Us in Wonderland

The Mad Hatter and March Hare

We've never been "into" halloween - but, we have always been "INTO" dressing up!  This year was no exception...

With the craziness of our travel schedule, it kinda snuck up on me. But, Lydia to the rescue!  She planned and executed one of our best themes ever... "Us in Wonderland" (a take on Alice in Wonderland)

 

The White Rabbit and Cheshire Cat

We didn't really plan to go anywhere - even trick or treating was out... it was simply for the fun of dressing up and goofing off!

Oh... did I forget - Don and I got in on the fun too!  The Queen of Hearts and her King!

The Queen of Hearts and her King!

Since we were dressed up, we decided to take the characters out to dinner at a family favorite, Red Robin. This turned out to be one of the most wonderful memories.  We met a darling waitress and her sister, heard about their lives and made some new friends!

The kids surprised me with chipping in significantly to leave the biggest tip I've ever left, and they learned how easy it is to be a blessing!  

 I've never been prouder!  Way to take back halloween and use it for the Lord

Biochemistry / Microbiology from Greg Landry's Homeschool Science: A TOS Crew Review

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

Self-paced 7th-12th grade half-semester classes : Biochemistry / Microbiology from Greg Landry's Homeschool Science

Biochemistry / Microbiology from Greg Landry's Homeschool Science is a great option for your self-paced learners!  Designed for grades 7-12th, it is a self-paced 0.5 semester credit. Students can complete 2 of these course in one year to earn a 1.0 credit. 

Five courses are available: 

- Biochemistry / Microbiology
- Embryology / Endocrinology
- Earth & Space Science
- Study Skills / Measurement / Lab Reports / Graphing

These courses are self-paced,  students watch Greg Landry, a 20 year homeschool veteran and former college professor, teach from recorded videos. Students get access for 9 months, plenty of time to work at their own pace. Each video is around 30 minutes.

A colorful PDF Student Guide is designed to be downloaded and printed for student work and notes. We chose Biochemistry / Microbiology.  One thing I truly appreciate is letting students follow their interests, even in upper level sciences!

Biochemistry / Microbiology covers carbohydrates, lipids, proteins, DNA, vitamins, hormones, viruses, bacteria, epidemics, antibiotics, pathogen cultures, top 10 pathogen diseases.

This course is accessed through Canvas, a popular college course platform.  My tester has been using this for dual credit college courses, so it was easy to get started.  Once the student logins, they simply click on the course and pick up where they left off.

Greg Landry teaches from a decidedly Christian worldview, and begins videos with prayer!  I appreciate that so much, we have a beautiful opportunity to teach our children how God and science work together - I strongly encourage you to NOT compromise in high school science by allowing secular science to creep into your curriculum.  Your subscription includes the ability to email him with any questions, he's quick to respond and easy to work with.

The Videos move a tad slow for my tester (he's used to quickly paced videos from our current science program) but, they are a great way to practice listening and note taking skills that will be valuable for future college classes.  He shares personal stories as he teaches, and his southern accent is easy to listen to.

I loved the first lesson focused on taking notes, sketching, and learning skills.  This was a valuable reminder on how note taking works, and what is effective for building recall.  I think we frequently skip over teaching our students "how" to learn while we focus on filling them with facts.

The 48 page PDF can easily be printed and kept in a notebook, this is how we used it.  One caution - you will want a color printer!  My favorite is the Epson EcoTank, you can print for pennies, even in color.

I really want my students to be self-learners, so turning them loose with a program like this lines up perfectly.  My tester is doing another science program, so we used this one as a supplement (because he loves science).  

The information is clearly presented, and the workload is manageable, even with a full schedule.  The topics are covered rather quickly, so it makes a great overview, or could be used for review as well.

Overall, he really enjoyed this course, and is interested in others as well.  The course is pretty pricey at $120 for 1/2 credit, which may make it difficult to add for most families.

Be sure to check out some fun Science Freebies for Homeschool Moms on their site and the other courses the Crew is looking at:

Virtual, interactive homeschool laboratory

• biology / anatomy and physiology
• chemistry
• physics

Self-paced 4th-7th grade one-semester classes

• Young Scientist Anatomy & Physiology
• Young Scientist Biology
• Young Scientist Chemistry
• Young Scientist Physics
• Young Scientist Earth & Space Science

Find Greg Landry's Homeschool Science on Social Media:

Hashtags: #hsreviews #homeschoolscience #scienceresources #scienceexperiments #scienceiscool #homeschoolchemistry #homeschoolbiology #homeschoolscienceexperiment

See what other members of the Crew thought here

                    

Premium Subscription from LightSail for Homeschoolers: A TOS Crew Review

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

Premium Subscription  from LightSail for Homeschoolers

Premium Subscription 

from LightSail for Homeschoolers is an online subscription to help build 

reading, writing, vocabulary, and fluency skills for grades PreK-12.

LightSail for Homeschoolers Library gives you access to over:

• 12,000 books - including 3,500 classics and many faith-based titles 

• Over 50,000 World Book Encyclopedia Articles with Maps, Atlases & Timelines

• Lerner Sports Encyclopedia

• Audio Books - over 13,000 titles including - standard audiobooks, audiobooks with text highlighting by word, and audiobooks with text highlighting by sentence

• 360 degree Images

• Videos

• Augmented Reality

• Livestreams 

It's truly a complete digital library that you can access anytime (with no overdue fees!) In addition, this program is designed specifically for homeschoolers with lessons in reading, writing, vocabulary, and fluency skills built in.

The ability to track reading minutes, use bookmarks, highlight quotations, and create memory lists are just a few more nifty features designed with homeschooling in mind.

Students are given an assessment as they begin to accurately determine their Lexile reading level.  This helps determine the books and assignments.  "Power Texts" are at the student's reading level, and are the tool for helping increase reading, writing, vocabulary, and fluency skills with educational features like fill-in-the-blank assessments to check reading comprehension, a full dictionary, read-aloud ability, related content while tracking reading minutes and offering incentives.

All student reading is overseen through the parental control features that let parents monitor and control content, assessments, media, features, chats, and more.

We are HUGE book lovers and were excited to see what LightSail has to offer.  With multiple children using this program, it was easy to find tons of great content, they can even read the same titles, and participate in a family chat or answer challenge questions.

Since we do love a good book with actual pages to turn, while cuddled up together, and my kiddos are all proficient readers - we focused mainly on all the great ways to use Lightsail, other than tracking reading minutes and building literacy skills, which this program is great at with an adaptive platform that customizes to your child's reading level! 

They have an entire library of interesting things to discover.  Like the World Book maps and timelines to go with our history studies.

The 360 degree images that really wowed us - visiting the Sistine Chapel or the inside of the airplane cockpit!

The Lightsail library is interconnected, so frequently related images, books, and articles are just a click away.

Their Video section is jam-packed too!  You can check out videos from a wide range of subjects, but our favorite has to be the Ted Ed talks...or maybe the Livestreams...

Who doesn't love a good Unit Study to spice things up?  Lightsail has over 150 to choose from - fully integrated with books, encyclopedia articles, videos, or any other multimedia content designed by homeschool moms, for homeschool moms.

The Library collections are impressive, you can pick from dozens of genres and thousands of titles.  Handy search features help you find books customized to your child's reading level as well.  I appreciate that they also have faith-based titles and an impressive collection of classics (especially after seeing some of the "Most Popular" reads... making me thankful for the ability to control the reading material options for my children!)

There is SO MUCH to this program, I feel like we will be unpacking all the treasures for a good time to come.  Best of all... it's easy to take on the go with you.  

Find LightSail for Homeschoolers on Social Media:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LightSailEd
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lightsailed/

Hashtags: #hsreviews #homeschool #homeschooling #reading #ebooks #edtech #elearning

See what other members of the Crew thought here

                  

Bible Breakdowns from Teach Sunday School: A TOS Crew Review

 

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

Bible Breakdowns from Teach Sunday School

Bible Breakdowns are a great tool to add to your Bible study tool chest!  They are one of hundreds of 

Printable Bible Lesson Plans, Study Materials, & Activities That Make God's Word Come Alive for Kids, Teens, & Adults from Teach Sunday School (a family favorite!)

They come as 2 PDFs - Old Testament and New Testament,  that you can download and print as many times as you need.  Each PDF contains a hyperlinked Table of Contents (no scrolling to find the book) and a one page summary of each book in the Bible (except Matthew... it's so jam packed that it gets two pages).  A quick glance tells you the Name of the book, the number it is in the Bible, and OT or NT.  I love how these breakdowns are easy-to-read and concise!

The focus of each of these one page summaries is to help you put the Bible into proper context. 

Each summary has a brief written description of the book with interesting facts followed by a handy guide to 

• Number of Chapters
• Type of Writing - ie History, Gospel, Pentateuch, Synoptic
• Date Written
• Time Period Covered
• Author

The "Breakdown" section highlights the Chapter/Verses and Subject - making it easy to see the content of a book of the Bible at just a quick glance. 

 "Classic Bible Stories" are highlighted in Blue text, making them stand out.  A light shading makes the lines easy to see, and provides a handy check box.

A bottom section contains "Most Popular Verses" and a Rank. This is a great place to start with Bible Memory!

Bible Breakdowns are a great tool, with so many ways you can use them!  I've printed ours and keep them handy near my Bible to use as an overview when I'm doing my personal Bible study and reading.  My kiddos each have a copy for them as well.

I love finding new ways to help Bible study become more fascinating.  I recommend you check out all the great tools Teach Sunday School has to offer.  Check out this FREE Bible Reading Checklist!

Find Teach Sunday School on Social Media:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SundaySchoolLessons
Instagram: @teachsundayschool
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/biblefun/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChwHfenlbCBU_XfzvqCFFPA

Hashtags: #hsreviews #biblebreakdowns #biblestudytools #bibleeducation #readingthebible #biblestudyguide #bibleprintable

See what other members of the Crew thought here