Preschool Reviews Archives - Pea of Sweetness

HelpTeaching.com Review

September 16, 2016 by Emilee Evans

As a busy homeschool family, it’s always nice to be able to access a variety of resources in one place. HelpTeaching.com offers a variety of homeschool resources from tests, worksheets, lessons, games and more for PreK-12th Grade. For our Help Teaching review we received the Help Teaching Pro Subscription for one-year.

We have been using HelpTeaching.com Elementary ages resources to supplement our homeschool with all three kids – ages 6, 8, and 10. All of the resources on HelpTeaching.com can be accessed online through a user’s account. This includes the printable resources as well as the online/digital resources. With a Pro Subscription members have access to all of the resources for the duration of the subscription. Other subscription options are available which includes a Free Member and Group Pro Subscription for schools and businesses.
The differences between the memberships includes:

Help Teaching Pro Subscription members have unlimited access to using the Test Maker to create custom tests and worksheets. They have access to unlimited online tests and lessons for up to 500 students as well as up to 100 questions in the custom tests and worksheets which can also have images. They are able to save their tests as PDFs, have access to the Test Room to administer online tests and lessons, have access to pre-made premium content, and they can browse and search CCSS-aligned questions by standard.
Group Pro Subscription members have the same resources available, but they get up to 500 students per teacher. Group Pro Subscription Members also have the ability to share tests with their group.
Free Members also have unlimited access to using the Test Maker to create custom tests and worksheets. They only have the ability to have up to 10 questions without images.

Help Teaching Review

Printable Resources

For our Help Teaching Review I have been using a variety of resources. One of my favorite resources is the Game Generator – particularly the Word Search. Our kids love Word Searches, and I love that it helps them recognize words. Plus, I was surprised at the options available. I have the ability to choose the title, place words backwards (or not), create the word list, and show the answer key. I can even quickly generate a new puzzle.
Something I really appreciate about this feature on HelpTeaching.com is that not only can I generate games, but I can then also download them to the computer in PDF format, save them to “My Content” within my account, or print.

Additionally, we have been using HelpTeaching.com to generate a variety of worksheets to supplement our curriculum. This has been the bulk of our use. We’ve been using a variety of worksheets from Kindergarten to 3rd Grade. Worksheets are easy to access searching by either grade or subject. They really do cover all grades and subjects! There are also Seasonal worksheets! I simply print them out and add them to the kids’ folder for the day!

Online Resources

Additionally, we have been trying out the Online Self-Paced Lessons. The subjects included are Language Arts, Math, and Science. The lessons include text and pictures, a video and practice questions. They are short lessons, and the kids seem to enjoy them. I do have the option to “assign” lessons, but I have opted to just open the lessons I want them to do at that time. It’s definitely been a nice supplement to our homeschool!

Although I think the Test Generator can be a valuable resource for many homeschoolers, I really don’t focus on or stress testing in these early years. So, although I took a look at the “Test Maker,” it’s not a resource I am interested in using in our homeschool. It also has many great features including generating your own completely from scratch, using questions from the Help Teaching Library, or just by specify keywords, grade level and number of questions. It definitely seems handy!

Overall, I do think HelpTeaching.com offers a variety of helpful resources. I, personally, have stuck to the resources mentioned. Many of the resources are aligned to Common Core, so I look over them carefully before choosing. We try to avoid Common Core, so not all of the resources were a good fit for our homeschool. Of course, we also found many that were. I do think it is a helpful resource for homeschoolers with a variety of styles and children of multiple ages.

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Would you like to see how other members of the Homeschool Review Crew have been using HelpTeaching.com? Check out their reviews by clicking on the banner below!

Christian HomeSchool Hub Review

September 9, 2016 by Emilee Evans

What if you could find a variety of Christian homeschool resources all in one place? There are so many resources out there it’s easy to lose track! CHSH-Teach.com offers a variety of homeschool resources including freebies, devotionals, helpful homeschool information and even a forum to connect with other homeschool families. We have recently been using a variety of resources from the CHSH Download Club.

CHSH-Teach.com offers over 50,000 downloadable educational and Christian homeschool resources. The Download Club is a subscription based resource within CHSH-Teach.com. There are two subscription options available – the Annual Subscription (which we received for our review) and the Lifetime Subscription. With the Annual Subscription members receive unlimited access to the subscriber only downloads for a full year whereas Lifetime Subscription members will always have access as long as its available.

Resources to Print or Save

The Download Club can be accessed directly through your CHSH-Teach.com account online. Simply sign in, and you can access all of the downloads! From there you can download them to your computer, save them on your tablet, etc. There are so many ways you can use the downloadable resources. A variety of worksheets can be printed out to be used and solved as well as helpful posters for the wall. There are also resources that are just handy to have on hand like book lists, reading charts and logs, etc. If you lack wall space, saving those resources for easy access for viewing when needed!
There are also books for reading as well as books for reference which may not be ideal for printing out given the number of pages. For those type of books, I save them to our iPad to easily access them when we need to look at or read them. Files can also be downloaded and used later when needed!

The CHSH-Teach.com Download Club covers all grades (Pre-K – 12th) and subjects. There are Christian homeschool resources including Bible verse memorization, Bible Flashcards, Bible Notebooking and Games, Sermon Notes, Copywork and more. These, alone, I found to be such a valuable resources as we incorporate Bible into every homeschool day. Of course, all kinds of subjects are covered like Language Arts, Foreign Language, Arts & Crafts, Music, Math, Science, Social Studies, Electives, and Health.
Phew! That’s a lot, right?
I was definitely impressed. I admit, at first, I was also overwhelmed. Where to start? I was glad to discover the downloads are sorted to be able to access just what you need. They are sorted based on a subject or by grade level. It even has resources sorted by seasons and organization as well as a “Miscellaneous” category, which I haven’t yet explored.
My personal preference was to search by grade level. Although we don’t necessarily focus on grade levels in our homeschool, I knew it would give me a good starting point to look at the resources to see if they would be a good fit. You can search for resources by typing a key word into one of the search boxes, which is great when you know exactly what you are looking for.
I thought I would focus mostly on the Kindergarten resources for our youngest, but I’ve been using a little bit of everything for all three kids. I found resources that filled holes I wasn’t aware we had. The resource books are wonderful. Plus, I printed out a few coloring pages and games. We have been sprinkling these resources into each homeschool week.

Christian Homeschool Resources

I think Christian HomeSchool Hub is great Christian homeschool resources. The Download Club offers so much plus there is a community. It’s more than just the worksheets, books, and posters. It’s an opportunity to connect with other homeschoolers. If you have resources to share with the community, you can add them to the Download Club for others to access as well!
Plus, I love that within the Download Club there are resources particularly for the parents as well. I am not only able to print out and save things to supplement our homeschool, but I have found the parent resources helpful as well. They offer “How To” resources, forms for planning and record keeping and calendars. It covers a little bit of everything! They even have helpful groups on social media to further connect with others!

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Can Do Cubes Review

August 26, 2016 by Emilee Evans

A couple days ago I shared my Jolly Grammar and Jolly Phonics Review. We have had also had the opportunity to review another great product from jollyliteracy.com – Can Do Cubes. This great resource from just2ducks LLC is a great companion to Jolly Phonics, and we’ve been using them well together!

The Can Do Cubes are a great hands-on supplement for phonics. They work particularly well with Jolly Phonics because the letter sounds are presented in the same order. They would definitely work as a resource for any synthetic phonics program, though. They were created based on many factors including various research on reading instruction, activities which are commonly used in successful programs, and teaching experience.

What is Synthetic Phonics?

To be honest, this is the first time I’ve heard the term “synthetic phonics,” so I, for one, was curious what it means. I know now Jolly Phonics is one, but when it mentioned it can be used with any synthetic phonics program I wanted to know what that meant.
On jollyliteracy.com Synthetic Phonics teaching is defined as “a simple to complex program where learners are taught the alphabetic code.” So they first learn the basic alphabetic code (one spelling for the basic sounds) and progress to the more complex alphabetic code (multiple spelling variations for these sounds).

Can Do Cube Review

The Can Do Cubes Starter Set Includes:

1 Tray of Stage 1 Cubes
1 Tray of Stage 2 Cubes
Handbook for Stage 1
Handbook for Stage 2
DVD
Phonics Chart
Word Chart

Amazing, right? Honestly, I would have been thrilled just to have the hands-on cubes, but I was impressed with all it includes. I love all the additional, helpful resources. As we progress I plan on adding the charts to our wall.
Because Chaz started Jolly Phonics at the beginning we have been using the Stage 1 cubes. The Stage 1 cubes are further broken down into groups called Cubes. So we started with Cube 1 which included the first 6 letter sounds “s, a, t, i, p, n.”

Chaz has been doing well and having fun building words. What I find so fascinating is he was already familiar with many of the letter sounds, and he could sometimes read the short words but struggled putting them together himself. Since using this hands-on approach with the Can Do Cubes, he’s been putting together many different words! Plus he’s having fun doing it!
With the Can Do Cubes they will naturally progress to building longer words and working with more letter sounds at a time. The Stage 2 Cubes even include capital letters and basic punctuation.
Overall, Can Do Cubes has been a great resource for our son! In fact, our oldest son is a delayed reader due to his special needs, and I’m going to start using them for his phonics as well!

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Different members of the Schoolhouse Review Crew shared their Can Do Cubes review. Check them out by clicking on the banner below!

Jolly Phonics and Jolly Grammar Review

August 24, 2016 by Emilee Evans

Our once resistant six year old has been loving Jolly Phonics from jollyliteracy.com. He has been learning his letter sounds in a whole new way and has been making amazing progress! Plus he’s had a great time singing songs in Jolly Songs to help reinforce his learning! just2ducks LLC also sent us Jolly Grammar from their jollyliteracy.com division for our Jolly Grammar and Jolly Phonics review.

Jolly Phonics Review

Chaz has been using Jolly Phonics regularly (3-4 days per week). I started him at the very beginning because he has writing challenges due to his special needs. Although he does know many letter sounds, I thought it would be best to follow the progression as it is presented in Jolly Phonics.
The Jolly Phonics program includes three Jolly Phonics Student Books – Jolly Phonics Student Book 1, 2 and 3. It also includes the Jolly Phonics Teacher’s Book in print letters which covers all three of the Student Books.
The Teacher’s Book offers daily guidance for teaching the Jolly Phonics program. It includes a detailed introduction as well as detailed information for the concepts the child will be learning including:

The Letter Sounds of the English Language
Learning the Letter Sounds
Learning Letter Formation
Reading (Blending)
Identifying the Sounds in Words
Tricky Words

I was impressed with all the details it includes. Once it breaks down into the Daily Guidance for Teaching, it explains the best way to go about teaching the lessons. We have been using Book 1, so each lesson includes a story to read to introduce the letter sounds. Each letter sound is taught using an action to help them remember the letter sound, so the story helps to introduce this action as well.

Jolly Phonics Review – Student Book 1

Chaz has been happily working through his Jolly Phonics Student Book 1. He’s been learning individual letter sounds as well as progressing to blend those letter sounds as the new letter sounds are introduced. He has been working on writing his letters as well as identifying pictures/words that contain the letter sound.
We have been treating each letter sound as a lesson. So each one is one page long. So each lesson only takes around 15-20 minutes. His biggest struggle is writing the letters. He has been enjoying the lessons so much, though, that he is actually attempting to write the letters, which is major progress. Generally he refuses to even try. We also brought out the white board to give him more practice as well.

Jolly Phonics Review – Student Books 2 & 3

We haven’t yet progressed to the Jolly Phonics Student Book 2 and Student Book 3. They are quite a bit different. In Student Book 1 we continue to progress through letter sounds and blending them together through the basic 42 letter sounds. Starting in Student Book 2 there are already full words presented right at the beginning. It presents alternative letter-sound spellings, more handwriting, tricky words and words and sentences. Capital letters are also introduced.
Jolly Phonics Student Book 3 presents more letter-sound alternative spellings, tricky words, comprehension and words and sentences. Of course, it also includes handwriting, but in this book there is free writing and dictation.

Jolly Songs Review

Jolly Songs complements what we’ve been learning in Student Book 1. It presents the letter sounds in songs written to familiar tunes. It includes a music CD you can play to sing along. I found knowing the tune alone made it possible to sing the songs without the CD. The songs also include the motions he has been learning to remember the letters.

Jolly Grammar Review

We haven’t yet progressed to Jolly Grammar. It includes the Jolly Grammar 1 Teacher’s Book in print letters and Jolly Grammar 1 Student Book. If following the recommended progression, Jolly Grammar follows the completion of all three Jolly Phonics books. It builds on what they have learned in Jolly Phonics and covers a variety of grammar concepts including: common nouns, pronouns, plurals, verbs (including conjugating verbs), adjectives, adverbs, definite and indefinite articles, sentences, questions, identifying parts of speech, improving vocabulary and using a dictionary.
I am really surprised by all it covers! The Teacher’s Book once again provides detailed information about the concept they’ll be learning as well as lesson information. Each lesson is one page long and has a corresponding page in the Teacher’s Book.

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Other members of the Schoolhouse Review shared their Jolly Grammar and Jolly Phonics review as well. They have children of different ages and abilities, so be sure to check out their reviews by clicking on the banner below!