Homeschool Crew Review: PandaParents

PandaParents is releasing a brand new product called MESSYLEARNING FOR PRESCHOOLERS AND KINDERGARTNERS. We received a 3 months of a 6 month digital subscription to use and review.
I know that MESSYLEARNING does not sound like a good thing, but it doesn't mean what you think it does. MESSY stands for:

Mixed Pre-school Subjects
Engaging Questions and Activities
Simple 1-2-3 Steps
Smart Designs
Yeah, a new way to promote STEM education and early brain growth

Each unit of MESSYLEARNING is designed to be used 2/3 days a week for 30-60 minutes a day.  There are three components to each unit: a storybook, video, and workbook.  The storybooks are designed for a parent to read aloud to child.  Then they can watch the corresponding video and complete the workbooks pages.  The workbooks have a variety of activities including a craft. Each month revolves around a different theme and teaches a variety of subjects through that theme.  For example The Scotty Skunk curriculum focuses on the letters "s and h," teaches sequences and numbers, science and nature, feelings, and home and safety. The three months we received were:

A Jolly Jingling Journey- Davy falls asleep and goes on a magical journey to Santa's cabin in the North Pole. The PDF version of the story was 50 pages, the workbook was 40 pages and the two videos totaled about 40 minutes.

Scotty Skunk Hears a Scary Sound-Little Muffin's mommy tells him a story about a skunk finding a new home.  The PDF version of this story was 40 pages, the workbook was 50 pages and the video was 32 minutes.

Mommy's Baby-It's bedtime but Amanda is not tired.  She and her mommy play a mommy baby game before bed.  "Are you mommy's muffin? I am your blueberry muffin."  The storybook is 30 pages long, the video is 5 minutes long, and the workbook is 40 pages long.

PandaParents is recommended for ages 3-6.  I think it will work better for preschoolers then kindergarten but that will vary depending on the child.  The basic idea for the curriculum is a good one, teaching many different things at one time using a centralized theme.  There is no teacher instruction so how you use the curriculum and how much you do every day will be up to you.  I thought the workbook had some good activities.  I liked the way they had some science oriented activities in each of the workbooks like in the Mommy's Baby workbook there is a section on different types of animal tails. The craft ideas at the end of the workbooks are simple and easy to put together.

There is A LOT of color in the workbook pages and story.  I think a physical workbook would be a better option then a PDF.  The story we just read off the screen because it would be expensive to print but if you do not want to have to depend on having a screen to learn a physical book would be a better option.  The company is supposed to be releasing a physical product in December. The video length really varied.  One of ours was only 5 minutes and another was over 30.  The 30 minute video was too long in my opinion.  The drawings, animation, and voices were very different then what we are used to and were not our taste but others may enjoy it.

To see what my Crew Mates had to say, stop by the Crew Blog!

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Homeschool Crew Review: Kids Email

Kids need to learn how to communicate using technology. Email can be a great way for children to communicate with friends and family that live far away, but it can be dangerous to allow children to have their own email and use the computer.  Over the last several weeks we have had an opportunity to use and review Kids Email Safe Email for Kids from Kids Email.

This is not my first time to review Kids Email.  We reviewed for this company back in 2016.  I was impressed with it then and my opinion has not changed.  Kids Email has some great features that makes it a great option for your children.

While your children will have their own email address with Kids Email, there are a lot of parent controls.  Parents set up the email addressed for their children.  Younger children will have a kidsemail.org address and older children will have a kmail.org.  Parents can set up a variety of safety settings including a contacts list.  Only the people listed on the contacts list can send emails to your children and your children can only send emails to them. You can set up the account so that copies of all of the emails are sent to your own inbox.  You can also block images in the emails and not allow attachments.  Parents can set up time limits and block senders. Children cannot change their settings, only parents can do that. One of the best parts is that NO ADS ARE ALLOWED!  Your child will never see advertisements of any kind on their email page.  Also spam messages are automatically filtered out so you do not need to worry at all about an inappropriate email sneaking through.

Each child's dashboard can be personalized.  There are several background choices that will appeal to boys and girls and others that will appeal to boys or girls.  There are some that will appeal to younger children and others that older children will appreciate.

There is a drawing board icon that allows children to draw pictures within their emails.  My 7 year old loves to do this!  She has done some on the computer but it is easier on my phone.

There is also a way to attach photos to an email.  You can use a photo that already has been taken or take a photo within the app and attach it.  My 9 year old had drawn a picture that she wanted to send to my parents so she took a photo of it on my iPhone and emailed it.My mom then printed it out and put it on her fridge.

For younger users there is a Read to Me icon that will read the emails they have been sent.  This is a great feature to allow children to read their emails without waiting for someone to come and do it for them.

We do not do a lot of communicating by email, but it is a great way to stay in touch with those who do not live close by.  Emmie especially has enjoyed being able to draw her pictures and send them off to my mom and dad, and her Aunt Kelly.  She has loved getting emails back. Kids Email really takes the worry out of allowing your children to use email.

Kids Email offers a 30 day free trial.  You do not have to enter credit card information to take advantage of the free trial. Check it out for yourself!

Other member of The Crew reviewed Kids Email.  To see what my Crew Mates had to say, stop by the Crew Blog!

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Homeschool Wrap Up Week 33

Happy Mother's Day!  I love being a mom and am so thankful that God blessed me with my wonderful children!

 First bloom on one of my rose bushes.

I do not like walking in tall grass, mostly because I am afraid of snakes.  I never even used to like seeing snakes at all even if they were behind glass, but children that are fascinated by reptiles caused me to have to get over that.  I still however do not like to see them outside.  At all.  Anyway, the other day I noticed an issue with a rabbit cage and the boys had not done any weed eating around there yet.  So I put on my rubber garden shoes and went out to take care of it.  The whole time I was thinking Please do not let me see a snake.  I completed my task and went inside.  About an hour later Nick went out to weed eat and about 10 steps from where I had been standing was a Copperhead! They took care of it.  We have only seen 2 others in our yard in the 11 years we have lived here and I hope to never see another one.  I told Art later that I realized I should have been praying please son't let there be a snake but if there is a snake, please let me see it! 

Anyway...

Week 33 in our Homeschool

We had a hard time concentrating on school work this week, I think our brains our on summer vacation already!

Bible: We read several lessons in Answers for Kids Vol 3.  I usually do 2 questions or so a day and read the corresponding Scripture.

History:  We read chapters 18, 19, and 20 in America's Story Vol 2 on Alexander Graham Bell and Helen Keller.  We also watched some Youtube videos on Helen Keller.


Music Appreciation: We completed lesson 11 on Tchaikovsky's The Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy.

Science: We started Chapter 5 on Nutrition.  One of our activities was to test different foods for starch using Iodine.

Art: We made woven crowns for our ARTistic Pursuits Art of the Middle Ages lesson.

Math: They completed 3 lessons in MLFLE.

Language Arts: Emmie's stories were If You Give a Dog a Donut and If You Give a Cat a Cupcake.  Lily's lessons were on the Rough Faced Girl and Christian and Anthony are working through their book study on Hugo Cabret.

Emmie's own circular story.

Spelling/Reading: The boys completed Step 17 of AAS Level 5.  Emmie completed lesson 52 in AAR Level One.  Only one lesson to go!  She just started picking up books on her own to read on her own this week.  She was reading Go Dog Go to Liam the other day.

 He didn't sit long enough though...

Other Activities this Week:

Monday the girls had gymnastics.

Tuesday was Chelsea's last day of college for the semester. 

I just love snuggling sleeping babies.

Thursday Lily had piano and then we had our 4 H meeting.

Then we left to go camping!

Camping is A LOT of work, but we do enjoy going.  I sent a text to a friend that said, "All of this relaxing is exhausting!"  We went to Kirby Landing.  It was our first time camping there and it was very nice.  We will be going back again.  The lake water was COLD!  Not that I swim.  I lifeguard from the shore.  But they could only stay in 30 minutes or so the first day we were there before lips were blue and teeth were chattering.  By Saturday they could stay in about an hour.  It was a very nice week-end around 90 each day.

Our site was right on the lake and close to the swim beach.  The children could ride bikes around the circle.  We had to drive to the playground, but I'd rather do that then drive back and forth to the beach all day.

This is a house.  My iPhone could not zoom in far enough to get a good picture of it.

It took them 3 nights to finish their Monopoly game.

 The children were feeding the fish at the marina.

Emmie's big fish.  She ate him for supper.

 The top fish was Art's.  The bottom one was mine.  Biggest fish I've ever caught.  They also got eaten.

 The boys brought a football to play catch at the playground.

Emmie asked me if she could decorate the picnic table with some flowers she picked.  I left them there until we left.

Christian thought he had a big fish but it was a turtle.

 Al cut him free and threw him back.  Art and I caught turtles too.

The children saw this sign and just had to check out the  trail.

 They loved the bridge!

I hope you had a great week!

Happy Homeschooling!

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