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 Looking for a holiday gift for someone?  Or maybe just looking to gift yourself?  Or..like me, are gloves a necessity for cold hands?

Agloves are pretty neat, and stink'n brilliant.

Agloves are knitted gloves that you can wear and still use your touch screen devices with.

*wear: as in- you don't have to take them off first. See? Brilliant!

I received a pair to review, and they were not at all what I expected.  I thought they'd be kind of bulky and have something on the finger-pads to allow for touch screen use, but to my delight- my Agloves were thin, knitted gloves, not bulky- and totally smooth, no strange finger pad thing-ies.

I have something called Raynaud's Syndrome...we'll just skip ahead and say I have really cold hands, fingers and toes.  I am -a connoisseur of gloves- out of necessity.  I have a pair or two in my purse, a pair in my van, a pair in each of my jackets- and spares shoved under my bed.
I wear gloves in church, in So. California.  (it's because of the air conditioner)  Lately, I've been wearing gloves with these cute little finger and thumb that pop off.  But, they really aren't that cute, because they are bulky and the tops don't stay on, even when you want them to- so they look kind of messy and weird.

My new Agloves are sleek, fitted, but stretch-able.  They have silver fibers knitted throughout the entire glove, not just the fingers.  The entire concept allows you to text with precision, keeps the design lightweight for easier typing and evens out the temperature in your hand, keeping you warm.

I could get into the whole bio-electricity thing, and the whole AG/periodic table= conductive element thing (which as a homeschooler I find kind of cool...) but, you can click over to www.Agloves.com for the whole technical skinny- and this is where you can order a pair too :)




Agloves is giving away a pair to one of my readers.  To enter, leave a comment.  Please make sure that you are reachable through your comment, or leave an email address.

Giveaway ends Friday, December 10th, 2010- 11 pm pacific time.
1 winner will be chosen through random generator.

This review was made possible through MomSpark Media. Thoughts, opinions and review are my own. I was given a free pair of gloves to review.  My free pair did not influence my opinion, however, I did, indeed find that they rock.  I tested them on my iphone, wore them in church- used them with my husband's iphone which has our hymnal for church on it...and wore them while taking notes.  See, they do rock!

Labels: reviews

Headsprout Reading online is offering a 25% discount on their online Early Reading Program. This is for lessons 1-80. You might remember I did a review of the program last year. Demi, Teddy and Amie all completed the program, and I was delighted with the results.
Click over to see my review; Headsprout Phonics, my other homeschool secret weapon

Click to this page; Headsprout Reading online-early reading program
and enter this code to save 25% HS2010BTS1

this offer is not good on any other products, and this offer ends August 31, 2010

Labels: reviews

Young beginner readers enjoy and benefit from playing word games. Through word games, your learning-to-read student will learn to recognize common sight words, and get phonics practice- all this while having fun, too. Here is one we had fun with last week:

Sight-word bingo is available in 3 different difficulty levels. You can find it at
Lakeshore learning. Teddy's special education tutor recommended this game to us.

It's bingo you remember, but with words. I was surprised to discover that not only my young beginner readers had fun with this game, but the 7th and 9th graders also, plus mom enjoyed several rounds of this.

In fact, as I type this post, Demi-Sky is playing this with one of the Bible college boys.

The kids really had a good time, we had several days with several games running back-to-back. I kept score of wins among the 3 littles..and ultimately the winner on Friday had the privilege of choosing a treat for everyone.

The choice was shamrock shakes..our first of the season! The game is playable with only two players also, just put the word cards in a bowl, face down and pick.

another example of homeschool = playschool
:)

*this is an unsolicited review, sharing what we live with my bloggy friends...

Labels: homeschool, reviews

Headsprout Phonics Review-

Headsprouts Early reading program is an online phonics program designed to teach your child to read, in a fun-interactive manner without a lot of teacher (mom) input.
Yeah! -A phonics program for the mom who has already taught phonics 3 times now...the slightly overwhelmed mom/the tired mom/the A.D.D. mom/the mom who is tired of tying her boys to the chair to do phonics... or who is teaching 5 kids and is having trouble staying consistent with the whole phonics instruction-thing.

ahem,

My Homeschool Secret-Weapon #2 is:
Delegate what you can. And, electronic/computer delegation counts, too.

Headsprout will take your child from the very beginning of learning-to-read; basic letter sounds,- to reading at a solid 2nd grade level once he has gone through all 80 lessons. Headsprouts is phonics-based, but also has quite a bit of sight-word learning. Each lesson ranges from 15 to 20 minutes long and features great animation and different game type activities as the child progresses. Each lesson has a variety of matching sounds by sight, listening to the sounds said out-loud, point and clicking on the correct answer, and prompts for the child to say the sound. The lessons are individualized for the child and adapt to the child's learning progress during each lesson.

There are times when the child will be prompted to go get an adult for a section so the child can read out loud. (just in case you were in the other room wrangling kidlets, cleaning up after the dog, or telling someone how to find the area of a triangle...)


This program is pricey, but you get discounts for extra kids. I am not saying that you cannot teach phonics with a simple program...just that for kids that can't sit still, or for moms that have done this too many times, Headsprouts could be the answer.

For me, it was sooo worth it.

With your subscription, you get a packet containing a map-poster with stickers to track your child's progress. (Mine loved the map) ..the map also alerts you to days you need to get a booklet out for extra practice - the program will also email you to alert you of this. -A.D.D. mom loved this!
You also get a set of booklets for reading practice and a certificate for when your child finishes the program. Extra reading comes in the form of booklets and flaschcards you print off your computer..again, you will be emailed and prompted at the end of the lesson. These printable booklets are useful for coloring fun, too.

I appreciated the visual and auditory training for blending this program gave. I also liked how the later lessons left the game-style behind, and presented book pages- highlighting the sentences they were working on, and once finishing the passage, asking comprehension questions. The comprehension questions were usually in the form of a picture, read the sentence and choose the right picture to go with it. Once the correct answer was chosen, the child was rewarded with an animated story.

After each lesson, you get an email detailing progress made that day, what booklets the child can read for practice, and very detailed information about which sounds/blends were covered. I found this part very, very helpful for my record-keeping needs for my charter school program.

Cons: * price. Still worth it to me. *student has to start at beginning of program. This could be a problem if your child is reading some, already. When we started, Demi-Sky was already reading at almost a 1st grade level. I decided to go with it, and I could see the need to start at the beginning, because Headsprout teaches sounds with a different sequence then the other programs I have used...many things were too easy for him, but there was also some new sound patterns he didn't know. *The types of games over time would become predictable. The program did a good job of mixing things up, though. Blocks of lessons involved different 'worlds' and different characters, so as things became too repetitive, the 'world' usually changed.
*no teaching of phonics 'rules'. No, 'magic e' or 'when two vowels go walking, the first does the talking' sort of rules to remember. Learning seemed to happen from repetition, sight recognition and practice. I do think to get a good, rounded experience that will produce a great speller, you are going to need to add on a program like Explode the Code or All about Spelling. -Not necessarily at the same time. I took 3 children through this program, 2 landed at a solid 2nd grade reading level- and this with no outside program. (My 3rd student has an auditory processing disorder, so his progress is a whole 'nother playing field)

I whole-heartedly recommend this program. It's very, very well done and can take the pressure off of a struggling student and/or a struggling mom. It's fun, gives a good mix of visual and auditory learning and the animation is top-notch.

Headsprouts has just unveiled a new reading comprehension program for grades 3 through 5, which will be Available Jan. 11, 2009. It looks like another winner, and I am giving it serious consideration.

this is an unsolicited, non-compensated review of a program I purchased myself. :)

Labels: homeschool, reviews, secret weapon, show and tell

If you are like me, you spend too many minutes in the juice aisle, scanning the labels for the 100% Juice label...ignoring the deceptive "100% Natural" labels. We only pack a lunch once a week or so, but when we do, I want it to be mostly healthy. Mostly.

I stumbled upon this fruit & VEGETABLE box line at the store, the label on the front that said, "1/3 less sugar" caught my eye. Yes, that's right, these have vegetable juice in them, pure fruit and vegetable juices with no added sugars, preservatives or artificial colors.

I read the ingredient list, and saw apple, pear, purple carrot, sweet potato, butternut squash, tomato among others listed.
-Yes, you read it...carrot and tomato juice.

I purchased them, living wild and living my dream of being healthy mom. Once home, I began to have my doubts, would my kids drink them? I hate tomato juice. I know it's healthy, but I've always hated it. I don't like carrot juice, either. I decided to try them myself, so I could deflect the sure to come wailing before it began. I could at least say, "come on, it's not that bad"...once I had, indeed, tried one.

I was very surprised that it tasted great, it was sweet, I don't think a child would detect the veggies if they didn't know.
Look for Apple & Eve Fruitables fruit & Vegetable juice beverage on your juicebox aisle. We tried the strawberry kiwi and the citrus flavors. I found these at Albertson's... a definite hit at our house, and I went back and bought more.
5 stars out of 5 stars
(this is a totally spontaneous and unsolicited review, because you know, I'm watching out for my bloggy friends :)

Labels: reviews

Again, I am opening up my homeschool closet to share my curricula-abundance with my fellow curricula-junkies, and with any new home-school moms treading the waters for the first time.

This gem of a find is published by Evan-Moor and part of a series covering several different subjects. I picked up
Daily Math Practice for Meg and Josie. We are currently using Math U See, and we are pleased with it...and yet I was a little worried the girls would forget facts learned in previous years and perhaps not learn any new facts that might show up on our yearly standardized testing.





Daily Math Practice is a painless way to add a little bit of review into your student's day. Each week you get 5 problems for each day and a little progress chart to track work done. I think the 5 problems is just enough, considering the girls have already tackled their Math U See work for the day.

It's a good thing, and- I picked it up at Barnes & Nobles with my educator's discount...very cool.

Labels: homeschool, reviews, show and tell

Maybe someone can benefit from my ever-growing stash of homeschool curriculum....

I love good stuff, and there is an abundance of good stuff out there in homeschool-land; I thought I'd share a peek into the things in my closet and describe a little about what they are and how they work.

We just started with Math U See this school year, after using a traditional, spiral, textbook curriculum (Abeka) which was very good and thorough...but frankly, it is designed for classroom use- and the price for all the different books needed for each grade, and the time needed for teaching each grade was overwhelming me.

Math U See is not "traditional" in the er... traditional textbook way- it reminds me very much of a Montessori approach, very hands on- using manipulatives to "build" your problem and then "teaching" it back to prove mastery. Math U See is also not "traditional" in the sequence and bundling of math skills covered in each book. For example, one of the books we are using this year is Gamma- and it covers multiplication...and pretty much only multiplication. A parent might get uneasy that division is not being covered in the same time as would be traditional. However, once the student moves on to the next level and subject, I think the subject will be very thoroughly mastered. We do yearly testing in our charter school, I am a little worried about long division skills being forgotten, so I am using a daily exercise book for the student's grade level for practice.

I switched to Math U See mainly to use the Dvd's that come with each level. I watch the dvd with the child each day (sometimes not, if I am familiar with the concept and teaching style) the lesson is maybe 10 minutes long and then the child works on the practice pages which include the "building and saying" part of the program. Also included in the practice page are word problems and review problems using a few skills taught in an earlier book or lesson. After the student has completed enough pages to show understanding, they complete a test page to show mastery and then you move on to the next lesson.

I really love not teaching the main lesson anymore. And it is a huge time saver for me, I can ideally watch my 2 older girl's lesson the night before- they are not long, and then let them run the lessons by themselves the next day as I work with the youngers. I do make a point to watch the younger kid's lessons because it is a new way of teaching for me.

The Math U see webpage does a very good job of describing the program and subjects covered in each level, and they offer placement tests to help place the student in the right level. I thought the books affordable, and I loved that the teacher book had the answer key incorporated into the book...I did not have to spend more money for the key. All the separate books I had to purchase for our other program made my head swim.

My kids don't grumble about math anymore (wow!) and I can see that Meg understands fractions now in a way she didn't before using the other program.

Labels: homeschool, reviews, show and tell