Homeschool Crew Review: Thinkwell

Thinkwell  offers online math courses for 6th to 8th Grade Math (6th Grade to Pre-Algebra including Essentials and Honors) and High School Math  (Algebra to Calculus including Essentials and Honors.)  For the last several weeks we have had an opportunity to use and review 8th Grade Math (PREALGEBRA) from Thinkwell.



Thinkwell's courses included online videos, exercises, quizzes, and tests along with printable notes and worksheets for students.  You can choose to pick and choose areas that your child needs to work on or follow the lesson plans for a full course.   Each lesson contains several short videos with step by step explanations that can viewed and reviewed as many times as the students needs.  Online exercises for the student to complete gives step by step answers and printable exercises have step by step answer keys.  You can choose to print the worksheets from the course website or purchase the entire set of worksheets separately.  Online quizzes and tests also give step by step answers and grades for quizzes and tests are recorded in the course.  Subscriptions are for 12 months but can be extended by 1,3, or 6 months.  Placement tests are available.


I have been using the 8th Grade Math course (PREALGEBRA) with my 14 year old 8th grader.  We had been using another online math course but were looking for something new when this review came up.  One of my main reasons for using online math classes is so that I do not have to teach and that my students can complete the work independently.  With our previous course we discovered that while the answers were given to each question, they were not given step by step.  Every time my son got something wrong and wasn't sure why he got it wrong I would have to go back and work the problems out myself to help him figure out what he was doing wrong.  This was adding time to my school day and making him wait for me to be available to help him instead of working at his own schedule.  I was VERY excited to see that Thinkwell shows answers to every single problem step by step.  This had made a huge difference in our homeschool!


How does a lesson work?

Anthony logs in to the website.  There is no separate log in for students and teachers, it's all the same, and clicks on go to course.  Then the main page pops up.

You click on the chapter you are working on.

Then the subtopic.

All of the coursework will be on that page (except quizzes and tests those are in the assessment section.)  You can print notes, watch the videos, complete the online exercises and Interactive activity and print the topic worksheet.  When Anthony is working if he understands the topic and gets all of the online exercises correct he does not do the printed worksheet, but if he needs a little more practice he does the printed worksheet and checks it with the answer key.

What did we think?

We love the video instruction.  The teacher is funny and interesting and the videos are a good length.  He does a great job of using visual examples and showing how to do everything step by step.

I love the combination of online and printable exercises.  You can choose what works best for your child or to do both if extra practice is needed.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE that everything is worked out step by step.  This is so important especially as students move into upper levels of math.

The  daily work and quizzes and tests have a good amount of problems.  There are enough questions to give the students enough practice but not too many that they are overwhelmed. 

I like that the grades for the quizzes and tests are stored.

The biggest pro?  Anthony understands it.  He is doing very well with his lessons and understanding why he misses something when he gets it wrong.


What Would I Change?

A few picky little things.  The log in is just a bit awkward to me.  I wish there was a separate student log in that would take them right where they left off and a parent log in for the answer keys and grades and check lists.

For some reason it only shows that he completes the first video even though he always watches all of them in a lesson.

I wish the grades were stored for all the online work including the online exercises.

I wish the quizzes and tests were in the same area as the coursework instead of a separate spot.  We almost missed the first one but thankfully I had read the lesson plan that day (he doesn't usually just goes to what is next.)

Overall I think Thinkwell is an outstanding math course!  I wish we had started with it this year instead of the course we did start with.  We will definitely be using it for the rest of the year!! I have reviewed several online math programs over the years and this is my favorite for middle school and up.

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

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Homeschool Crew Review: Elephant Learning Math Academy

We received a 12 month subscription to Elephant Learning Math Academy to use and review.


Elephant Learning Math Academy can be used with children as young as 2 through teens as old as 16.  They cover counting to algebra concepts. Elephant Learning uses a series of game like puzzles that help students learn how to solve math problems.  The program tests what your child knows and tailors their questions.  Elephant Learning can be accessed using a web browser or an app on a smart phone or tablet.  There are also worksheets you can print.  Their website states that by using their program 30 minutes a week for 12 weeks students will gain one year of math. 


We log in to Elephant Learning Academy using Google Chrome as a web browser.  Our family log in takes us to a dashboard where I can see reports for my students and have each of them log in from there.

When the student is logged in they go to a screen where they can choose the theme of their "game" play that day.  There are several different choices that will appeal to both boys and girls and younger and middle grade children.  Choosing the theme does not affect the questions they are asked, just the types of characters that are on the screen when the questions are asked.

 

Then they go into their questions.  The game says the child's name frequently during the time they use it.  It will say things like "Good Morning Christian" and then ask them the question.  The voice and the accent changes throughout the course of their time playing. 

Elephant Learning Academy does not teach concepts.  Instead it gives questions and asks your child to figure them out.  Here are some examples of the types of things they will see.

They are given different numbers on a number line and asked to move the character close to or on that number.

They will be given a certain number of something and asked to find a fraction of them. 

They need to select a certain number, fraction, or percentage of something.

They have to put a certain number of items in the center but cannot take items away.

 There is not a stopping point.  Questions continue to be asked until you decide to stop for the day.  There is a little timer that shows up that will show how long you have been playing each session.

I had my children use Elephant Learning Academy 3-4 days a week for 10 minutes per day.  I liked that I could easily see everything from one dashboard and could get them logged in and ready to play.  They liked the different themes for the games.  Emmie would choose some of the cuter more girly things like polar bears or ponies while Christian stuck with things like knights, soccer, or the anubis. They struggled with some questions because it doesn't teach you the concepts.  You have to figure out how to solve the puzzles.  My daughter who is more math minded did very well with that and I was impressed at how she worked the problems out, even things she had never seen before.  She did have trouble with counting questions that only showed you the items for a minute or two then covered them up and wanted to know how many there were. My son who really struggles in math had a harder time with it, especially in things like what I would call logic statements because he had never seen those before and didn't understand how to answer them and he became very frustrated.  The program really makes you stop and think and work things out rather then just having children memorize facts, which is a really good thing.  After using the program 3-4 days a week for several weeks, it became monotonous.  The same types of questions asked in basically the same order every single day.  We saw only a small amount of growth (.2) in their Elephant Age in the weeks we spent using the program. 

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

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Homeschool Crew Review: Mattie Richardson's Horses in History Series

We have been very blessed to receive a lot of great books to review in the last few months!  Our latest book review was for Mattie Richardson's Horses in History Series from Author Mattie Richardson/Appaloosy Books. We received a set of four books including:

Appaloosy
Dusty's Trail
Golden Sunrise
Day and Night

We also received a downloadable PDF of the Day and Night Enrichment Guide for the Day and Night book.

Mattie Richardson was only 13 years old when she wrote Appaloosy and then had it published at 16.  Since then (she is now 23) she has written 4 other books, earned her Associate Degree, and works full time at a local business.  She also speaks to schools and groups about writing and her books.


The Horses in History series is geared for ages 8-14.  They are paperback, historical fiction stories that are told by the perspective of the horse.  Each of the books features a different horse and a different period of time.  The books do not need to be read in any particular order.  You can choose a book that coincides with your history studies or read them all for enjoyment.  Each of the stories end with a short Blast From the Past section that talks about the time period.  The stories all contain a few black and white illustrations.

Appaloosy is a 125 page paperback book. This book tells the story of Storm, an Appaloosa stallion that lives in the late 1800's during the  Nez Perce War.  Shortly after Storm is born , he discovers that he is not a free horse like he thought, he belongs to the Nez Perce Indians.  Storm does not want to belong to anyone and desires to head west where he can run free.  After spending some time with the Indians he is captured and taken to live with white men.  After being with a man who does not treat him well he comes to live with a girl named Faith after she buys him with her gold locket.  He loves Faith and the other horses on the farm and is content to stay there forever until horse thieves steal Storm and his friends.  He ends up having to make an important choices about his future.

Dusty's Trail is a 78 page paperback book.  This book takes place during the early 1860's and tells the story of Dusty, a quarter horse.  Levi (Dusty's owner) reads and ad in a local newspaper looking for young men willing to risk life daily to deliver mail for the Pony Express.  Levi sneaks away from his farm to take the job.  Dusty is a horse that is easily spooked but can really run.  He is perfect for the job in the Pony Express.  The job doesn't seem as dangerous as they first thought it might be until trouble with Indians endangers their lives.

Golden Sunrise is a 100 page book that takes place in Texas in the early 1800's and tells the story of Cheyenne, a Golden Palomino mare.  Cheyenne's owner Jared is a volunteer soldier during the Texas fight for Independence and orders to defend  Fort Alamo against Mexican forces.  Cheyenne and Jared travel to San Antonio.  They fight in battles and make some famous new friends along the way.

Day and Night is a 150 page book that takes place during the Civil War and tells the story of Tucker a horse in the U.S. Mounted Infantry and Shiloh a horse in the Confederate Volunteer Calvary. Tucker and Shiloh are brothers but are very different from one another.  They are separated when one is sold to the US Army and the other ends up with a young Confederate soldier. Both learn a lot about the war and the effect it had on its people and it's land, but will they ever see each other again?


The Day and Night Enrichment Guide is a 98 page PDF.  It is split up into 7 different sections.  Each section of the guide discusses a part of the book (Part 1 covers pages 1-27.)  In each section you will find: reading comprehension questions. vocabulary, history, a soldier's life, living history activity, geography, horses in history, creating your own story, biography, and further reading. Part 8 has a finishing your story section, optional field trip activity, further reading, and conclusion.  A 14 page answer key is also included.


I read aloud to my 4 youngest children (8,10,12, and 14) every night before bed.  We pick a chapter book geared towards the girls and read a chapter each night and one geared towards the boys and read a chapter each night.  All four children listen to both books.  For the last several weeks we have been reading from the Mattie Richardson's Horses in History Series.  We started with Appaloosy because it was the first one written and then moved on To Dusty's Trail.  Next we will do Golden Sunrise and then Day and Night.  

My girls absolutely love horses and books about horses so I knew they would enjoy these books. They would love to own their own horse someday.  I like to read historical fiction myself and love to read those types of books to the children.  I think it helps bring history more to life for them.  We are not studying any of these time periods in history right now but still enjoy reading and learning about different periods in our read aloud time.  I did pre read a bit through Appaloosy before starting it with it being a bedtime read aloud and discussing the Nez Perce Indian War I wasn't sure how graphic or detailed it would be for an 8 year old, but I didn't find anything I was worried about reading.  The girls have really enjoyed the stories so far and the boys have liked them as well.  So far the girls liked
Appaloosy the best.  I asked them what their favorite parts were and Emmie said, "All of it."  Lily said her favorite part was when Storm got hurt and Faith came and rescued him.  


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

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Homeschool Crew Review: CrossTimber- Name Meaning Gifts

Back in 2016 we had an opportunity to do a review for CrossTimber - Name Meaning Gifts.  CrossTimber offers many different types of personalized gifts that give the meanings of names and a Bible verse to go along with the name.  For this review we were offered a new product from CrossTimber, Your Amazing Name - Personalized Adventures for EVERY name!


Your  Amazing Name is a 28 minute cartoon video that is personalized for your child and teaches them about what God says about names and what their own name means.  In the video they travel to the moon to meet some stars in the sky, to a tree to visit Mr. Owl, and to a field to visit a shepherd named Rescued to learn about names.  They are guided on their journey by a pencil names Benjamin. During the video the child's name is said over 20 times and there name appears in other places in the video such as in the bedroom on the suitcase, the blocks, and the pillows.   

To order the video, parents fill out a short form providing the information such as the spelling of the name, and parents names, what type of background for the plaque,  and also attach a photo of a piece of the child's artwork to be featured in the video, and a picture of the child.  Parents also type a short letter to the child that is read to them during the video.  Your video is delivered via live stream in HD video over a secure server and can be watched on computers, tablets, or phones.  You also have the option to a order a physical DVD.  You also can choose to purchase name plaques that will match the one that is shown in the video. 


I had the Your Amazing Name - Personalized Adventures for EVERY name! made for my youngest daughter Emelia Rose (age 8.)  The process for turning in the information to make the video was very simple although I did make my personalized letter too long and had to shorten it and resubmit it. Attaching the photos was easy I just took a picture of her artwork on my phone and used a photo of her I had taken recently.  

When the video arrived via email we watched it together.  Emmie loved all of the personalized things in the bedroom.  She was so excited to see  her own painting in the video (but was not very happy when it was drawn on to turn it into the rocket.)  She thought the stars and shepherd were cute and understands the message behind the video that every name and person is special and important to God.  She liked being able to see her name meaning and verse and loved that the end of the video showed a picture of her.  The animation is geared more for younger children.  Emmie though it took a bit too long to get to her name meaning.  The video quality is excellent.  Even with our iffy country internet we had no problems streaming the video.

Here are a couple of shots of Emmie's video. 

The first one came from Mr. Owl's tree when he was talking about history of names.

This is the personalized plaque with the meaning of Emelia's name and her Bible verse from Galations 6:9.

And the picture of Emmie at the end of the video.

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

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Homeschool Crew Review: Goldtown Beginnings by Susan K. Marlow

Several years ago, I  reviewed a Circle C Beginnings book (Andi's Scary School Days) by Susan K. Marlow.  Ever since then, I have taken every opportunity I have been offered to review Mrs. Marlow's  books and have purchased several as well.  We own every book that she has written because we love them that much!!  I had been hoping for some time that Mrs. Marlow would write more Goldtown Adventures and was so excited to find out that she had started writing a series called Goldtown Beginnings.  We were thrilled to have a opportunity to read and review the first two books Jem Strikes Gold and Jem's Frog Fiasco  by Susan K. Marlow and published by Kregel Publications.

Susan K Marlow writes wonderful, wholesome, historical fiction books for children.  One set of books takes place on the Circle C Ranch in the 1800's in California, and follows the life of Andrea Carter.  There are 4 different series of Circle C books following Andi Carter at different ages in her life ( In Circle C Beginnings she is 6, Stepping Stones she is 9, Adventures she is 12 and Milestones she is 15-18.)  The other series is called Godtown Adventures which follows the Coulter family during their adventures during the California Gold Rush.  Goldtown Adventures has 4 books in the series and follows the life of 12 year old Jem and his sister Ellie.  The new series, Goldtown Beginnings takes place before Adventures.  It will have 4 books by March and follows the adventures of 7 year old Jem and his sister Ellie.  The Circle C Books are geared more towards girls and Goldtown Adventures more towards boys but  my boys and girls have loved both series.

The first book, Jem Strikes Gold, is 80 pages long and has 10 chapters.  In this book the Coulter family lives in a tent on their gold claim.  Pa works at panning for gold while Mama helps the family survive by doing laundry for others and baking pies and selling them.  One of Jem's jobs is to deliver the pies that Mama bakes.  This job isn't as easy as it sounds because Ellie has to tag along and a mean bully, Will Sterling, causes Jem all kinds of problems.  When Strike-it-rich Sam returns to the gold claim with a scrawny dog Jem is so excited but disappointed when his parents say no, they can't afford another mouth to feed.  But the dog just might make his way into Jem's parents hearts when he helps Jem out of a jam.

The second book, Jem's Frog Fiasco , is also 80 pages long and has 10 chapters.  Jem needs to earn some money to buy dog food. He is offered a job by the cafe owner who will pay Jem for frog legs.  Jem is excited to have a job that he thinks will be easy for a boy like him.  But Ellie and Nugget have to tag along and keep causing problems.  Jem gets angry and tells Ellie to go home.  Later when Jem returns home, Ellie is missing and no one knows where she has gone.


The Goldtown Beginnings books are geared for ages 6-9. Each of the books start with a list of vocabulary words and definitions that may be unfamiliar to the reader such as coyote hole or prospector.  The books end with a Peek Into the Past section that gives a little history of the time period.  Throughout the books you will find cute black and white illustrations.  If you go to the Goldtown Beginnings website you can find sample chapters,  free activity pages to go with the books and more.

Vocabulary Words

Peek into the Past

I read aloud to my 4 youngest children every night.  One chapter book geared for the boys (12 and 14) and one chapter book for the girls (8 and 10) but all of the children listen to both. Right before we found out about this review, we had started The Goldtown Adventures series.  I had read it to the boys a few years ago when it came out but the girls were little and didn't remember.  We finished up that series right as the Beginnings books arrived.  Lily (10) could've definitely read these one her own quickly but Emmie (8) does not yet have enough confidence to read chapter books so we read these for our read aloud time.  (After I finished them, I convinced Emmie that she can read short chapter books like these on her own and she has started reading Jem Strikes God to herself!!)

Even though the stories are geared for the younger children the boys enjoyed listening to them as well.  Christian (12) was gone somewhere the last day I read Jem's Frog Fiasco and had to pick it up and read it himself so he could see how it ended.  One thing I never have to worry about when reading books by Susan K. Marlow is inappropriate content.  The books are wonderful stories that will teach your children life lessons and history as well.  It's fun to step back in time and experience life through the eyes of a child and these books do a great job bringing that history to life for children. Jem struggles with things (like loosing his temper) that children today can relate to and reading how his deals with problems can teach important life lessons.  The books are funny too.  Emmie could not stop laughing when Jem and Ellie were trying to catch the bullfrogs. The length of the books is perfect for the intended age range.  I read 2 chapters a night and we finished both books in 10 days.  We also loved the illustrations.

I highly recommend Goldtown Beginnings and other books by Susan K. Marlow!  We can't wait for the other books to be released! To see what my Crew Mates had to say, stop by the Crew Blog!

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Homeschool Crew Review: Creating a Masterpiece

We were first introduced to Creating a Masterpiece back in 2017 when we were given an opportunity to review their Monthly Plan.  I have never been so impressed with the results of an art program as I was with Creating a Masterpiece.  We created absolutely beautiful artwork and learned so many new techniques.  I was excited to see them on our vendor list again this fall and this time we were able to review their online Drawing Program.


Creating a Masterpiece is an online art program for ages 4 and up taught by master artist Sharon Hofer through streamed video lessons.  This fine arts program was designed to help students create art step by step that will make them proud of their work and feel like a real artist.  They have several different products you can choose from: Drawing Program (which this review will focus on), Core Program( 24 different media with 59 projects in 6 different levels), Unlimited Access(gives access to every video on the website), Art History Program( 3 specialized levels of projects with 16 different projects using 11 unique media), and Books (two series of books are being developed Step by Step: Fine Art for Kids and Exploring the Art of Yesterday..to Create Art Today.)


You can subscribe to the Drawing Program monthly ($19.99) or annually ($199.00.)  Subscription to the program gives you access to all of the levels.  Each of the levels uses pencil, charcoal, and colored pencil.  Levels are not determined by age, but by skill level. Length of time to complete the project will vary depending on the project.

Beginning Drawing: For beginning students or those that need confidence in their drawing abilities.  This level contains 8 projects: Giraffe in Cartoon, Simplicity, Polar Exploration, Hoot Owl, Field of Daisies, Angling for Trout, Moonstruck, Baby Elephant.

Drawing Level 1 :for those who want to grow their drawing skills.  There are 6 projects in this level: Arctic Seal, First Thanksgiving, Ornery Ostrich, Alaskan Wilderness, Penguin Family, Tuckered Out Turtle.

Drawing Level 2 :Designed to grow students who love to draw and continue to advance their skills.  There are 7 projects in this level: Drawing the Egg, The Lion Cub, Dawdling Duck, Polar Bear, Orbiting Saturn, Antique Lantern, and The General's Horse.

Drawing Level 3 : Level 3 will advance your skills to an intermediate level.  This level contains 8 projects: Cunning Wolf, Snowed In, The Rose, Dreaming of Africa, The White Rhinoceros, Prairie Buffalo, Tabby Cat, Rocketing Through Space.

Projects do not need to be completed in any special order.  You can pick and choose which projects you would like to complete.  Once you log in and choose your project you are taken to a screen which gives a project description, links to view supply list or purchase supplies, and a link to click on to go to the lesson.

Clicking on the lesson link will take you to the page that contains the video lessons.  Each project is broken down into several smaller videos.  The videos will give you a good stopping point if you would like to split the project into separate sittings. The Hoot Owl has six separate videos.

This page also has the project supply list, special tips, project images, lesson highlights, and can also show finished works from some of Sharon's students.

Last time we used Creating a Masterpiece, it was during a time of the year where life was not so busy for me and I had an opportunity to sit down and do the lessons with them.  I loved it just as much as the children did.  This time, it has been a very. very busy time for me.  I did not have time to sit down and do the lessons or even think about planning art projects for the children.  I was so glad to have this review opportunity.  The children could sit down and do the projects all on their own. I even could leave an art project for an assignment for them to complete when I had to be out of the house.

 We started with the Beginning Drawing level.  My 10 and 12 year olds mostly used this program but my 8 year old wanted to complete some of the projects and my 14 year old also did a few of the projects.  We wanted to complete at least one project from the three different media used: pencil, charcoal, and colored pencil, but other then that did not go in any particular order when choosing projects.  I just let them choose what they wanted to draw.  Each of the projects they did they finished in one sitting in about an hour.

Here are some examples of their artwork.

In Pencil they did:

Giraffe in Cartoon

Hoot Owl

 Simplicity

In Charcoal Lily and Christian did Field Of Daisies

In Colored Pencil Lily and Christian did Moonstruck

One of the things we love about Creating a Masterpiece is the easy to follow step by step instructions.  You can easily pause the video if you need to or back up and watch it again.  Sharon is very encouraging and helps the students strive to do their best work and make their work their own.  I love the variety of lessons and the inclusion of the different skill levels so that as your confidence and experience grows you can move on to a higher level.  Creating a Masterpiece makes it easy for you to purchase your supplies.  You can click on the purchase supplies list for the project and it takes you to an online retailer and adds everything to the cart for you.  They strongly urge you to buy quality supplies as the quality of the supplies will affect the outcome of the artwork.  I already knew this and was reminded of it when the paper we needed for the charcoal project was out of stock and we do not have any art supply stores nearby.  They wanted to do the project anyway and used regular white drawing paper, but it was difficult to erase and did affect the final product and they reminded me to order the correct paper for them. The children were excited to learn new techniques and to be able to not just work with pencil but also colored pencils and charcoal.


We love Creating a Masterpiece and will continue to work on our drawing skills.  I would also love to purchase some of her books in the future. To see what my Crew Mates had to say, stop by the Crew Blog!

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