October 8, 2021 // Comments off

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew

A few days a week, we have been using Counting Kingdom, a fun online introductory math program from Reading Kingdom, for review. Reading Kingdom offers other programs: Story Smarts, Spelling ninja, along with Counting Kingdom that you can read about by clicking the banner at the bottom of this post. These are online based programs, and will require internet access to be used; they can be used on a desktop or device.

We found the program to be easy to use, and fun. My 5 year old used it on my iPad most of the time. Counting Kingdom is designed for children ages 4-8, and I found that this is probably the most appropriate ages, or more specifically, the right level. This is going to be a great supplement to homeschoolers with younger children not quite ready for full blown math curriculum, or students that need extra practice working on a 3rd grade level and below.

About the Program

The program says for best results, use 4 days per week. I can see how this could hinder some use, but the idea is to use the program consistently. Students will learn math concepts including recognizing, counting, and understanding numbers up to 10, 1:1 correspondence, and more.

level 1: teaching and understanding number concepts using 1-10
Level 2: starts with introducing higher level math concepts using terms such as same, all, some
Level 3: starts adding memory tasks and introduces basic operations

Students begin in lesson 1:1 and move up through the program. You can adjust the student’s level in the settings, if needed. There is an option to adjust the speed of the program as well, allowing more or less response time. Parents can also get a report on how well students are doing. There is a key for what each symbol means in the dashboard for parents to easily see progress.

My 5 year old did enjoy this program more than my 7 year old. I started it with my 7 year old, but switched to the 5 year old because most of the concepts were new to her. I really like that it works with a ten frame and creates that visual concepts- this was the main reason I wanted to review the program. Ten frames are such a great tool for math concepts using numbers 1-10.

My older girl was definitely not as interested; it is a slower paces program which is going to serve its purpose for some students, ????! For others it is going to be too dull and slow. As always, knowing your student and what they need is going to be best for your family. The concepts are solid, and I think for students that need help with fewer distractions (crazy noises, bright lights, flashing/moving characters) this is going to work well for them!

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Homeschool Math Help with Math Skills Rescue from math Essentials

by Meghan // September 29, 2021 // Comments off

I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

Math Essentials has done it again, with a great homeschool math helper! This time my 5th grader has been using their Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2. This is a 2 part math series designed to help mathl students master the critical, foundational skills in grades 3-algebra. This is going to be a wonderful resource for homeschoolers needing extra practice or help getting down those hard to grasp skills!

I can’t tell you what a great time it was for our family to use this series. Though she has only worked in book 1, the extra practice has been such a great help for my 11 year old. Long division with 2 digit divisors y’all … it’s taking more effort than math skills in the past.

About the Books

These lessons are short, concise and help students with the math they need to know, with each topic building on the next. It has really been a helpful practice for my daughter. The back of the book has the answer key, which is helpful for student’s self checking, or for parents. These skills are all the same things we are learning in our math curriculum; it lines up perfectly in 5th grade! I know if we can get through these books, pre algebra and algebra are going to be so much easier for my girl.

Book 1 covers topics:

Whole numbers & integers
Fractions
Decimals

Book 2 covers:

Geometry
Problem Solving using all the above skills
More Advanced Pre-Algebra Skills

With a strong background in these areas, students will be prepared for success in algebra and beyond.

The cover of each book is thick and glossy. The pages are a thick, white paper that just barely shadows, but does not bleed through. They are 242, and 248 pages long respectively. The back of each book has a glossary with terms used, and some very helpful charts- charts for symbols, fraction equivalents (woo hoo), and squares and square roots just to name a few. The first are pages are resources for parents, including tips for using the online video tutorials, notes to parents, and a How to Use This Book section. The table of contents breaks pages down by skill learned which is going to be helpful your child needs to brush up on specific topics.

How We Are Using The Series

Book 1 is as far as we have gotten for now, but it has been a great practice book so far. Now that we’ve made it to the 2 digit divisors section, and she worked through the lesson, I think she’s finally got it! Whew, we’ve been working on this for a few weeks on our own.

I’m so glad to know that these topics are important for future math skills, and that we have help to master them before middle school. We do use graph paper to help with the process of “showing work,” so on most of her pages are just the answers. She puts her graph paper work pages into the book with the corresponding page so I can see her work/help if there are mistakes.

Each lesson has a helpful hints section, which are reminders on how to do the math skill learned in that lesson. This helps set parents and students up for success. The reminders are well written, to the point, and give examples/visuals of what is being practiced. This was helpful for my daughter to remember a specific skill that she maybe hasn’t practiced in a while.

Review is built into each lesson so your child retains what they have learned thus far. There are final tests to measure progress, which is great for parents that are keeping records, or just want to be sure their child is ready to move forward. I like to keep tests for records, and chunk the practices, so I will plan to keep these tests as well.

Something else that is sooo helpful, is the free access to an online video library with the author of the Basic Math Skills Rescue series. If you have purchased the books, the videos are included for your benefit.

We will continue working through the series as we come across the corresponding topics in our math curriculum.

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Reading Eggs and Math Seeds for Your Homeschool

by Meghan // September 23, 2021 // Comments off

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

I need to get the garden picked, and dishes done … and help with the animal chores. But first I want to tell you how much we have enjoyed Reading Eggs! This subscription includes both Reading Eggs and Math Seeds, their math program.

We have reviewed this interactive reading program before, and my children all enjoy it. This time I used it for the younger two, and they had so much fun. The program is suitable for children 3-13! Yes, you read that correctly- up to 13.
After farm chores, or school time I would let them each take a turn working through their level in the program. They enjoyed making their own little character, and working their way through the reading map.

I love that there is the option for desktop or an app for Reading Eggs and Math Seeds.

Students can (and should) take the placement test which is simple, and takes the guess work out of trying to find the just right level; the program does it for you! The placement test was right for both of my girls, with no problems. If your student is not familiar with using an online program/app (like my 5 year old) I would say help them with making the choices/moving the pieces during the placement teat, because that can obviously impact their level. But after a little practice of using the app, it becomes pretty intuitive for them.

My girls progressed well through their levels. I love that the added reading practice is fun for them; it helps on days when I may not have time to put together something fun for their practice, or we need a change up from the typical school day. My children usually get a little screen time after cleaning day is over, so Reading Eggs is great for that, too! They like having something new to try and I like that it is educational and helping with their foundational reading.

The parent’s screen for each child lets the parent know how that child is progressing, what they have read well, where there may be struggles for added practice purposes. There is even data for their growth in each area. This is great for anyone needing to give a district or state data, as well as just wanting to track progress for yourself.

Then there is Math Seeds! Math Seeds is an interactive math program for children ages 3-9 that helps them with problem solving and solidifying math skills. The structured lessons are fun and inviting for kids and easy for parents to set up. As you can see below, there are different areas to choose from in Math Seeds- after taking the placement test, students can begin lessons at their personalized level.

There are options for lots of fun games and skill building, test taking, spending points earned in the shop, and there is even a play room for children to explore. I remember doing some old school programs back in the 90s that had rooms like that- and I *loved* them. If your kids are anything like mine, they will love this! And you can rest knowing they are learning and spending time wisely.

$Math Seeds$

I think Reading Eggs and Math Seeds are great for foundation skills in both subjects; it is also a great supplement to your current schooling situation, whether at home or elsewhere.

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Homeschool 2021/2022 School Year Choices {5th, 3rd, 1st, and K}

by Meghan // August 23, 2021 // Comments off

This homeschool year, we are starting slowly. This is the first year we have taken a full blown summer break … we have done maybe a week’s worth of school since the end of May, and filled some time with lap books and other fun schooling activities. We’ve really taken off the majority of days for pool time (because I just can’t resist!), gardening time & family trips; and we have loved every minute of it!

Our main core as a family this year will be continuing through Sonlight Core D (Bible, History, and Read Alouds), which is American history. When we finish this core, we will move on to Core E, the second half of American history. After doing several years of wold cultures and world history, we are very much savoring American history. I’d like to focus on President’s and state capitols this year. There are so many great read aloud, and readers for US History. Just not enough hours in the day for all the books!

I am also finishing reading through the P4/5 Core with my youngest 2. They will be K and 1st this year; they are less than 2 years a part, but one is a fall baby and one is summer, so they’re close in grade levels. We made the choice a long time ago to keep our fall babies back a grade (they don’t meet most cut offs anyway, and like many states we aren’t required to school until age 7). We are very happy with that decision; but I like them being the older in their “grade” for the purpose of Co-op, sports, and church activities. I will start Core A with them at naps and bedtime once they finish P 4/5.

Math- We will be using Christian Light Education for our math, as always. My kindergartener will be using their K2 books, and I hope this bridges the gap between K math and 1st grade math for her. I will probably add in Saxon K worksheets for her as well. I think CLE K2 combined with some math games and a little Saxon K, will be a fine math foundation.

Science- I just haven’t made up my mind here. I really love Apologia’s science programs. We would do the Anatomy and Physiology if we go with Apologia … we really need to complete the Sonlight Science for Core D *but* every time we go to do the science, my kids already know everything we are discussing (thanks Wild Kratts), so I just feel blah continuing with it. I know I don’t have to finish it, but I hate to leave it incomplete; also, it isn’t only animals and biology. Core D Science covers lots of other fun topics, so I should just persevere.

We will also add in No Sweat Nature Study again. We have really enjoyed these classes, and are building some great nature journals.

Language Arts- My beginning readers (K and 1st) will be using AAR plus The Good and the Beautiful. My older 2 will continue with The Good and The Beautiful, in levels 3 and 5. This includes spelling, some phonics, grammar, some writing, and geography. The 1st grader is a great reader, so lessons with her are pretty smooth. The K wants to read so badly, and was killing all the CVC words we practiced on our Florida vacation (during snuggles in the morning). So we are looking forward to her reading this year.

We add in Explode the Code, and Wordly Wise to our language arts. My children love both of these, and it does improve their skills, along with giving extra handwriting practice. I like them because of all this, plus they provide independent work for my children; so while I work with one student on language arts or math, the others have some independent work that keeps them on task.

Handwriting- We begin with Handwriting Without Tears, and after the PreK and K books, we move on to A Reason For Handwriting book K and then A. I like giving my children lots of good handwriting practice. They usually fly through both K books, but then Book A isn’t as difficult and they’re better readers by then, making the copywork easier. My 3rd grader is in their first cursive book. My 5th grader has done so many handwriting copyworb books, and she likes them so much. This year I got her the Memoria Press cursive book … I think it is a poetry copywork.

Extras- We are doing logic this year, with some workbooks I found on Rainbow Resource. They do problems logic in their math, but this is just extra practice; my husband wanted to be sure they were hitting logic, so we are going to try it this year.

My 5th grader is doing French from Memoria Press, which she is sooo excited about. I think I couldn’t given it to her for her birthday and she’s been just as excited. We are adding in some new sets of Brain Quest for fun, Fandex Presidents and States, and Kanoodle for a little brain teaser game.

We are using the Answers For Kids boxed set for our Bible discussions, along with the Heroes of History and Christian Heroes added to our morning basket time.

We are praying over our homeschool year that each step taken is led by the Lord, and that our words glorify Him. I am truly grateful for the blessing of our homeschool journey, even during the hard days (especially) or mornings when life feels heavy, I know the relationships we are building are worth it. At the end of the day, the math and reading, and science topics don’t save my children. Jesus does. And while we love learning (just one reason we homeschool), learning to love each other and serve one another on really hard days, is maybe one of the best things I can give my children. Or at least show them day in and day out.

I hope yall found this helpful. If you have any questions about what we do, or why/how we do it, let me know and I can go more in depth for you!

Are yall ready for the school year? Or school week? Or school semester/term? You’ve got this mamas!

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Math Essentials {homeschool speed drill practice}

by Meghan // August 11, 2021 // Comments off

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew

If you are looking for supplemental math practice, Math Essentials Speed Wheel Drills offers addition, multiplication and division practice.

We have used these books several times a week to practice math facts. We began practice with them after a 4-5 week break during the summer, and boy were my kids rusty with their math ? . We all laughed because my math loving 8 year old had suddenly forgotten all his multiplication facts. Within a few days of practicing with Math Essentials Speed Wheel Drills, he was remembering them at lightening speed again.

My 10 year old really enjoyed using the timer on my phone to time herself as she went through the wheels. (This lead to her wanting to also calculate how quickly she can read a age in a book, and figure out at that speed how long it would take her to read the entire book in seconds, minutes, and hours)

There are great tips on learning math in the front of the book, along with a how to use this book page.

The books each have a sturdy, glossy cover with binding that held up great to medium/heavy use (are your kids as hard on workbooks as mine?). There are 1400 sheet wheel drills that help with instant recall, making math easier for students. It’s super easy to track progress. If you have 2 students using the same book like we did, put the child’s name and day 1, day 2 etc on the top of the page to track individual progress. I’d say no more than 2 kids using a book though. The pages are a crisp white, and they do not shadow onto the other side, which is really nice.

Wheels are arranged differently on each page so students aren’t memorizing the order of the problems, but the math facts themselves. Students can easily check themselves using a math chart (we used our math chart printed from Schoolhouseteachers.com, and laminated) which makes this even less aren’t intensive. My children really enjoyed watching how much faster they could become and how many more they got correct each time.

As a mom I like how each page is simple and not too crazy, which is helpful. It is so hard for some kids (and adults) to concentrate on the task at hand when the page is busy with color and graphics. I like the simplicity and cleanness of the speed wheel pages.

These make a great supplement to math throughout the school year, or as we found, for summer break to keep some practice but without doing full school. I took an easy approach, of no fuss or pressure and my kids really enjoyed it. It became something they used to improve their skills but they just thought it was fun competing against themselves ?

Connect with Math Essentials (they have other great math resources as well)

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Homeschool Math-All Grades-with CTCMath

by Meghan // July 8, 2021 // Comments off

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

Many homeschool families are looking for an easy to use, online math program for their children. CTCMath is a full online math program, covering all grades, kindergarten through 12th, including calculus. We know there will come a day when my children may need more help than their math books and I can give them, and CTCMath will be a great option at that time. (I have blurred out names and email address in the images below).

$CTCMath Homeschool Online Math Parent Dashboard$

After logging in, families will find pre-recorded video tutorials with directions explaining step by step each math concept. They are easily accessed any time, anywhere via your account. I found these lessons to be clear and easy to follow along, making it like sitting in class listening to a teacher.

In the parent dashboard, parents can add each student, selecting their grade level and where to begin on lessons. From there, students can login, complete their lesson, and take a quiz over what they just learned. A lesson summary can also be downloaded for each lesson. I love this because we enjoy making math notebooks with concepts my children may need to revisit. It helps make it hands on, too.

$CTCMath Homeschool Online Math Parent Dashboard$

$CTCMath Homeschool Online Math program$

Topics may have multiple lessons, which are all in order for the student to follow. The quiz questions on each lesson can be read to the student by clicking the speak button next to the questions; this is a great option for early readers, or students who better comprehend by listening. Weekly revision sets help consolidate learning and identify areas of struggle. In the CTCMath parent dashboard, you can find extensive reports making tracking easy for parents and record keeping.

Parents can set tasks, view results, and see the history of what students have been working on.

There are also some really fun games found at the bottom of the screen: speed skills, times tables, and swap pieces. I have to be honest and say these are a lot of fun, and will definitely help your kids find motivation to do some extra math learning. These are a great rewards for having completed math lessons for the day or week.

CTCMath Homeschool Online Math Parent Dashboard

CTCMath Quiz grade 5 Homeschool Online Math program

Maybe one of the best parts- CTCMath offers a 12 month guarantee- I don’t know any math curriculum that backs their program with such confidence! Overall, this program is definitely going to help improve math learning for students. If you family is looking for an online, video based learning option, CTCMath is where it’s at! Between the easy to follow lessons, simple tracking, and fun games, kids and parents will both enjoy this math.

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Easy Homeschool “Beauty” Resources

by Meghan // August 25, 2020 // Comments off

Maybe you’ve heard it before, “homeschooling isn’t school at home.”

It isn’t crisis schooling, or virtual school. Homeschooling goes beyond “school time.” Homeschool is where we can explore art, history, music, handicrafts, Shakespeare, astronomy, and creation without limits. These (and other) subjects are often what we call the “beauty” subjects.

Homeschool is about keeping the love of learning, that fire of curiosity God gave us at birth, lit. Homeschool mamas (and dads, too) want to educate our children well, but do it in such a way that encourages our children to be life long learners.

We have an abundance of resources at our fingertips to help add a little excitement and beauty to our homeschool.

Pic Source – CC0 Licence

What’s In The Mail Today?

My children are obsessed with getting mail. One set of grandparents sends postcards from all of their travel locations, and the kids send and receive letters to all their grandparents. How exciting! If you dont live near town, there are lots of places that sell stamps besides the post office . You can set up a writing station (my kids use a giant boot show box) with envelopes, stamps, pens and paper. Let them write to their little heart’s content. We still have a lot of practice to get writing friendly letters down, but the 9 year old has it down just about perfectly.

of course it is also a perfect way to connect with those we love.

Listen To That Music

We know music is excellent for brain development so adding it into our days has been important to our family. It can also be great to create a calming environment for children (and mom) to work, so this could be something to think about.
However, if you do have instruments in the house, then you may want to include these in your plans. After all, it’s always more fun to use our bodies, rather than just work with paper.

Something like a keyboard and an app is simple and fun. Piano Maestro is one of our favorites; my kids have learned so much by using it just 1-2 times a week. We subscribe to Practice Monkeys for violin and will soon start piano.

Some of our Favorites

Resources such as Read Aloud Revival Premium Membership, You Are an Artist!, and Audible can all be great additions to homeschool.

Encouraging a love for learning can be as simple or as involved as we want. How you educate your children is up to you. And it is beautiful!

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Reading Skills for Kids with Reading Eggs {a review}

by Meghan // September 6, 2019 // Comments off

We have used Math Seeds by Reading Eggs with my 4 year old. Now my second grade, newly turned 7 year old has been using their 200 Essential Reading Skills for Second Grade. You can check out all their workbooks HERE.

These workbook style reading lessons are short, and will help improve reading and critical thinking skills. Lesson focus is divided by day, with days 1 and 2 for comprehension, day 3 spelling, day 4 a spelling lesson that builds from day 3, and day 5 a grammar lesson. There is also review built in to the lessons. The pages are colorful, with helpful tips and instructions that are easy to understand.

There are 72 comprehension lessons that includes both non fiction and fiction passages to give children exposure to many types of text; poetry, novels, plays, informational, persuasive and imaginative texts. 72 spelling lessons covering the most common spelling rules such as digraphs oo, ar, or, suffixes, homophones, the sound of k/ck, and the list goes on. 36 grammar lessons cover adverbs, possessive nouns, simple sentences, punctuation, capitalization, conjunctions, etc.

Parents and teachers will find an entire lesson layout covering the week, days, and the lesson focus with its objective (ex: verb endings, main idea, making inferences, endings:y, ey, irregular plurals, etc). There are 36 weeks of lessons, which you can choose to double up, or spread out. There is also a Year Planner chart page for those of us that are visual.

What We Think About it & How We Use It

Lessons took us about 15-20 minutes tops, but usually less. My son enjoyed the grammar lessons most, but found all the skills fun and the lessons easy to follow. The lessons aren’t cut and dry; they vary with games, drawing, using pictures for clues, matching, sorting, and more! Sometimes I have to help Mister with a problem on the page, but mostly he is able to work independently after reading the lesson instructions.

In the comprehension lessons students use fun strategies like circling, drawing a shape above, boxing, underlining and coloring to mark what they know, have read, etc. This helps them find the information when answering the comprehension questions. Mister really enjoyed this part, because it was like “solving a puzzle.” =)

I like that these workbooks cover the basics, cover them well, and aren’t long boring lessons. Anytime we can cut table time down in our homeschool we do so! This workbooks definitely helps in that area, if you’re a workbook style student/parent combo. And, even if you’re not, but you want something for reviewing basic skills or practicing, these are great lessons that your child can get through without painful hours of frustration and complaining.

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