June 2, 2014 · 1:49 pm

Progeny Press . . . A T. O. S. Review

My children and I have been given the fun opportunity to review a study guide from Progeny Press, our first time ever! 🙂

Progeny Press Review

Progeny Press gives us the chance to study works of literature from a Christian perspective, which I do appreciate. Their guides do use the NIV translation of the Bible, but in the “Note To Instructor” section of the Study Guide, it is clearly stated that the study can be used with any version of the Bible. My family prefers (and always uses) the King James Version.

Because we already owned the book and had been needing a push to get it read, I chose the Study Guide for “The Courage Of Sarah Noble“, which is currently available for the cost of $11.99. This is a downloadable product, so there are no shipping costs, plus, you have the advantage of using it for more than just one child if you like.

The Courage Of Sarah Noble, The E-Guide is suggested for lower elementary (grades K through 3), and my kids are older than that, but we quite enjoyed it anyway. My guys are special needs, two of them still struggle with reading, and the others with thinking skills, so it was a good fit. I would definitely put the reading level of the book at the upper level of the suggested range, but that could just be because “Mr. Loquacious” and “The Puzzler” still struggle somewhat when it comes to reading, and “Mr. Loquacious” dislikes reading altogether! We did think it was a pretty good book, which is based on a true story, something that all of my boys thought was really “cool, mom!”

The book “The Courage Of Sarah Noble” is about an eight year old girl in the year 1707, who goes to cook and clean for her father when he builds their family a home in the wilderness of Connecticut. During her time there, she learns the meaning of trust and friendship as she gets to know the Indians living nearby, and stays with them when her father goes back to get the rest of the family.

The pdf Study Guide is 39 pages long, and if you have reluctant children when it comes to handwriting (or are not proficient with it), the guide is set up so that they may type in the answers, and then print out the pages to keep in a notebook, portfolio, or any type of records you like to keep.

Within the study guide, there are “Before You Read” activities, such as defining a word, looking up a place on a map, or speculating on the “why” of something you will be reading about.

There are “As You Read”
Activities, such as making a list of how many times Sarah reminds herself to “keep up her courage”, and holds her red cloak. We are asked why she holds it, and what it reminds her of.

As we read the book, the study guide broke it up into two chapters per session, with pages for vocabulary, questions, and Bible passages having to do with something in those two chapters.

Question and answer portions we generally do orally, because we like to do unit studies together, and because it makes it easier for all to participate, no matter what their writing or thinking proficiency happens to be.

Finally, there are “Activities, Arts and Crafts” which relate to the book, and which your kids may find to be lots of fun. There is a crossword puzzle, a game that Sarah played with the Indian children, instructions for an art project to create a picture of Sarah and her father, a craft project in which the child can build a pretzel log cabin, and a recipe to make corn meal biscuits.

Finally, our study guide gave us a list of suggestions for further reading, plus an answer key for all of the questions in the study guide.

The Courage Of Sarah Noble, The E-Guide from Progeny Press is very thorough, and we really liked it. I particularly like that it is from a Christian perspective, and that we are not locked into a specific Bible version. It was definitely “tweak-able” for my special needs family, and also for my “King James Version only” family. I also appreciate that as far as I can see from looking at the various titles available, if you do not already own the book you are interested in studying, you will most likely find it at your local library, which definitely saves on the cost! 🙂

Check out Progeny Press via the following social media:

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Twitter – https://twitter.com/progenypress
Pinterest – http://www.pinterest.com/progenypress/
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100 Review Crew members reviewed a variety of Progeny Press Study Guides. To see what they and their children thought, please click the graphic below!
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May 28, 2014 · 2:34 pm

What On Earth Can I Do? A T.O.S. Review

In our homeschooling family, we have really loved all things from Apologia Educational Ministries, so I was very excited to be given the chance to review for you the fourth volume in their “What We Believe” series, which is designed to aid you as you teach a Biblical world view to your children.

Volume 4 is titled “What On Earth Can I Do?“, and teaches a Biblical worldview of stewardship. We received the entire set in our review package, as listed and pictured below:

The main text “What On Earth Can I Do?” which is a very nice hard bound book, with just under 300 pages, and retails for $39.00

The Notebooking Journal, spiral bound, 236 pages, which retails at $24.00

The Jr. Notebooking Journal, also spiral bound, 184 pages, which retails for $24.00.

and the “What On Earth Can I Do?” Coloring Book, which is softcover, 64 pages, and retails for $8.00.

This curriculum technically has eight lessons within it, but they are broken up into small chunks, so if your family is like mine, you can really take your time with it. The eight lessons are titled with the following:

Your Story Or God’s Story?

Who Put You In Charge?

Will You Be Found Faithful?

Where Is Your Treasure?

Where Does Your Time Go?

Whose Life Is It Anyway?

Why Isn’t It Easy Being Green?

What Will Happen When The Master Returns?

Each of these eight lessons is, as I mentioned above, broken up into several segments. You can either quickly complete each one within a couple of weeks, or you can take your time, allowing yourselves to really dig in deep with questions, discussion, and following rabbit trails.

The first half of the book follows a family during World War 2, and we are really seeing it mostly from the view of the children. At first, I thought it might be too heavy for my children, but it wasn’t. They were very saddened by what was happening in the story, and in the true, historical things we read about, but it did spark really good discussion and questions. For example, in our church, we have close friends who are Messianic Jews, and “Mr. Loquacious” asked me “if L. and E. and Miss S. were alive then, would they have been in danger like that too?” So we discussed what kinds of changes World War 2 made in the world.

The second half of the study follows another set of siblings, this time in Africa. We have not gotten to that part yet, but we look forward to it!

Each lesson contains several important components:

The Big Idea (introduction and brief overview of what has already been learned)
What You Will Do (learning objectives)
Short Story (this is where we read more about the children featured in this section)
Think About It (comprehension questions)
Words You Need To Know (vocabulary words from that lesson)
Hide It In Your Heart (memorization verses)
Integrated Learning (articles related to an element in the short story or tied to the lesson)
What Should I Do? highlights a godly character trait that the child should demonstrate as the right response to what they have learned.)
Prayer (conclude the lesson with a prayer to thank God for the gifts He has given, and all He has done.)
Parables of Jesus (a retelling of a parable of Jesus, imagined from the perspective of one of the characters in the parable, giving cultural details to better help the child understand what is happening.)
Going Deeper (discussion questions to encourage children to think about the parables of Christ and what they may mean for us now)
House Of Truth (Beginning in the first book of this series, the student is given instructions on building a “house of truth”, with one section being built in each book.)

We are very much enjoying “What On Earth Can I Do?”, and really looking forward to completing it. We like very much that it is written to children, and that the stories about the siblings featured are written from their perspective.

While my kids, with their delays, vastly prefer the Jr. Notebooking Journal, I will tell you that the Notebooking Journal is quite nice! For the older child, there is more writing, the puzzles are a bit more difficult, and it does not have the coloring pages that the Jr. Notebooking Journal has. It does have the mini books to make, which are then glued to specific pages to keep.

In the Jr. Notebooking Journal, the puzzles are easier, there is a lot less writing, there are plenty of coloring pages, and it also has the mini books to make and keep.

The coloring book has many of the same coloring pages as the Jr. Notebooking Journal, and would be a wonderful addition to use with the very young child who would then have something related to do while the older ones are reading out loud, and working on the lessons in the curriculum.

What I chose to do was to have “The Batman” take turns reading with me, and we would all discuss the questions in the text. “The Artist” was chosen to work in the Notebooking Journal, “The Puzzler” worked in the Jr. Notebooking Journal, and by his own request, “Mr. Loquacious” worked in the coloring book. He doesn’t like to read or write, even though he can do so.

We will be continuing on with “What On Earth Can I Do”. I am extremely impressed with it. The only “con” for me is the usual one, that the Bible verses are never from the King James Bible, something I find very frustrating, given that it is the one version that you do not have to pay for the right to copy. At the same time, it did give my kids more practice looking up verses, as I prefer them to read them from the King James Version! However, when the Bible verse is a clue to a word in a puzzle, it’s harder for the kids if the puzzle uses a different version. With this one exception, I really love this curriculum, and highly recommend Apologia Educational Ministries!

Check out Apologia on social media:

Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/apologiaworld
Twitter – https://twitter.com/apologiaworld
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Pinterest – http://www.pinterest.com/apologia/

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May 27, 2014 · 4:26 pm

Soulwinning–The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly (IBTR #30)

This is very good. My Pastor (http://www.mesabaptist.org) often talks about how so many churches rely on what he calls ” 1, 2, 3, pray after me” in order to increase numbers. Our Pastor back in MI felt the same way, and was completely supportive when we wanted to be absolutely sure our younger kids really understood what they were doing before becoming “saved” and before we allowed them to be baptized. They needed to come to an understanding that it wasn’t just so they could have Lord’s Supper. They thought it was a snack they were being denied, lol! I’m so gratefull that all four of my boys are saved and baptized, and truly understand the decisions they made, even with their special needs. Unfortunately, we have also been in churches in the past in which numbers were the be all and end all, which is sad, and which I believe causes a lot of false professions of faith because people, especially children, are pushed to make a profession they don’t even understand.

jimmyreagan's avatarThe Reagan Review

soulwinning

If there is anything Independent Baptists can hang their hats on, surely it is their soulwinning efforts. It has seemingly always been an emphasis. Even if we must point out areas worthy of reform, we must give credit where credit is truly due. Independent Baptists have carried the Gospel all over the world. Even the problem areas worthy of concern are not an issue in most Independent Baptist churches as only in a few is it a serious issue.

The Good

Can you imagine the number of doors knocked, the tracts given, the Scriptures printed, collated, and given over the years? It is absolutely incalculable. I have seen some of the boldest people among us walk right up to some brawny, agitated guy and tell them that Jesus came to save.  I have seen so many times what I believe to be deep sincerity in one telling of the…

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May 17, 2014 · 5:14 pm

Feeling Sad and Nostalgic Today . . .

Two years ago, I left my very best friend “Annie’s” house for the last time, because we were getting ready to move from Michigan to New Mexico, for my husband’s job. At the time, she and her children lived about two and a half hours west of us, having moved to be near her family about a year after the death of her husband. We had for years, spent our kids’ birthdays together, either at her house or at our house. It was the best thing, too, because she and her children love my kids, no matter what their differences and difficulties have been, and always treated them the same as any other kids, even though they aren’t. That has not always been the case in the lives of my children. Kids can be so mean, once they realize another kid is different, you know?

So anyway, we realized that there was no way we would be able to go there in June for the birthdays of her two oldest, which are two days apart, and since “Mr. Loquacious” and “The Puzzler” share a birthday in May (being twins, you know), we decided to go and spend a few days at our friends’ home in May, and just do all four of the kids’ birthdays over a couple of days! Over the years, we were often able to visit for 3 or 4 days at a time because we both homeschool.

We did my boys birthdays on Tuesday, the 15th.

My friend is really awesome at making themed cakes. This is what she did for “Mr. Loquacious”, who really wanted a Lego themed party . . .
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For “The Puzzler”, who loves all things Thomas The Train, this is what she made . . .
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Here I am with the kids, waiting for the candles to be lit . . .
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And here is my dear friend, getting the candles ready for the birthday boys. The picture is a little blurry, though!
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My boys, very happy with their the cakes . . .
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Later, after presents, because we ALWAYS do “Pin the something on something”, I had ordered a pin the Lego shark in the water kit and a pin the smokestack onto Thomas set. Here are all the kids with the Lego mask blindfolds on, trying to hit the right spot.

“Mr. Loquacious”
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“The Puzzler”
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“The Batman”
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“The Artist”
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Next up, we have my Friend’s children . . .

“J. L.” . . .
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“L. E.”
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“L. A. ”
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Here’s how they all looked in the Thomas blindfolds . . .

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As always, I had ordered goodie boxes with themed favors, so each kid got a Thomas one and a Lego one!
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So, that was the party for my twins, on Tuesday. On Wednesday, the 16th, we had a birthday for “J. L.”, and his sister “L. E.”, whose birthdays are two days apart. Their birthday was chocolate theme. You can’t go wrong there, right? 🙂
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Everyone loved their parties, and their presents!

Wednesday evening, we went to my friend’s church, Midland Baptist Church. While we were there, we got somebody to take one final picture of “Annie” and me.
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The next day, the 17th of May, 2012, we had to leave and go back to Port Huron, so I could get to work on packing and readying for our moving sale. I had done absolutely fine the whole time we were there, but when it was time to leave, the hardest thing was to not cry. And I didn’t, until we were out of sight of the house, then the sobbing started, so I pulled over and sat for about 30 minutes until I was OK to drive.

I miss my friend “Annie” so much. For years, we had been each other’s support system, we both have been raising challenging children, although the challenges were and are different. We always knew we could call on each other if we needed someone to keep our kids when we had to do something. In fact, she kept mine for 4 days when I went for my bariatric surgery in 2011.

We began as unlikely friends, who became very close. “Annie” has been my confidante, my Titus 2 woman in my life. I will always love her, and all of her children, so much, and will never stop missing them.

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May 12, 2014 · 1:30 pm

Golden Prairie Press, A T. O. S. Review

Digital Heroes & Heroines of the Past: American History Curriculum, is a curriculum we were given to review, along with 99 other Schoolhouse Review Crew members.

This curriculum is from Golden Prairie Press, the home of “History At It’s Best”, according to their header.

Digital Heroes & Heroines Of The Past: American History Curriculum is a one year package of 30 lessons, and has been designed for children from 1st through the 6th grade levels. It is available for $98.99.

This downloadable curriculum will take your student from 1000 AD up to the present day, using two e-books.

The first half of the curriculum is Heroes and Heroines of the Past: American History Part 1 e-book, which covers the original people in America and continues on through the administration of President Jackson ( 1829 – 37 ).

You will then continue on with the second half of the curriculum: Heroes and Heroines of the Past: American History Part 2 e-book, covering 1837 to the present day.

We also received the following items, which are included in the digital curriculum:

Additional Materials CD (we received this as a collection of pdf files) which can be used as supplemental materials, including timelines, instructions and videos, coloring pages, and much more.

Historical Skits e-book, which contains 19 skits from the time of Columbus to World War 2. Your children can use these to further bring history to life, if they are interested in acting out what they are learning.

Sing Some History CD, which we received as audio files. This contains many of the songs that are referred to in the curriculum, further bringing the history to life while you and your children listen to them.

Listen to Some U.S. History MP3 CD (we received this as a downloadable collection of mp3 files), allowing you and your children to listen to 20 original speeches, poems, sermons, and documents that are mentioned in the book.

What we like:

The format of the curriculum e-books. I enjoy that we are given two different options for each lesson as far as the reading goes, one for younger students who aren’t ready for more lengthy information, and one for the older kids, which goes into more depth. For my kids, we are actually able to (mostly) use the more in-depth portion, as long as we are using this as a read aloud. This is not a problem, since that’s how we do a lot of curriculum, allowing us to do it all together. I enjoy being able to read right from my laptop, so that we only need to print things like coloring pages, etc.

The sound files! We enjoy hearing what we are learning about, whether it is the music or the speeches and such.

We like the Additional Materials CD for things like coloring pages, the extra sound files, and the timelines. Speaking of the timelines, the thing I like the best regarding them is that there are different versions available. You may choose to print out the fully filled in timelines (perfect for some of my kiddos), or the partially filled in (allowing your kids to fill in the rest), or the blank ones, so that your more advanced kids may fill them in from memory or by looking them up.

Here’s the best thing, as far as I am concerned . . . while there are Bible verses throughout for the kids to read and/or memorize, only the reference is given. The verse is not written out in the text (or at least, I haven’t come across any which are as yet), which means no matter what version of the Bible you use (we are a King James only family), you need to get your actual Bible out and LOOK UP THE VERSE FOR YOURSELF! I LIKE that! There is no reason any child who can read cannot learn to look up verses, and too many of us, especially in curriculum, become lazy and just let the text we are learning from do it for us.

What we don’t care for:

Most of the activities are simply things we rarely bother with. We will probably do some of the cooking ones, but I don’t see my kids making paper canoes and such, for example, or a teepee in the house. However, as some of my friends would remind me, that’s mostly because “I” don’t like the mess involved, so, maybe if not for that, my kids WOULD do them. Maybe “I” need to loosen up a little bit on this one, LOL!

All in all, for my kids, I do enjoy this curriculum, and am pleased that it is digital, allowing me to print as many copies of things as needed for my kids. Although it is designed as a 30 week curriculum, I’m quite sure that we will take considerably longer. We very likely didn’t get as far as other reviewers, because with four special needs boys, I do tend to go much slower when it comes to working our way through curriculum. But that’s OK. In MY opinion, it’s one of the beauties of homeschooling, the fact that you do not have to do things in a specific way or time frame. 🙂

To check out Golden Prairie Press on social media, please go to:

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Please always remember always that my opinion is just that, and there are many other crew members reviewing the same product. I encourage you to click the graphic below, and go check out there reviews as well!
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May 9, 2014 · 5:34 pm

I Am Pro-Life Because of My Mother

My mother also had an unplanned, unmarried pregnancy, me. In her case, she and my dad married, and were together until his death nearly 36 years later. However, in an era when society judgement often caused parents to force there daughters to give up babies like me, my grandmother told my mom that she’d help raise me, if my mom didn’t want to marry. My parents were 17 and 18 when they married, and my mother hid her wedding ring under my dad’s class ring so she wouldn’t be thrown out of high school in her senior year. I love my mom and dad and miss them very much, and am very thankful that my grandmother ignored societal judgement in the 1950’s when girls were made to marry, have an illegal abortion, or give their baby away. I am, and always will be, unabashedly anti-abortion.

theministrymama's avatarThe Ministry Mama

I Am Pro Life One of the most popular debates of our day is the pro-life and abortion topic. I must declare in honor of Mother’s Day that I am pro-life because of my mother.

A Humbling Choice

In 1982 my mother came home to her parents expecting a child. She would become an unwed mother at the age of 20. After living away from home for some time, she humbled herself and asked if she could come home. My grandparents received her back home declaring they would make lemonade out of life’s lemons.

A Decision to Make

My mother contemplated the decision on whether to keep the child or give the baby up for adoption. As a Christian, she knew if she were to give up the baby, the adoptive family might not tell her baby about Jesus Christ or the gift of salvation. She decided to keep the baby so she could…

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April 28, 2014 · 10:52 pm

Once More . . . Trying To Declutter

Every week, and I do mean EVERY week, this is what my beautiful ottoman looks like by the time we get to the weekend . . .
2014-04-21 02.34.22

And every week. I try to make it look nice again! Of course, there are things I regularly keep on the ottoman, but we all have developed a bad habit of just dumping “stuff” on it, every day, then just all of a sudden, it looks like the photo above. Well, we are hoping to move and live closer to our church in just a few months, so we are TRYING to get decluttered once again, get the house clean, and begin packing up stuff that we don’t “have” to have available between now and then.

Here’s my ottoman “declutter” . . .
2014-04-21 03.19.28.

Of course, it is beginning to get cluttered again, so I guess tomorrow I’ll work on it again! 🙂

As always, I’d love it if you joined me on all of “My Journeys Through Life”! Just go to the “sign me up” button at the top of the blog and enter your email information! And, if you enjoy “My Journeys”, please go to our Facebook page and “like” it. I’d sure appreciate it if you did! 🙂

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April 21, 2014 · 6:21 pm

Philippians In 28 Weeks . . .A T.O.S. Review

I have been blessed to have another opportunity to review a product from the Home School Adventure Co..

I received a pdf copy of Philippians In 28 Weeks “Love Him With All Your Mind” with Reflection Journal, written by Stacey Farrell.

This book is available in the ESV or the KJV version. As most of my regular readers have already guessed, I chose the KJV version.

Stacey Farrell has devised a very simple way of learning (memorizing) Philippians, although I made it harder than it needed to be at first, lol!

The ages this book is meant to work for are:

Read aloud and discussion as a family: ages 9-11

family discussion and/or parental/teacher guidance, ages 12 and up

Most high School age students should be able to handle this book on their own.

Philippians In 28 Weeks is available as a complete print edition, in either ESV or KJV, for $28.95. The ESV version is also available as a complete e-book for $14.95, while the ESV Memory Cards e-book is available for $9.95.

Stacey has set out five steps to memorizing the book of Philippians:

1. Read the book of Philippians every day.
2. Record your insights in the journal she provides in the book.
3. Repeat your current week’s verses daily.
4. Review and recite from memory.
5. Retain what you have memorized, by reciting your verses at the start of the week, before beginning a new card.

Stacey has provided a very nice log within the book, so that you can keep yourself accountable for keeping up with your study, along with a very nice set of printable cards which have all of the verses to memorize for each week. They are meant to be printed out with the verses on one side and a picture on the other side, but I would prefer not to use all that ink, so only print out the verse side. Also, I have never really cared for the “what everyone thinks Jesus looks like” picture that is used for either the cover of the book or the cards.

I had intended to do this with my boys, but truly over-estimated what they could handle at this time. This is the time of the year when they are memorizing scripture for several different groups within our church, and they just couldn’t manage anymore without falling apart. Therefore, while I will definitely save this for use with the boys later (perhaps during the summer?), I thought it best to at this time, try to do this one on my own. Even so, it ended up being more difficult than I thought it would, but that is NOT the fault of the book, or the author. I have been battling health issues for several weeks, and just as it seemed to be getting better, and I began working on this, it hit back with a vengeance!

However, I really, really love this system! And especially with the things I’ve been dealing with, Philippians is the perfect book for me to work through, so I will be persevering, and I will finish it. I know now that for me, it WILL take longer than 28 weeks, but even so, it is worth it, because I think having verses from Philippians automatically come to me when I need them will be a wonderful help to me during difficult times. I will continue on, even if I need to maybe take TWO weeks for each one week section. I think Stacey Farrell has come up with yet another winner, and I hope she does many more titles for the Homeschool Adventure Co. 🙂

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April 18, 2014 · 1:04 pm

Weekly Wrap-Up . . . Education for MOM! :-)

So, I have been exploring this thing called Zentangle for a little while now. When I first discovered it online, and read all the stories of people it was really helping in areas of relaxation, anxiety, even physical issues like shaky hands due to Parkinsons and other things, I knew I had to try it. Besides, it’s really, really beautiful, and you don’t even have to be an artist or have an art background to do it! I had been trying to learn what I could, from books and the internet. One favorite site is Tanglepatterns, which has an index of many, many patterns, complete with step-outs to show how to draw them.

This past weekend, I went to my very first Zentangle class with two Certified Zentangle Teachers. It was AWESOME! We learned ten different tangle patterns, and used them to make two zentangle tiles.

Here’s my first one, using patterns crescent moon, hollibaugh, printemps, static, and tipple.
2014-04-18 03.11.07

During the second half of the class, we learned five more patterns, and made a tile using florz, hibred, ‘nzeppel, pokeroot and pokeleaf. Here is mine . . .
2014-04-18 03.23.23

In both sessions, we also learned about aura-ing on some patterns, and how to shade to give our tiles dimension.

One of our teachers, Dennie York, has posted all of the tiles the class made on her blog dentangles. Go give it a look, and check out the rest of her blog too, it’s just become one of my favorites! 🙂

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April 14, 2014 · 11:09 am

Weekly Wrap Up . . . More Drama!

As I told you last time I did a wrap up, “Mr. Loquacious” has had a chronic nosebleed problem. Since the Sunday night when he blacked out at church, he’s had a number of new nose bleeds, and so this morning had an 8;00 appointment with the specialist. Well, he will next be having surgery to hopefully correct the problem. Of course, he is very unhappy about this. 😦 Now, we wait for the surgery scheduler to call, and the earliest he can have it will probably be in May.

Other than that, this past week has been slow and easy with homeschooling. We did some science experiments from Supercharged Science, those who are in piano lessons did daily practice, and we’re working on a history curriculum that is an upcoming review. Plus, our homeschool co-op at church had the end of the year creativity fair Friday night, so the two youngest, “Mr. Loquacious” and “The Puzzler” participated in that while “The Batman” and “The Artist” were at a youth group activity that was a pirate theme murder mystery party. Pictures will be coming in a post very soon! 🙂

Hope this week will be a bit simpler to deal with!

This post is being linked up at Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers

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As always, I’d love it if you join me on all of “My Journeys Through Life”! Just go enter your email into the “sign me up” button at the top of the blog, and never miss an update again! If you DO enjoy “My Journeys”, please go to our Facebook page and “like” it. I’d sure appreciate it if you did! 🙂

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