About the Program:

Included with the Learning Dynamics Reading Program is the following:

• Lesson Manual
• Student Workbook
• 50+ Full-Color Books
• 30+ songs on a music  CD
• Letter Characters
• Flashcards

The books, flash cards, music, letter rewards, and lesson manual are all reusable. The only piece that is not reusable is the student activity workbook.  If you need to use it with more than one student, extra workbooks are available for about $18 instead of having to buy an entire second program.

The program takes several months to complete, but students can be reading their first book in just about 3.5 – 4 weeks on average. The  program just takes 15 minutes per day, about 3 days per week.

Inside the Lesson Manual, there are step by step instructions on how to work through the program with your student.  I also found the training video on their website to be very helpful.  One thing that is mentioned is to make sure you aren’t going through the program too fast.  We have only gotten through Lesson 8, however my son isn’t quite four yet.   We are doing a lot of reviewing and making sure it is fun for him instead of pushing him too fast.

Lots of encouragement is needed to keep small children motivated to practice reading.  Each lesson introduces a new character, a new song, and some fun activities.

The company is so sure you will love their program, that they are offering a 30-day money back guarantee!

Our Thoughts:

My son would much rather be running around playing instead of learning, but he doesn’t mind this program.  He likes meeting the new characters and loves when I cheer for him after he has remembered previous letters.  He thinks the songs are silly and likes to make the characters “dance” while they are played.  He has even been asking to do “his school” and brings me the box that contains the Learning Dynamics program.

I like that the Lesson Manual gives me instruction on how to encourage reading and what to do each day during the program.  We are usually finished in 10-15 minutes, which is the perfect time frame for my little guy.

When we are finished with a lesson, we put the flash cards and characters in ziplock bags to safely store until the next time.  Before we start anything new, we always go back and review the letters we have already learned and then evaluate if he’s ready to move on.

Although it’s taking my son a bit longer than the average four weeks to read, we are very pleased with his progress.  Honestly, he’s gotten further than we thought he would.  I had guessed he would have been very resistant but that hasn’t been the case.  We really have enjoyed reviewing Learning Dynamics Reading Program and will be continuing it until completion.

For More Information:

For more information, please visit the Learning Dynamics Reading Program website.  The program is currently available for $99.99 and free U.S. shipping.

You can also find out more on Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram.

For more reviews on this product and others, please click the banner below.

My 3rd grader has been using Matific Galaxy as an online math resource over the past few weeks.

Matific Galaxy is a program geared toward kindergarten through sixth graders and is designed to make math more playful and reduce anxiety.  It is beneficial to enhance public school learning and assist in homeschooling.  The learning path below shows the route kids take with this program, starting with addition and ending at measurements.

Throughout the program, children collect pixels to put together the aliens that have lost their pixels.  It’s neat seeing the learning progression this way and the goal is to get the aliens back whole again.

Children and parents have their own separate logins so the kids can play while the parents check up on them to see how it’s going.  As you can see above, my daughter is doing great with multiplication and division, but needs a little practice with mixed operations and numbers.  From there, I can click on the “More” option and pull up the exact section that they suggest she work on.  I can hit the play button and it will replay that particular game so we can go over it together and make improvements, which is what we will be doing in a few moments.

Under the Parent Zone, parents can also send fun little encouraging messages to their children.  My daughter liked getting these.

Matific Galaxy can be played online or through an app from the App Store or Google Play.  We did find that our old iPads are too old to use the program, but I was able to add it to my phone for my daughter to use on the go.  The games are really fun.  I even took time to play Cherry Chomp and I thought it was cute. I had to mark how many cherries were on the table and then the monster would come up and “chomp” some of them and then I had to see how many they ate.

We ran into just a couple of math problems that were quite hard, and I did have to come help my daughter.  One even stumped me!  It was rearranging shapes to create other shapes, which sounds simple but this particular problem was tough.  I ended up googling how to make the shape out of other shapes and found a solution that worked.  I felt it was worth noting for this review, but it wouldn’t be something that deterred me from using this program.

Matific Galaxy is a fun, animated program that my daughter didn’t mind doing at all.  In fact, after watching her work on the program, my older two kids that are in this age range are now begging for subscriptions so that they can give it a try.

I could definitely see us renewing the subscription on Matific Galaxy and/or adding the other kids in the future.  A great program that is beneficial to our family.

For More Information:

For more information, please visit the Matific Galaxy.  Subscriptions start at just $19.99 for the year!  You can also find out more on Facebook and Instagram.  To see what other homeschooling families thought about this program, simply click the banner below.

The 200 Questions About American History set includes the following:

• 200 Questions About American History Student Guide
• 200 Questions About American History Teacher Key
• 200 Questions About American History Flashcards

Inside 200 Questions About American History Student Book, there is a recommended schedule.  I found this to be extremely helpful in setting up my 7th grader’s studies and for the most part, we have followed their schedule.  He is currently working on reviewing for his first test and we will probably test tomorrow.

The work is broken down into 34 weeks, which makes it much easier to digest.  Each week may have a few chapters for reading, followed by drill questions in their book and corresponding note cards.  Some weeks are designed for studying or testing.  Each chapter is only 1-2 pages, making it a breeze to read a little each day.

The included note cards are very helpful in keeping facts fresh in their minds.  There are drill questions, timeline pieces, quotes, and presidents.  I think once he has memorized all of them, he will have a great grasp on American history.  I am trying to memorize them along side of him and it’s amazing how much we can remember when it’s presented in a simple fact format.

If you follow the suggested schedule, and in addition to the products provided in these sets, you’ll need to grab Story of the World Volume 4.  That isn’t needed until week 25.

The Story of the Thirteen Colonies & the Great Republic Set includes the following:

• The Story of the Thirteen Colonies and the Great Republic text
• The Story of the Thirteen Colonies and the Great Republic Student Guide
• The Story of the Thirteen Colonies and the Great Republic Teacher Guide

The Story of the Thirteen Colonies & the Great Republic did not have a schedule included, nor is there a schedule that shows how to use both sets simultaneously that I could find.  That would be a wonderful thing to be added to these sets.  This book has 32 lessons inside, so we could spread it out to one lesson a week or so throughout the school year.  We found it didn’t exactly line up so we are just working on it as we read through the chapters and come across the material.

Each lesson includes vocabulary, comprehension questions, and enrichment.  Enrichment was my son’s favorite part.  Some activities would be to find locations on a map, add timeline pieces, and composition.  Below, you can see him responding to the enrichment activity in lesson three, where he had to write a journal entry from the perspective of Balboa after he climbed the mountain and saw the Great South Sea for the first time.  I love that it brings out thinking and creativity along with working through history.

The teacher’s manuals are very thorough with the answers needed to quick check my son’s work.  Tests and answers are also included.

Overall, we are enjoying this program.  My son enjoys reading so he doesn’t mind having several chapters on history to read each week.  As I mentioned above, the only thing I would change is having a schedule that included both sets of books in it to easily determine what is supposed to be done each day.  We are happy with it and will definitely continue using this when we officially start his seventh grade year this fall.

For more information:

For more information, please visit the Memoria Press Website. You can find The Story of the Thirteen Colonies & the Great Republic Set for $48.00 and 200 Questions About American History set for $27.90.

You can also find out more on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, or Instagram.  Also be sure to click the banner below to read Crew reviews on this product and others from Memory Press.

EdAlive generously provided us with one-year subscriptions to both Typing Tournament Online and Maths Invaders Online for each of our middle three children to give the programs a try.

About Typing Tournament Online:

Typing Tournament Online is a 10 finger typing course for children ages 6 through adult. On their website, students can try a free typing test to gage their current level.  Throughout the program, there are 128 drills, lessons, and games and students progress at their own pace.  The Typing Tournament Online is $10 per month per student or $90 a year.

We’ve tried several typing programs in the past with our children and non seemed to stick after a while.  Typing Tournament Online is a program that they actually like to do!  The Medieval look and challenges are fun and encourage the kids to keep moving forward in their lessons.

Behind the scenes, the parent can login and see how each student is doing and their current WPM (Words Per Minute). While the program was a bit challenging for the kids, they stuck with it and are making strides.  We saw improvement after just a few shorts weeks of our kids using the program.

The hardest thing about the program, wasn’t actually the program but was breaking bad habits about finger placement that the kids have already developed.  This required me to sit beside them at times to make sure they weren’t going back to bad finger posture.  I would recommend making sure you have time to sit with the kids to correct any finger placement issues.

About Math Invaders Online:

Like Typing Tournament Online, Math Invaders also has a free Math Invaders game online that the kids can try out and there is also an area for parents to see how the kids are doing.  By practicing math, kids can “save the planet” from the invaders.  This program is designed for kids ages 5-15 or anyone that would like to continue practicing math facts.  I really like that this is a fun online program that can be beneficial for middle and high schoolers as well.

Math invaders works on the following:

• Times Tables
• Addition
• Subtraction
• Multiplication
• Division
• Fractions
• Decimals
• Percentages
• Numeration
• Counting
• Squares
• Square Roots
• Powers
• Directed Numbers
• and More!

This program was a hit with my kids.  They loved having the challenges.  It starts off easier and they build confidence as they work on harder topics as the program moves on.  This definitely helps to lay a firm foundation for math facts.

My Kids Thoughts:

6th Grader: Math Invaders is my favorite.  It’s easy and fun!  I think Typing Tournament is a little hard because I keep putting my fingers on the wrong keys.  I hope to get better on this program with practice.

3rd Grader: I like Typing Tournament because I am learning the keys and which fingers to use.  It gives me three times to try and then I get a test.  On Math Invaders, I like to press practice and work on multiplication.  Both are a lot of fun.

2nd Grader: Math Invaders is my favorite program because I get to blast the bad guys.  Typing Tournament is fun because I like learning to type words.  I like when I can type and throw balloons to stop the fire.

For More Information:

For more information, you can check out the EdAlive websites for both Typing Tournament Online and Maths Invaders Online.  You can also find out more on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram.

Please click the banner below to read more reviews on this product and others from the Homeschool Review Crew.

I’ve mentioned before that I’m a huge fan of online learning programs for my children’s homeschool enhancement.  The latest we’ve been reviewing is offered by IXL Learning.  We received three annual membership to IXL, which helps with Math, Language Arts, Science and Social Studies.  My 6th, 3rd, and 2nd graders will be helping me review this product.

About the Product:

IXL is a comprehensive K-12 Curriculum that can be used from Pre-K through Twelfth grade.  As children work on subjects, the program is designed to narrow down their ability levels and focus on areas that need improvement.

Parents or teachers can check out the analytics behind the scenes to see how their children are doing.  I can view usage, diagnostic stats, trouble spots, scores, questions, and their progress.

Diagnostic Stats help to find a level in each learning area for students.  The more that they work on the program, the more narrow the diagnostic stat will become.  Then, recommendations are made based on the results of the diagnostics.  Above, you can see some of the results my younger child.

On the question section, I can see exactly what questions my children have answered on the program and see their answer.  I like being able to see this in case there are simple errors that we can discuss to help get it right the next time.

IXL can be downloaded as an app to take learning on the go.  I really liked this feature because we only have 1 desktop for the kids to share, but they do have tablets that they can use for schoolwork.  We greatly preferred using the program on the apps instead of on the computer.  It seemed easier to use that way.

IXL subscription packages  begin as low as $9.95 per month for single subjects per student or as high as $19.95 per month for all the core subjects.

Our Thoughts:

I watched the kids working on the program for a bit and liked what I saw as a parent and teacher.  One area that I think is most important for homeschoolers is that it would peg their levels based on ability.  Many kids are not on the same level in each subject and this helped me pinpoint which of the subjects needed to be worked on more with which kids.  Definitely helpful for a large family homeschool program.

My 2nd and 3rd graders liked IXL for the most part.  The main thing they didn’t like is that there isn’t really a fun aspect to it, other than collecting little virtual prizes.  They did like to see which prize they would receive for working diligently on the program.  My 3rd grader especially liked it because it kept things simple for her.

When I asked my 6th grader his thoughts, he told me it felt like a never-ending test.  Although he states that IXL wasn’t his favorite, he didn’t complain when it became time to work on the program throughout the week.

For More Information:

For more information on IXL, you can visit their website.  You can also find out more on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and YouTube.

You can also click the banner below to read reviews on this product and others from other homeschooling families.

My kids have become huge fans of these audio dramas!  The latest that we have checked out is For The Temple from Heirloom Audio.  Whenever one of these CDs arrive from Heirloom Audio, my kids will always take off with it.  Once that happens, I know that I won’t see them for a few hours while they soak in the story.  This time, my 12 year old son took off with it, but that’s okay since he’s helping with the review!

About the Story:

G.A. Henty is out on a coffee break when someone runs into him. George tells him of a story about a jew named John, who was a gardener at his father’s house. John is out on a boat trip with Mary, who is betrothed to John, when a storm comes and sets them out of the way. They are saved by Jewish fighters, who were also sailing. John decides to join the army against the Romans, since the Jews first and foremost duty is to protect the Temple. John fights many battles, survives, but loses many friends along the way.  When he decides to fight again, Mary tries to keep him away from the fights. Finally, the Romans are on the move toward the Temple and John has to do what ever it takes to defend it.  Even if it means he has to put together a rag-tag gang against the Roman camps, while uniting bands of murders, John will do whatever it takes.

My Son’s Thoughts:

One of my favorite parts is when John and his rag-tag gang go about terrorizing the Romans. They blow horns, they take down tents, and set fire to Roman tents. Another one of my favorite parts is when John and Titus are fighting.  First Titus has the upper hand but he finds out that John is a very experienced fighter. John wins the fight and forces Titus to promise to do in all his power to spare to Temple.

My favorite character in this audio drama is John. He is brave and very faithful. My least favorite character is Titus.  He made a promise and could have easily ordered his men not to attack Jerusalem at all. I like this CD set since it has a good story, a good plot, and a good amount of action. The only thing about this that I don’t like, is that at the end of it, John and his friend end up in the hands of slave traders.

The Study Guide:

One neat feature of For The Temple audio drama is the study guide.  It includes “Listening Well”questions and “Thinking Further” prompts to help create discussions with your children.  There are also “Defining Words” listed that are good to go over with your children to make sure they understand what they mean.  Also included in the study guide are interesting tidbits about the area and customs.

For More Information:

For more information, please visit the Heirloom Audio website or check out For The Temple.  The 2-CD set can be purchased for $29.97 plus shipping and handling.

We also recommend reading our reviews on other Heirloom Audio dramas.

• Wulf the Saxon
• Beric the Briton
• The Dragon and the Raven
• Captain Bayley’s Heir
• St. Bartholomew’s Eve

You can also find out more on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and Instagram.  You can click the banner below to read more reviews on this product and others by other homeschooling families.