Review of Daily Geography Grade 6

I have another great resource to share with you today that is simple to implement and helps students enhance their geography skills. We were sent Daily Geography Grade 6 from Timberdoodle to review. I used this with an older student who is heading into grade 8 but needed some refreshment on reading maps and especially geography vocabulary terms.

Daily Geography is available in a beginners level and for grades 1-6. Our review will focus on Daily Geography Grade 6. This is another one of Evan-Moor's wonderful quick and simple productions. I loved that lessons can be completed in as little as 15 minutes per day making it so simple to implement into our already full day. If you'd prefer, you could certainly do an entire week's worth of lessons in one sitting. We did that on occasion as well and since I was dealing with an older student didn't find it overwhelming at all. However, it was better for us to break the vocabulary terms down into days since that was a strong area of focus for us. This 160 paperback book contains 36 lessons broken down each week into 5 daily lessons. 

Each weekly lesson contains a page to introduce the weekly concept, a black line map, geography vocabulary terms, student question sheets broken down by days, and an answer key.

Students will learn elements on a map, how to read coordinates, mountain ranges, deserts, and rivers of the world, time zones and so much more. They will be exposed to city maps, tourist maps, ancient maps and taught how to read them, implement them, and even design their own. Included in the back of the book is a Geography glossary with all of the terms taught in the lessons.

All of the pages are perforated allowing for easy copying.  Copies can be made for all students in a single classroom.  There is also a free PDF downloadable file accessible by registering at the Evan-Moor website and using a code available in the front of your book.  The file contains all of the black line maps to make it even easier for you to print for each of your children. 

As I stated earlier, I used Daily Geography Grade 6 with my daughter who will be entering 8th grade in the fall. Most of the map work and questions were a great review for her and fairly easy but the vocabulary terms was where she needed the most review and the glossary was a great bonus for us. This book currently sells for $26.99 and can be purchased here.  If you are looking for a simple and quick solution to complement your history, geography, or social studies curriculum this might be a great fit for you.

This book is also a part of Timberdoodle's Sixth Grade 2016 Curriculum Kit.

**I received a free copy of this product through Timberdoodle in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions I have expressed are my own or those of my family. I am disclosing this in accordance with the FTC Regulations.

Review of Marie's Words

When my children enter the high school years, my mind immediately goes to ACT and SAT preparations. I can't help it! Marie's Words, a visual vocabulary word game sent to us from Timberdoodle has been a great tool to help us brush up on our vocabulary skills. Although I'm using this with high school and middle school students, I can see it as a valuable tool for younger children too. The recommended ages are 5+.

Marie's Words contains 550 vocabulary cards for students to study and play games using. I loved reading the back story behind the design of the cards. Marie Bradvica designed these cards when she was seventeen and preparing for her own SAT exam. The designs on the cards are hand drawn full color illustrations that she found helped her retain the vocabulary memory more efficiently. She then decided to share her creations and Marie's Words was born.

On the back side of the card is the pronunciation, definition, synonyms, antonyms, and a sentence using the word. Cards come in a sturdy card stock and are already hole punched making them a great portable tool as well.

The suggested game that comes with the cards has you place several cards on the table (how many is up to you) and take turns trying to define the word using only the illustration. If the player answers correctly, they keep the card. The player with the most cards wins. The other players serve as the judge to decide if the student's answer matches the definition.  If a student does not answer correctly, the card is turned to the definition side and no longer in play.  At first glance of the cards, it may be difficult for younger students to guess the definition but after reviewing them more than once it does become easier.  

You could also assign a set of words each week for your student to complete and learn through out the week and test their knowledge at the end of the week. I loved that the cards are numbered so you can easily place them back in alphabetical order.

Another great way to utilize these cards for the entire family would be to pick a card for a word of the day.  You could quickly review the previous words before adding a new one to keep the words in the student's minds.  You could also do more than one word a day if you are trying to get through the words at a faster rate.  There are lots of fun ideas to use these cards to help students build their vocabulary.  These cards currently sell for $36.95.

These fun cards are also a part of Timberdoodle's Fourth Grade 2016 Curriculum Kit.

**I received a free copy of this product through Timberdoodle in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions I have expressed are my own or those of my family. I am disclosing this in accordance with the FTC Regulations.

Menu Plan Monday

I am trying to get back in plan mode around here and that always begins with a menu plan!  I try to plan 6 meals but I do not assign them specific days because it is just easier to plug them in the week as I go.  

Here's what is planned for the week:

1. Italian Pasta Salad (per request)
2. Tacos
3. Chicken pot pie (per request)
4. corn chowder (need to use up some corn fast)
5. pizza boats, salads
6. grilled chops, zucchini squash & onions, potatoes

Review of Easy Grammar Ultimate Series - Grade 8

Summer has been great but it is now time for us to start adding back in some of the basics. It's not our official start back to school but school nonetheless. I like to begin back reviewing the basics - the 3 R's as they are often called. We were recently sent Easy Grammar Ultimate Grade 8 from Timberdoodle and it fits perfectly for our simple start. We will also be able to continue using it throughout the upcoming school year.

Easy Grammar Ultimate Grade 8 contains 180 lessons that can be completed in 10-15 minutes or less. The pages are reproducible if you would like to use them with more than one student. Lessons are meant to be completed daily. We used the digital format last year for Sarah but I really love that I don't have to print out the pages each week to prepare this time. The whole year is right there waiting for me!

Each lessons follows the same format but also builds upon the previous lesson. The lessons are designed to be simple to use and follow for the student no matter their previous grammar experience. We are required to annually test our students in NC and we usually do that with the CAT test. Sarah's scores have improved in the Language Arts portion of the test and I really think it's because she is constantly reviewing grammar daily. We found that before, she would have learned a concept but during test time if we hadn't reviewed that particular item such as comma usage, her test scores dropped. Using Easy Grammar Ultimate Grade 8 helps her to get the constant repetition she needs for mastery.

Each lesson follows the same format and is divided in to five parts including capitalization, punctuation, grammar concepts including parts of speech, comma usage, phrases/clauses, etc, and finally sentence combining. I'm not sure why but Sarah's biggest struggle area was the sentence combining. It's an area I would not have thought of on my own to teach her so I am so thankful it was included. Students are also given age appropriate sentences containing history, geography. literature, and more.

I love that the books are written for the students to be able to complete independently. Students can also check their own answers which are included in the book. Sarah still prefers for us to go over answers together so that's what we do usually first thing every morning.

Again, the concept is pretty simple but we have found more times than not that simple is successful! The use of daily grammar activities has helped Sarah gain confidence in her annual test scores as well as her writing. This workbook currently sells for $28.75 for a full year. There are different books for different grades. I think it's perfect for middle school and high school because it takes up so little time. Scroll down on this page to see sample pages. This book is also a part of Timberdoodle's Eight Grade 2016 Curriculum Kit.

**I received a free copy of this product through Timberdoodle in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions I have expressed are my own or those of my family. I am disclosing this in accordance with the FTC Regulations.

Tenacious Thursday - Weeks 8 & 9

Week 9 was vacation week and let me just say that maybe I need a vacation every week!  I think I had my highest week of steps yet and we spent many hours that week on a plane!

Fitbit steps - This was packing and prep week.  As I stated in the last update, we were also painting our son's apartment. I've noticed a pattern of my steps being low when life gets busy!  The steps do not accurately show how busy I at least think I was. 

Where I finished on my friends' list for Week 8.  I moved down the list again!

Here is vacation week!  Woohoo finally met my goal plus some!

And another goal crushed - top 5 among my friends for Week 9 - best yet!  

Other goals:

• try hard to hit my step goal of 7,000 daily steps at least 4 times per week
• water intake - doing better
• weigh in - I stayed the same at 216 - Total loss/gain = -2

Thanks for those of you joining in with me and keeping me accountable!  How was your week?  What were your accomplishments?  Let me know!  It's never too late to join in! Let's keep each other accountable!

Friend me on Fitbit  - melissa@gchomeschool.com

Review of NotebookingPages.com

To aid in our summer studies of focusing on God's Word, we have been taking advantage of the Lifetime Membership from NotebookingPages.com.

If you are unfamiliar with what notebooking actually is, think scrapbooking for school subjects. It's a fun way for students to make subjects come to life. Students journal and draw about what they have learned and every page shows each student's own unique personality. There is no right or wrong way to notebook which is the beauty of this system. They offer pages that cater to students who may prefer to draw and students who prefer to write. There are also options available for a mix of the two.

NotebookingPages.com offers 1000's of pages to download and print in Bible/Character, Alphabet, Famous People, Fine Arts, Geography, History, Holidays, Language Arts, and Science/Nature. They also offer basic lined notebooking pages that can be used with any subject.

So far we have have just touched the surface on the pages available with this membership. The most fantastic part is your membership never expires so you can take all the time you need to complete your projects! You also gain free access to any future updates that may occur with your lifetime membership.

For our homeschool, we focused on the Bible notebooking pages. This set takes you through the Old Testament and New Testament from Creation to John's Vision on the island of Patmos. It comes in a zip file and once unzipped it contains 54 files of PDF printables. This set alone has over 500 different pages to choose from!

I used this set with my daughter, Sarah, who is 12. We used the Bible notebooking categories as our devotion point each day. We began by researching the Bible verse or verses then added our own drawings or timeline and journaling information. Some days, we added a paraphrase with our thoughts and some days we simple copied the verse from the Bible but it has been a great time to spend with each other and growing in God's Word.

One of the files included an overview of every page in the set which made it so much simpler to pick and choose which pages we wanted to work with. Below is just a small sample of what is available.

We hole punched the pages and inserted them inside this small 3 ring flexible binder.  You could also add them to the binder with a clear front and decorate with your own binder cover. 

The Table of Contents page included was great to keep us on track.  You could also number your pages to correspond with the Table of Contents if you wish to make pages easier to look back on.

Here are just a few of the Bible notebooking pages that we completed.

Sarah enjoyed this way of working through the Bible. She is very creative and loves to draw so this was a perfect fit for her. There are also pages available with illustrations for those who would rather just narrate what they have learned as well as a combination of both.

I love to do special activities on holidays so I know the holiday section will come in handy for us too. There are pages for most of the traditional holidays. Here is a sample of just one of the pages offered for the fourth of July.

Next school year, we will be focusing a lot of other countries and geography so I have already begun to explore and print some of the pages in that section for next year too. The geography notebooking pages include maps, country pages, and more.

NotebookingPages.com offers lots of free pages too. You can sign up for a free sampler to see if this unique system will work for your family. I love that there are so many options in so many subjects so I don't have to take the time to search the internet for each individual page. When you are finished with your pages, you will have a real treasure on your hands written and designed by your student.

Find out more about NotebookingPages.com on Facebook and Twitter.

Review of Veritas Press Self Paced Bible New Testament 1

We have been focusing on one subject more than any other this summer - Bible. When we began homeschooling, my main objective was for my children to have more time to grow in their relationship with God. Veritas Press has a wonderful curriculum that really helps bring the Bible to life. We have been having a blast testing out their Self-Paced Bible course on the New Testament 1: The Gospels.


Since we reviewed their Self-Paced History course last year, we were pretty familiar with the format as both work in the same manner. 

 
The Self-Paced Bible course for the New Testament: Gospels offers 128 lessons covering 32 events of the Bible beginning with Zacharias Learning of John's Birth to the Ascension of Jesus. 

  
We found the course to be extremely user friendly. During our review period, we had some issues with our internet service and often found the statement "slow connection" printed on the screen. We could not watch in high definition at that time but still found the images of the video to load clearly and none were distorted. We also had an issue with one of the slides seeming to get stuck not allowing us to move forward in the lesson. I contacted the company and had a response with the issue resolved within the same business day. We have been smooth sailing ever since.

Each event has 3 lessons and a test so we worked on this 4 days per week. It could definitely be completed by the student independently but I love watching the lessons and seeing how well I can answer the questions too. As time went on, I also found my older son joining in to listen and trying to answer as well. Sarah, who is 12, actually answered the questions on the screen and played the review games as only one set of scores is recorded but we still enjoyed listening and answering on our own. 

 
Students have their own login information and the screen below shows them where they are, how they are progressing, and their current grade in the course.

In the New Testament: Gospels Bible course, students are taught the events by a carpenter, Benjamin, and his apprentice, Jude, along with Spyro the dove and Uz the termite. Lessons are taught in conversation style with lots of wit and humor thrown in along the way.

In every lesson, students are given review questions and games to play to help with review. At any time a student can go back to a lesson for review but scores will be kept from the first attempts. For instance, in this game you try to keep your caravan together using the arrow keys to dodge obstacles in the road such as horses, cows, rocks, trees, etc.

 

Once you reach the end of the road, students answer review questions to earn additional points. Once a predetermined amount of points has been reached students may advance to the next slide or lesson.

 

Students are also taught geography and timeline as well. We found it hard to stop "learning" some days because it is so much fun. The built in review really helps to solidify the facts. I never knew the dates for when Zacharias was told he would have a child but now I sure do and so do my children! The Veritas Press Gospels Flashcards sold separately would be a great addition to this program as they are taught in a catchy memory song through out. All the information on the cards is taught in the course.  The cards are not necessary to complete this course but make a great addition. 

There are 5 Self-Paced Bible courses. The other Self-Paced Bible courses currently available besides The Gospels are Genesis to Joshua, and Judges to Kings. Chronicles to Malachi and Acts to Revelation are coming soon.

This course is an online course in which you have one year to complete. It is recommended for students in 2nd-5th grades but we found it great for our older children too. Children will need some basic keyboard skills as well such as dragging and dropping.  The course regularly priced at $179 for the year but until 7/11/16 there is a $100 discount lowering the price to only $79 for the year! You can purchase it now if you wish and defer your start date to a later time. We think this program is a fantastic way to learn your Biblical facts. You can also find Veritas Press on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, and Twitter.