Kids Can Publish

"Children like to write more than many adults realize," says Linda Radke, president of Five Star Publications who co-founded Kids Can Publish University with Lynda Exley, an award-winning editor and writer. "It's just a matter of giving them incentives to motivate them to stay interested in writing and develop a desire for continuous improvement. Because nothing is more exciting for a child than to see his or her "winning" byline in print, we developed a monthly Kids Can Publish contest for first- through ninth-graders."

I was told about Kids Can Publish, a part of Five Star Publications, by my review company, Mama Buzz. We were encouraged to try out a free contest for our kids who loved writing, or those who needed the encouragement of online publication (and the accompanying glory and fame).

The entries can include stories, poems, editorials, articles, photography or cartoons! So whatever your child is 'in to' can be submitted. I got excited because Claire is studying poetry and writing this year and has already written a few poems. I planned on going over, filling out the form with her entry, and hitting send.

I went to the site and was a little confused. I couldn't fill in the form for a writing submission. I saw that you were supposed to print it out and mail it in. Then I read further and now I think that you also need to mail in the writing (or photo or whatever) itself, also. After emailing the help people for 3 emails, that's what *I think* (it wasn't definitively answered).

So, although I was pretty excited on Claire's behalf, we never got anything submitted, much less won any glory or fame. Oh well. If I get more ink in my printer and want to cough up a stamp I will later. Gotta let some of the good things go, I guess.

This was a review for Mama Buzz- you can see their button in my sidebar. I didn't receive anything in return for this review, and I hope it was helpful to you!

Another blog!

Just to let you know, my daughter Claire started a blog called Fantastica! Check out the link in my sidebar!

iTouch

Oh, the iTouch! How awesome it can be! Before reading this post, please understand my lack of tech coolness- I didn't even want an iPod until I read a book (an 'old' one, too) about it. I thought until this past week that an iTouch was just a collection of apps. What was the point? No phone service, and a bunch of games for adults.

So I probably mentioned that our computer had crashed and we were in the process of getting it up and going again, including having a friend un-crash it, add a hard drive, and then I had to download *8* CDs! of pictures and get an anti-virus scan (17 viruses in over 16,400 files), anyway we couldn't get on the desktop until this morning. So James set up the iTouch to receive our wireless signal- voila! now I was able to check my email and peck my way around the internet. The best part about the iTouch is that when you type it makes the old-fashioned click-clack noise. Yes!

However there are drawbacks to the iTouch, it doesn't do everything I need. So today I am online- on the desktop- again!! A full-size screen and I can type with all 8 fingers! Yay!

Free Form Poetry

Rainbow Resource, How I love Thee

by Tracy Dear

Rainbow Resource, How I love Thee!

I love thee in many ways!

I love the length and breadth of your catalog-

O its thin pages!

The tiny descriptive print!

The exhaustive index is dear to me.

I love your website online!

What easy navigation,

the search feature- the bargain bin!

And O! the joys of the wishlist-

so many facets to ponder...

compare and contrast with

the click of a mouse.

How I tell others of this Resource!

the 800 number- cherished!

helpful, real and patient people!

Let me expound upon the

variety of choices- be it

a text, a workbook, an extra-

you choose to support my worldview.

Thank you, beloved Resource,

for always mentioning the pros and the cons-

yet you encourage me to follow my own path.

O! The dedication and commitment-

you are like water to the thirsty and fatigued,

You encourage the downtrodden and

you lift up the beginner.

Rainbow Resource! Thank you for your service.

Big Thoughts for Little People

At first glance, Big Thoughts for Little People by Kenneth N. Taylor looks like every other ABC story book. However, it isn't. Now, I used to be in favor of a fun-filled preschool where the little kids learn their ABC's by absorbtion and observation until you finish up with some fine-tuning in Kindergarden. But, this book has altered that idea for me! I think it would be a great 26-week ABC, Bible, and character study.

Big Thoughts for Little People uses the alphabet as a baseline for starting discussions with your child ages 3-7. I think it is too in-depth for reading in one setting- like the title suggests, there are some pretty big thoughts in here! When we got it in the mail, we sat down and started to read the entire thing, and my kids were zoning out by the time we got to the letter "Dd." It's just too much to think about all together. It's better to read it a page at a time, so they can really focus on each idea and give some thought to its teachings.

This book is just ideal as a jump-off for a focus for the week. This was my idea: Teach one letter a week until you've gone through the entire book/ alphabet. Start with Big Thoughts and read the 2 pages for the letter of the week. Curl up on the couch and peruse the detailed illustrations looking for ways that demonstrate or fail to demonstrate the trait. Then, for the rest of the week, focus on that letter of the alphabet and the corresponding quality. Bam! Preschool curriculum in one book. Just throw in some counting and call it a success.

For instance, my three-year-old is learning to trace the letters. I always start them on the letters of their name because they have a vested interest in those letters. So, Lily and I would start at "Ll." It says in a colorful block at the top of the left page:

"L is for lying

A thing not to do.

No matter what happens,

Only say what is true."

Then the paragraph below goes over a few events from the illustration on the right page. It asks the child to interact with the story the drawing tells- to make guesses and judgments about the picture. This is an important skill for kids to learn in the early years. It has 3 questions for the child and parent to talk about, one of which was "Can you think of a time when you wanted to tell a lie, but you told the truth instead?" and is summed up with a scripture at the bottom (You must not lie. Exodus 20:16). In addition, the illustration has a lot of items in it that begin with the letter. On the "Ll" page there is a Lemonade stand, a lollipop, a lamb, a llama, some laundry, a lily, and a ladybug.

This is a review for Mama Buzz, you can see their button in my left sidebar. I received a free copy of this book, valued at $14.99, by Tyndale Publishing in exchange for writing this review. I hope you found it informative!

Keeping House

Last night I took the baby out of the tub when the water got cold, and as I wrapped him up like a burrito, my dad came over to measure the counters in the kitchen. I put Nathan at the table and by the time my dad left, he had discarded the towel and was running around naked. I went into the kitchen, and stepped in a spill. When I went back to clean it up, I noticed tiny little pigeon-toed footprints coming out of it. So. Guess I should put a diaper on that kid.

As I try to do school and clean up for the Lego club this afternoon, I have y'all on my mind- gotta get my desktop up and running again! Here is one of my very first posts from March that is good to keep in mind today.

"Well, yesterday morning, with no notice really, my parents came over for breakfast. The house was perfectly clean! My mom even commented how nice it looked. That was at about 9:30. Today, less than 24 hours later, it seems like a disaster. I have a few comments to make on this point that we should all keep in mind.

First, we are called HOMEschoolers. We are home all day, living in our homes and using the things in them. At my house, there are 5 people and 2 dogs and miscellaneous guests here all the time. We clean our homes and then immediately start re-making a mess. I'm sure if we cleaned and then left for the day the house would look better.

Second, there are four small people here with sinful, selfish, lazy tendencies (just like me) who are slowly being trained to clean up after themselves and serve others. I need to remind myself how merciful God has been with me when I resist what he is teaching me- how to be a responsible, serving reflection of his Son. Like my daughter who would rather play Pollys or my son who is engrossed with his latest Lego creation, I would much prefer to lay in bed, reading and dozing, than educating a sometimes resistant child.

There are a few quotes that I really like that apply here. One, I made into art for the kid's bathroom. It says "Cleaning house while your children are growing is like shoveling the walk while it's still snowing." Love it! The other is something I'd like to put on my front porch: "If you'd like to see my house, call and make an appointment. If you'd like to see us, ring the bell."The last one is from Ecclesistes 3:1 "To every thing there is a season." Our homes will not always be messy. There will come a day when the kids have all moved out and things will be quiet and untouched for days on end. But in trade for that, the little hands and feet will have grown and the little voices will just come on the other end of the phone line. So lets enjoy the time we have in our messy homes.

We homeschool because we want to be with our children and influence their development. Not because we want a perfect home. If family or neighbors who don't homeschool don't understand why the house looks 'lived in' all the time, just smile and remind yourself that it is lived in. We homeschool with the knowledge that education is happening in our homes, sometimes literally under our feet. We don't all have the blessing of separate schoolrooms. We can't necessarily pack away the materials or the project or experiment so that the house looks gorgeous. One week last year I had 5 peanut butter jars on the counter, with different kinds of soil settling in them. Not as attractive as matching flour/sugar/tea/coffee canisters, I can tell you!

Newborns have dirty diapers. Clean dishes leave behind dirty dishwater. Homeschooling includes a home in which the level of tidiness ebbs and flows like the tide. But soon enough the mess-makers will graduate and the house will look sparkling and tidy all the time, because this season has passed and another season has started. "

Algebra HELP!

Sorry I'm late today! My computer crashed last week and my desktop is not up and running yet- I'm limping along on my husband's laptop when he's home, so my posting schedule is a little wacky.

I know that since my kids are in elementary grades that the blog can be lacking on the upper-class topics. I know that grandparents and friends and neighbors from the other schooling options can be skeptical of our ability to teach upper math and sciences. I know people have asked me if we plan on "making" our kids homeschool through high school, and it's good to have a ready response. So when I was told about this web service that is available for kids k-12, but seems to focus mainly at older students- I thought I'd tell you and we can have it in our arsenal of retorts for when people ask "Where are you going to get them Algebra help?!"

It's called TutorVista. Check out their press page it looks really cool. They give unlimited tutoring sessions in all subjects, but seem to focus mainly on math problems. The site does list English, Physics, Chemistry, Biology, and general science in addition. Here's a tutor essentially in your home that can create a relationship with your child and help them all the way through college.

TutorVista facilitates real tutoring with an actual person online- there is a virtual whiteboard and the same tutor every time. It's great for math word problems help all the way up to Algebra 2 help. What I love is the ability to create a relationship with one person. Instead of hoping you get a good tutor each time you log on, you know who will help you. And this picture from their website makes me happy too. I love the idea of a symbiotic relationship where my family is not only getting assistance with our edcuational goals, but also helping people around the world.

So as your kids get older and finding the right math answers is getting tougher, this company could be a big help. It charges a monthly fee that seems pretty reasonable given what is available (like no driving to an appointed place and keeping the little kids busy in the car for an hour, and feeling like you can't ask someone how their week was because you are paying for a certain window of time. Yeah, I've done it.)

They give a free session so the next time you and your homeschooler are stumped by a couple of difficult algebra word problems- or a whole textbook of them- you could try them for free.

Latin from N. Dakota

Hello, my peeps!

My parents came back from North Dakota last week and dove right into a weekend with my kids! They are nuts! but I didn't try to dissuade them.

One of the surprises they brought back with them was the Latin and Greek root study book that I was contemplating buying(English from the Roots Up, Vol. 1)! Wow! So I've looked it over, and it looks really, really good. The author, Joegil K. Lundquist, has a ton of enthusiasm bubbling over. The edition I got is coming off it's spiral binding, and I'm going to have to get it rebound, but the first 4 pages of introduction and how-to are detailed and energizing! She really advocates this kind of study starting in second or third grade. I'm excited to get started, but I am going to restrain myself until the fall next year. (That's the plan right now anyway.)

We'll have to see if any other root/refix curriculum falls into my lap! Also I am waiting with bated breath to hear if I won anything from Rainbow Resource for my review last month. We'll see. Maybe a big honkin' credit at their store will facilitate more curriculum "falling into my lap!"

Upturn by Timberdoodle

Well there certainly was a kerfluffle in our house when this box came to the door!

This game is for any age child who knows or is learning the double-digit numbers. I was a little overwhelmed by the variety of symbols on the game pieces, but this was remedied as soon as I read the instruction booklet (funny how that works, huh?). The pieces are easy to figure out after you read the definitions! In addition, the pieces themselves are very pleasant to handle- they warm in your hand and remind me of ivory dominoes. They are sort of a modern, curvy, tilted rectangle. The symbols are carved into the face of each piece and the grooves are dyed to make them easier to identify.

It is basically a "put the numbers in order" game. Depending on which way the play is going, you put down the next larger or next smaller number tile. Then, they throw in some variable like skipping turns, handing out extra tiles, or flipping the direction of play.

It's not an overly face-paced game, and easily converts to play in teams -- an older child paired with a younger one, working together to figure out the next best tile to lay down. As a homeschool mom, I see the intrinsic value of such solid and pleasant tiles. It would be easy to use the tiles as a stand-alone tool to practice ordering the numbers.

Benefits to UpTurn were quickly visible. Not only limited to practicing and improving their math skills, it was an opportunity for my older daughter to practice patience and helpfulness as my younger son figured out the next tile to use. Sometimes a tile instructed a child to give tiles to another player. It was evident that this action could easily lead to frustration between siblings, so it was an opportunity for them to practice good sportsmanship. At one point my son got frustrated at the game, but the next time his turn came around, he was able to put down 4 tiles and give away four tiles, and suddenly he was in the lead! So the course of the game can change really quickly.

My kids are used to educationally-minded toys and games, so they were open-minded with UpTurn. As a parent, I could see that it was fun enough for them to not groan when I took it out to play with... definitely better than doing a math drill or flashcards! However, for a family that is not usually playing educational games, or who uses a wide range of electronic and entertaining media, this game would probably not be a winner.

I did this review for Mama Buzz (see their button in my left sidebar). I received a free copy of this game for free from Timberdoodle. I hope you find it informative!

sorry

My computer crashed and I was unable to write. I'm sorry! I'm going out of town and I'll be back here on Tuesday!