P is for The Penderwicks! This funny and charming story about four sisters and their father is fun for the whole family. This is the first in a series of five books that chronicle the adventures of these sisters and their friend Jeffery (whom they meet in this first book). The sisters, Rosalind, Jane, Sky, and Batty show a love for each other and while they do not always agree, they are great role models for positive sibling relationships.
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While there is a bit of a romantic crush discussed in the book, it is a mostly clean and wholesome book that had us both laughing and crying. The girls make mistakes, but learn from them and have some really grand adventures on their summer vacation with their father. Their mother died shortly after Batty was born and so the girls have learned to really stick together. They play soccer, watch pet rabbits, get chased by a bull and a host of other silly adventures.
My 11-year-old daughter said, “I like the Penderwicks because they go on adventures, whether they go somewhere or stay home. I also like their dog, Hound.” You might think that because it is just a group of sisters it would be a book for girls, but my 13-year-old son also enjoys listening to all of their adventures.
In addition to The Penderwicks, I have listed below a list of other favorite P books that we have enjoyed or that my readers recommended over on my Facebook page! Have you read any of the The Penderwicks books? Tell me what books come to mind when you think of the letter P.
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
Gena Suarez from The Old Schoolhouse® has created a wonderful new tool for homeschool moms! I was excited to get a chance to review the Hey, Mama! Homeschool Planner for 2019/20 Year and try my hand at using a paper planner. This is a beautiful 188 page spiral bound book with a variety of planning resources and devotionals included.
Homeschool Mom Planning Kit
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The calendar portion of this planner begins with July 2019 so I was not really using that portion (though I did go ahead and plug in some important dates and events). However, this is not just a calendar; there are a variety of planning pages in this planner that can help you get your new year planned, goals set, and curriculum organized.
In the past, I have typically used my computer to plan and one of the first benefits that I saw with the Hey, Mama! Homeschool Planner for 2019/20 Year was that it was very portable. Instead of planning while sitting at my desk, I was able to take the planner with me wherever I wanted to go. Planning while sitting in a swing and watching the waves on the river proved to be much more relaxing than staring at my computer. I also took it along on a family camping trip and used campfire time to discuss first semester goals with my two older children.
This planner starts out with information for creating an academic transcript if you have a child that is in high school and then flows into annual calendars for the next several years. Then the really good stuff gets started, you have the first devotional from Gena Suarez. Each month has a one page encouraging devotional for mom before the planning page and two-page calendar spread. This pattern continues from July 2019 through June 2020.
After the calendar pages are lesson planning pages, each week is a two page spread offering spaces for up to five children and seven different subjects. These are undated which allows you to fill them in as you go and not worry about weeks off or changes in plans. There are also some great devotionals distributed throughout those pages.
The Hey, Mama! Homeschool Planner for 2019/20 Year finishes with planning pages for each child (up to five children). There is a blank page for notes, a curriculum planning page, attendance, Books Read page (my children are excited to track their books this year), annual goals and semester goals pages. I really liked how these were laid out and kept it fairly simple. We worked together on our goal planning and I think that having the goals right there in the planner will help us stay focused on them as I am reminded of them whenever I use the planner. The goals sheet was broken down into seven different areas to address the ‘whole child’ and not just academic goals.
Goal Areas:
Educational
Spiritual
Physical
Personal Talents
Life Skills
Financial
Relational
My older two children both chose similar physical goals and are looking forward to training for and competing in a 5K during the first semester. They have even picked out the race they want to run on Thanksgiving morning. I was most appreciative of the relational goals because we are working hard on their relationships with each other.
If you are looking for a homeschool planner I encourage you to check out the Hey, Mama! Homeschool Planner for 2019/20 Year from The Old Schoolhouse®. I think it offered a variety of resources that would be useful for planning for younger or older children and could help keep your home school year on track. I do need to mention that they are 98% sold out and do not plan to print any more until next year. If you want to find out more about how other families are using this planner make sure you click the link below to read more reviews.
Resource Library and Affiliate Disclosure
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
Otis is a charming and entertaining tractor. Yes, I said tractor. This adorable book series, written and illustrated by Loren Long, is based on the adventures of an old farm tractor and his farm friends. I don’t know that I ever thought my children could learn so many life lessons from an old tractor but this series is full of great lessons woven into engaging stories.
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In the title book of this series, Otis, the kind old tractor enjoys his life working on the farm and sleeping in the barn near his friend the calf. Then one day Otis is retired when a new tractor is purchased to do the farm work. This is a sad day for Otis and his friend, but in the end when his friend is in trouble it is Otis who saves the day.
My four year old loved that books so much that I had to read it over and over. Once he found out there were more books in the series he asked for them all. We have been collecting them at various holidays or when I have been able to find them at yard sales or used book sales.
In addition to Otis, we have Otis and the Kittens, Otis and the Tornado, and Otis Gives Thanks. Otis Gives Thanks is a shorter book because it is a board book and great for toddlers. My son loves all of these books and has me read them to him often. I love the moral lessons that they fit seamlessly into the stories. They teach children to value friendship, be kind, be helpful, and work together.
These adorable picture and board books make a great read aloud to toddlers and preschool age children. They would also be fun reading for young elementary aged children. They are the kind of books that I plan to keep even after my children are older, so that I can read them to my future grandchildren.
Tell me what books come to mind when you think of the letter O. Have you read any of the Otis books?
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
I am so excited about this month’s study! It is a fun song, that I remember fondly from my childhood. When I was doing my research I looked up “Rise and Shine” because that is what we called it, but I learned that it is also often referred to as Arky Arky. This is a bit different than most of the traditional hymns that we feature because it is a song that was written for children.
So rise and shine, and give God the glory, glory.
Rise and shine, and give God the glory, glory.
Rise and shine, and give God the glory, glory,
children of the Lord.
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The author of this fun song is unknown and the song appears in several different hymnals and collections including the Complete Anglican Hymns Old and New. This is not one I traditionally heard on Sunday during church, except maybe Sunday school, but rather, it was a song sung at camp, vacation Bible school, or other fun children’s programs.
In addition to the chorus, there are six verses that accompany the song. These verses share the story of Noah and the Ark in fun rhyming lyrics that are easy to remember and enjoyable to sing.
As you are studying this song and enjoying some of the many versions that are available, there are many ways to extend this study. If you have a young child, you can use the verses about the animals coming on the ark by twos to practice skip counting. You can also talk about and study the animals mentioned in the song. For example, you could watch elephants on a live webcam from the zoo or research some of the unique characteristics of a Kangaroo to appreciate God as our creator.
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
I normally like to go ahead and post these at the beginning of the month, but May seems to have come and gone in the blink of an eye. I decided that ‘April Showers, Bring May Flowers’ for this post and we did a flower out of my son’s foot prints. I’m also sharing pictures of a couple of the craft projects that my five-year-old son did as a part of his Toucan Box subscription and a cute seashore chalk pastel lesson that my older two children completed. It may have taken until the end of the month, but they all enjoyed their various art projects.
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For the baby, I simply chose purple as the color of the flower, dipped his foot into the paint and pressed it onto the paper. I then moved the paper slightly and repeated until I had a circle (mostly) of footprints. I used my finger to add a yellow middle and a green stem from finger paint. If you were working with a child that was a little bit older, they could probably do that part themselves. It is amazing to me to see how much his little feet have grown since January.
I am trying to think of a fun summer or beach themed idea for June. I’d love to hear your thoughts or ideas in the comments.
Benjamin enjoyed working with shapes and paint by adding in the black foam lines and then painting the various rectangles. The other part to this activity involved sticking the foam circles onto the framed area to make interesting designs. This was one of two kits that were in his Toucan Box this month.
My older children are feeling the summer itch and ready to be spending days at the beach so this fun tide pool lesson was a big hit!
Resource Library and Affiliate Disclosure
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
There is a lot of discussion about summers in the homeschool world. Should I take a long break? School year-round? Keep doing math? Spend all day outside? The choices seem endless and sometimes a little overwhelming.
However, I love that each family can decide what works best, and that can change from summer to summer.
Last week I shared a little about how we were going to focus on resetting our rhythms and routines over the summer to help us get back on track with chores, fitness, and Bible reading.
These are things that I want to become ingrained habits that are a natural part of our day. In addition to working on those rhythms and routines, I had to decide how I wanted to spend our summer days.
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After such a busy year, I really wanted to be sure we had some downtime to relax and rest. I have left lots of ‘white space’ in our calendar to play outside, watch a few movies, make lemonade, and just enjoy our time together. We will have the opportunity to spend some time enjoying time with our family down at the river: swimming, boating, and playing in the sand.
However, I know that my children do best with a little bit of structure. I have decided that we will be enjoying some focused time on a few ‘electives’ this summer, as well as some family reading. In addition, we will be continuing to work on a few new reviews for various products, so keep an eye out for those.
Big sister helping little brother with his violin (messy bed and all).
Music Lessons
My three oldest children have been learning instruments this year and I plan to have them commit some of their time this summer to furthering their musical goals. My daughter just moved up a level in her Practice Monkeys violin class and feels that she has a lot to learn to be successful in this level. Some extra practice time this summer should help her feel more confident and continue moving her forward.
My five-year-old son is also working in the first level of violin and will hopefully be able to move to level two before the summer is over. My oldest son wants to play the guitar and has begun to learn but has not felt that he has the time to devote a lot to practicing. I am hopeful that this extra time will allow him to gain confidence.
This also fits well into my rhythm and routine theme for summer because I believe that if he is practicing daily and making progress, it will be easier for him to fit that in when we start our regular school schedule in the fall.
You Are An Artist Art Camp!
We are excited to be spending some time at ‘art camp’ this summer. It is the perfect camp because we don’t have to leave home! It is included in the price of our regular art program, it has lots of option for various interests and ages, and I can fit in around our schedule.
My plan is to get up in the mornings and work on our routines (chores, Bible time, and fitness), have breakfast, and then complete an art lesson.
Next, we will have a snack, and then the kids can spend some free time outside playing before we tackle our other projects and review work. Nana with You Are an Artist has so many wonderful art lessons for them to choose from each day can be new and exciting.
Summer Reading
I do not want to lose the momentum that we have with reading and books. I am grateful that my children naturally spend time reading, and I do not have to assign free reading, but I want us to spend some time reading books together this summer. Some of these books I will read aloud, and some of them I plan to purchase using my audible subscription. First, I want to read The Secret Garden. I found this great free family book club guide from The Read Aloud Revival to go along with the Secret Garden, and I’m excited to get started.
Next, we have been talking about reading Wonder and just have not gotten around to it. I plan to read it together and then have a family movie night to watch the movie. Finally, a couple weeks ago, I shared about how much we love the Mr. Lemoncello books.
When I went online to share the link with everyone, I found out that a new book had just been released: Mr. Lemoncello’s All-Star Breakout Game. This should be a great light summer read that will make us laugh. I also have a few other books that we may find the opportunity to read, and, of course, I’ll be reading lots of picture books with my younger children.
Independent Learning
Finally, I plan to have each of my three older children pick a topic or skill of interest to work on independently this summer. I really want to cultivate the skill and love of lifelong learning in them. I want them to experience the joy and satisfaction that comes from deciding they want to learn about something and figuring it out.
I believe that my daughter is going to learn more about photography with her new camera. We have some resources that she can use in our SchoolhouseTeachers.com membership as well as some free online resources. My 13-year-old son is wanting to take beekeeping classes to further his skill in that area. I’m not sure about the five-year-old yet, but I’m sure we will come up with something fun for him to work on.
All in all, we are excited about summer. I am hoping that this flexible plan of fun with a little structured enrichment will keep things on a smooth track. We can further some skills, get some rest, and make some memories. I would love to hear more about your summer plans.
Resource Library and Affiliate Disclosure
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library, you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always, I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in, and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
A couple of years ago I saw, A Nest for Celeste recommended for our study of history. It sounded really interesting, so I purchased it to use with my children. When it came in I sat down to look through it a bit before I gave it to my son to read and ended up reading the entire book. It was a fun and engaging book that combines art, history, science, and fiction.
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Written and illustrated by Henry Cole, this book tells a bit about the life of James Audubon through the eyes of his young apprentice Joseph and Joseph’s friend Celeste the mouse. If you are looking for a biography of James Audubon this is not the book for you, however, if you are looking for a book that can introduce James Audubon while getting kids excited about birds and nature this may be a great choice. The illustrations are done in beautiful detailed black and white pencil sketches.
The story tells of Joseph’s adventures as he travels with James Audubon and helps him to collect and draw specimens for his research. There is some sadness in the book as animals are killed in order to be saved for drawing but it is well written and appropriate for most children. Many of the events in the book are based on real events recorded in James Audubon’s journals. Joseph was also a real person and apprentice; though Celeste, of course, is fictional.
This book is a great independent read for upper elementary school students and possibly even middle school. It is also a good family read aloud for younger children. And don’t tell my children because I have not bought it yet, but as I was putting this post together I found this sequel, Another Quest For Celeste. I will be adding it to my wish list!
In addition to A Nest for Celeste, I want to recommend that you check out the scripture based picture book Nothing that I reviewed a couple weeks ago. It is a beautiful book that is perfect for preschool and early elementary students.
Tell me what books come to mind when you think of the letter N. Have you read A Nest for Celeste or Nothing?
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
We recently had the opportunity to review Typing Tournament Online and Maths Invaders Online from EdAlive. The children are always excited to try out new online learning opportunities especially when they are in the form of games.
I used Typing Tournament Online with both my seventh grade son and my fifth grade daughter. The program is set in medieval times with knights and dragons. This makes it a bit more interesting than just typing practice. My daughter really liked that it was teaching her new typing skills and not just providing practice. She said, “typing is a lot of fun and I learned very quickly and it helped me to increase my speed.”
The program starts with lessons and practice at each level and then progresses to games that you can play once you are comfortable with the level’s material. If you win the game, it lets you take the test to move up to the next level. There were several games but her two favorite games were the Dragon Chase game and Siege. In Dragon Chase, you are racing a dragon to get to the castle, you type words to race and the higher up in levels you get the faster you have to type. Siege is another fun game where you type words that are attacking the castle, as you type them it blows up the words, if the word gets to the top of the castle you lose and have to try again.
If your student already has some typing proficiency, they can test out of levels until they reach their current level of proficiency. I really liked this part of the program because it kept my children from being bored in the early stages. Once you complete (or test out) of all of the levels on the map you earn a movie. My daughter was very excited to earn the movie, though she was not overly impressed with the movie itself once she watched it. You can then go back in and set a higher goal and continue working. My son also enjoyed Typing Tournament Online but has not quite finished the map yet. There are also some great parental reports to help you track progress.
Maths Invaders Online was a math review program that takes the form of space games. The two main games are Galactic Campaign and Space Rescue. Galactic Campaign was the main program and by scoring well you could earn the opportunity to play Space Rescue. We had a little bit of a false start in this program because we did not realize at first that you could change the level. This meant that, much to their delight, my fifth and seventh graders were doing lots of basic addition and subtraction. Once I realized that we needed to go in and set their levels it was more challenging for them and more beneficial. I do wish setting the levels would have been explained a little more clearly so that we could have started out on the right track.
Maths Invaders Online is not a game that you would use to teach new math skills but provides a fun way to review their current skills and increase speed and proficiency with math facts. You can choose for them to work on a certain grade level material or even go in and choose a particular skill that they need to work on. For example, I was able to go in and choose fifth grade level fractions for my daughter to review because that was a skill we had just covered in her math book.
There are a variety of reports in the parent portal that let me know what skills they have mastered, how many questions they have answered during a given activity, percentages, correct, and it can even correlate their work with several different sets of standards if your instruction is based off of one of those sets of standards.
Overall, we enjoyed both of these programs but the favorite for both children was Typing Tournament Online. We felt that it really helped them to improve while enjoying their typing time (they would even use it during their free time). I encourage you to visit the EdAlive website to check out these two programs as well as their other products. You can check out how other families used these programs by clicking on the link below to view the other reviews.
Resource Library and Affiliate Disclosure
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
God is Better than Trucks sounded like the perfect book title for my son. This alphabetical picture book is written by Sarah Reju and published by Christian Focus. The overarching message of this book is, “Trucks are powerful, big and fun! BUT GOD IS BETTER THAN TRUCKS!”
Opening his package!
A new book!
This hard-cover picture book includes fun and colorful illustrations on each page. It is an alphabetical book that features a different mode of transportation for each letter. Each letter also included a Bible verse that correlates to that page. The text of the book shares what is wonderful about each mode of transportation but then reiterates that God is better than each of those things.
For example, for the letter ‘U’ they showed an underwater submarine. The text for that page was, ” THE UNDERWATER SUBMARINE explores a mile DEEP, but God made the whole ocean. God is better than UNDERWATER SUBMARINES!” Then they shared ” The sea is his, for he made it…” Psalm 95:5 as the verse for that page.
I read this book several times with my five-year-old son, who really enjoyed the pictures. By the end of the book he could say the last line of each letter, ” God is better than …” One of the pages featured and ice cream truck handing out ice cream at the beach. He said that was his favorite page because he loves ice cream.
This book is great for young children ages birth to six or seven. The younger children will enjoy looking at the pictures and listening to it being read aloud. Many children on the older end of that range are fascinated by various cars, trucks, and trains and may enjoy reading about the different types. In addition to using it as a read aloud book, you could pick a page to focus on each week and memorize the scripture and maybe find out more about that type of transportation.
In addition to God is Better than Trucks, the Review Crew had the opportunity to review a variety of different books from Christian Focus. These included another picture book, God is Better than Princesses. Some families also reviewed a biography of Elizabeth Prentiss and Big Bible Science. which are for older children. Be sure to check out their website and use the link below to check out reviews from the other Crew members!
Resource Library and Affiliate Disclosure
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
When I was a young girl I fell in love with the Mandie series by Lois Gladys Leppard. In a time before Amazon and other online retailers, my mom would take me to our local Christian bookstore and I would purchase one or two new books. I would begin reading them as soon as we got into the car and often finished at least one of them before I went to sleep that evening. They were engaging, entertaining, and full of adventure.
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Fast forward a ‘few’ years and my eleven year old daughter is now also enjoying these books. I even found out that there were movies made about the first few books and we have enjoyed watching them together. We even found out that the movies were filmed in our home state and we had been to the ‘mansion’ in the movie that now serves as a visitor’s center for a park.
These books tell of the many adventures of Mandie and her friends Cecilia and Joe. Mandie is helped by her Uncle Ned; who is a Native American friend of her father. After her father dies, she goes to live with her uncle and continues to find mysteries to solve. Adventures seem to await her with every turn of events. Mandie goes through some difficult circumstances during the course of the book, but she learns to trust in God to help her through adversity.
While the main character is a girl, these books are truly fun for girls and boys. They are clean wholesome fiction that will excite and engage readers. I would recommend the Mandie series for upper elementary and middle grades readers.
Tell me what books come to mind when you think of the letter M. Have you read any of the Mandie series?
When you sign up for the Schoolin’ Swag free resource library you will get a link and password to the library, we are adding to the library each month with new items. You will also get a bi-weekly newsletter email to keep you up to date on what we have going on.
This post may contain affiliate or referral links, including Amazon affiliate links. As always I will never recommend a product that I don’t believe in and you will never be charged more for purchasing through our links. It does help pay for the costs associated with the blog.
Fit2B just announced they are having a Mother’s Day sale! Use code mothersday25off for 25% off! We use this for both my personal fitness and some of our PE for the kids (all included in one membership). A great way to get you safely moving and incorporate fitness into a busy day.
Free Makeover Your Morning 5 Day Challenge! This is a great way to help re-focus and get your day off on the right foot.
The Tummy Team is having a 35% off sale! This makes for some very reasonably priced online rehab programs or esessions. I am excited to be getting a course to help me get back to being in my best health! I have loved the other courses that I have taken from them and they are so helpful and supportive. I know this one is not directly homeschool related but it affects so many moms that I wanted to share.
The Schoolin' Swag Blog 