And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
Somehow I managed to skip over this favorite of mine. I can't believe that I have never posted this song! Ever since the Lord saved me, I have loved Victory in Jesus!
Jesus had victory over sin and death and through His blood, we have victory in Him!
I knew that we were going to be studying American History this year and I had assumed that we would just continue with our regularly scheduled program {curriculum} but then I started peeking around to see what else was out there.
Here was my criteria for potential new curriculum:
Biblically sound - check!
It had to be something everyone could do together {I am not about to embark on 3 different history books thank you very much} - check!
Bible, History, Science should flow together - check!
I wanted to read REAL BOOKS - check, check and check!
We do oral narration but I felt like I we needed a little more, like discussion questions - check!
Charlotte Mason friendly - check!
Notebooking and lapbooking - check!
TM needs to be laid out in homeschool mom terms that my brain could understand AND follow through with - double checkity check!!
Interesting books and hands on activities - check!
I would like to keep Fridays free or light - check!
When the UPS man delivered the box I tried to act like it was no big deal and sneek into the house. ALONE. But as you can see I ended up having help. My little dude loved that everything was wrapped. He helped unwrap everything while asking me if these were for his birthday {smile}.
Things that exceeded my expectations:
Character Traits are something I am always trying to incorporate into our day but sometimes fail to do so. I love that this is integrated into the Bible Portion of POE {Light for the Trail which is sold separately}
We love Nature Studies but rarely fit in Nature Walks and never get around to using our Handbook of Nature Study book. Would you believe that a main component of POE's Science is the Handbook of Nature Study!!!
I really like that the TM is broken into 6 week unit increments. I also like that week 6 is for review and catch up.
Language Arts in included in this curriculum. From what I understand so far, it is taught through literature Ruth Beechick style.
Not only are there hands on activities there are GAMES!! My kids are going to love playing Columbus Bingo and Charades!
As you can see, this looks like a great curriculum! I will update my thoughts on POE once we get started and as we move along.
Anyone else starting something completely new this year?
Disclaimer: I received Trail Guide for Learning - Paths to Exploration, at no cost
to me, in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are mine.
If your little peeps are anything like mine, they can tend to get a little boooored when most of the school books have been put down. This year I am being proactive, in other words I a gotta plan!
I am scoping out some fun summer activities {hopefully the kind that lasts for more than 10 minutes} for them to do.
Here are my requirements: 1) frugal 2) simple 3) fun!
Sidewalk paint sounds like a winner! My kids ALWAYS want to paint - what better way to fill that desire than outside on the patio or sidewalk!!
My kids love to play with pool noodles, and I don't even mean in the pool. They have used them for jousting when we studied knight and they can frequently be seen playing with them on our trampoline. I think this would be a huge hit!
These little babies look like they would kids the kids off the couch! Sponge Bombs would be great to add into backyard water play. Simple, cheap and fun, fun, fun!
I am not normally a fan of my husband's soda habit but this week... drink up honey! These are soda bottle bowling pins are awesome and I am definitely making them! The kids have already seen them and approve : )
A great way to get out and about would be a Nature Scavenger Hunt! I plan to take the kids to a local park to do this.
I think that a Backyard Twister Game would win me a Best Mom of the Year Award for sure!
For the Angry Bird fans.... Angry Bird Water Balloon Game. This looks so fun that I believe I will be playing this one too!
My boys will LOVE this! All you do is grab some masking tape and your imagination and get to it! I am saving this one for a rainy day.
I thought it would be fun to do our own Blue Ribbon Awards for LSG'sTop 10 Favorite TOS Crew Products that we REVIEWED this year. These are not in any particular order, truthfully it hurt my brain way too much try to figure out which one particular product would be number one - there were just so many great ones!
Being on the TOS Crew has been a huge blessing for our family. We have been given treasures to review that we would not necessarily find on our own. Dive Into Your Imagination is one of those such treasures!!
Dive Into Your Imagination was started by Annie Crawley, A.K.A Ocean Annie. With her experience as an underwater cinematographer and scuba diving instructor, and her passion for our environment and ocean, Ocean Annie gives us a fabulous ocean education!
Members of the TOS Crew were given the opportunity to review one of the 3 Dive Into Your Imaginations DVD's. The choices were:
What Makes a Fish a Fish? - the first DVD in the Dive Into Your Imagination series. This DVD teaches children about astounding fish from around the world. How do fish take a bath? Learn the truth about sharks. Play hide and seek on the reef. The underwater realm provides boundless opportunities for parents to learn and laugh with their children. An upbeat original score celebrates the ocean and brings it to life. The DVD has three audio tracks.
Who Lives in the Sea? - teaches children and their parents about animals living in the ocean. Why do dolphins move so fast? What kind of noise does a sea lion make? Did you know turtles walked with the dinosaurs? Meet whale sharks, octopus and blue-footed booby birds! After your kids watch this DVD, they will want to swim like a dolphin and laugh at the nudi, nudi, nudibranchs!
Dive Into Diversity - teaches children about all the variety of life under the sea and how animals rely upon one another for survival. Take a ride to a depth of 1500 feet in the deep sea with a submarine pilot! Find out what happens on the reef at NIGHT. Learn what eating ice cream and brushing your teeth have in common. Answer questions like, why do crabs have claws and what can grow three feet in just one day?
While they all looked great, we chose the What Makes a Fish a Fish? DVD. I remember the first time I put it on. The kids were not in the science/ ocean video kinda mood for some reason but I, as Mom, over ruled and we watched it {smile}. With in about 30 seconds Little Bits was yelling excitedly about the different fish! Then, one by one, the other kids became glued to the video. They were calling off names of fish they knew, and were very interested in to learn the names of the ones they didn't. They especially liked learning about the Stone fish, that guy was super cool!!
We learned things like what makes a fish a fish {of, course}, about sea anemones and sharks, what fish eat and how they take a bath!
This is a great video and all my kids loved it! I would love to have the others in the series. We found What Makes a Fish a Fish? very informative. Not informative in a boring documentary way but in a fun and engaging I could watch this again and again kind of way. Annie is a wealth of knowledge and her passion the ocean overflows in the this wonderful video.
Included in our review, we were also given the PDF study guides that go along with the DVD we received. Can I just say W-O-W! I could not believe how much information was in these babies! We downloaded the Pre K - K and 1-3 grade guides. Just to give you an idea of how much is in this guide let me just tell ya that it is 374 pages long. They are full of lesson plans, discussion questions as well as coloring and activity pages {things that would fit nicely into a science or nature notebook}.
This series would make a great addition to any homeschool library. I believe that these DVD's are worthy on their own, would nicely compliment a study of swimming creatures and ocean life or they would also be great as a stand alone science curriculum for student in 3rd grade and under.
The PDF's are also available for sale. The guides are available as a printed version for $299 for the whole set of 6, which would the Pre K - K and 1-3 grades for each of the 3 DVD's. They can also be purchased as individual PDFs for $69.95.
As a special for the Homeschool Crew and The Old Schoolhouse Magazine and followers Annie Crawley of Dive Into Your Imagination, Annie is willing to GIVE you a set of PDFs with purchase of the DVDs, meaning for FREE!When you place your DVD order, just let her know in the notes that you are a Homeschool Parent!
