Reading Kindgom: Story Smarts

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Disclaimer: I received a Complimentary copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions I have expressed are my own or those of my family. I am disclosing this in accordance with FTC Regulations. 

Having a solid foundation in reading is very important right from the start. For the last few weeks Micah has  been plugging away at an online reading program called Story Smarts from Reading Kingdom.  

The Reading Kingdom program was created by Dr. Marion Blank, world renowned reading expert and Director of the Light on Learning Program at Columbia University. Using the program she created can teach your children, aged 4 to 10, to read and write to a third grade level in a fun and exciting way. 

 

Story Smarts is a series of stories that the child reads or has read aloud to them.  They are then tested on sequencing and putting the story back together as well as reading comprehension.

 With easy-to-use and interactive components, the program offers a customized online reading instruction for your child. During the whole process, the program targets your child's weaknesses while also keeping them confident in their strengths.  Reading Kingdom is easy to start, no need to download anything. Just log on to the website and start reading! 

   If you want to try Reading Kingdom out for your family, you can sign up for 30 Day Free Trial. After the trial period has ended and you would like to continue, a subscription costs $19.99/month (with no monthly minimum), or $199.99 per year. Additional children on your account get 50% off ($9.99/month or $99.99/year) and you can cancel your subscriptions at any time. In addition, because Reading Kingdom is so passionate about everyone getting to enjoy the joy of reading there is a scholarship program available for those who qualify.

   

 Overall, we have enjoyed Reading Kingdom and the phonics and reading platform it supports. I look forward to continuing to use this over course of the rest of the school year so that Micah stays actively involved in reading and phonics instruction. I encourage you to look into giving it a try for your family too! Check out what my CrewMates thought by clicking the banner below!

Find Reading Kingdom on at these Social Media Links:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/readingkingdom 
Twitter: https://twitter.com/readingkingdom 
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/readingkingdom/
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/readingkingdom/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/ReadingKingdom

Vocabulary Virtuoso: Mastering Middle School Vocabulary ~ a TOS review

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Disclaimer: I received a Complimentary copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions I have expressed are my own or those of my family. I am disclosing this in accordance with FTC Regulations.

 

 Do you have a favorite homeschool company that you always seem to navigate back to? I am a huge fan of The Critical Thinking Co. so I was thrilled when we were picked to receive Vocabulary Virtuoso: Mastering Middle School Vocabulary to use with my youngest daughter, McKenzie, who is in the 6th grade. The Critical Thinking Co.™ provides fantastic critical thinking resources for young students, let me tell you a little more about this one. 

 The Critical Thinking Co. is a family-owned business that has been “empowering the mind” for more than 50 years. They sell critical thinking products/supplements that cover reading, writing, mathematics, science, and history. Instead of rote drilling and memorization, students are encouraged to “carefully analyze what they are learning.” The Critical Thinking Co. is on a mission to develop the critical thinking skills in all children.

 Vocabulary Virtuoso: Mastering Middle School Vocabulary is written for students in 6th – 8th grade and is available in print or as a digitial PDF eBook. We received the digital copy which only works with PC computers and retails for $16.99. The book includes 15 lessons that have twelve words each with the goal of helping kids gradually increase their vocabulary. The best part of this program is that all of the words are taken from the PSAT so your child is getting a head start on learning 180 PSAT vocabulary words!

Each lessons list of words includes the pertinent information about the word including the part of speech, pronunciation, definition, and a list of synonyms, idioms, or phrases that pertain to the word. A variety of lesson exercises are included to help use the words in context including multiple choice, fill in the blank, unscrambling words, and writing sentences to name a few. As your child progresses through the lessons they will encounter words that they may encounter while reading.

Vocabulary is one of our focus areas for McKenzie this year in addition to spelling. During our review period we took the lessons really slow by working with the words and lesson for a minimum of two weeks. Since there are 6 activities within a lesson I scheduled our vocabulary time out to be 3 days a week. Because I had the eBook version of the book I was able to print out the lesson pages for McKenzie to work on. We simply stapled the lesson together so we would not lose any of the pages as we worked with them over the course of the two week time period. 

McKenzie had a little bit of trouble at first because the program actually uses different forms of the words given and not just the standard words on the list. Once she figured that out though, she didn’t have as much trouble completing the activities. She also liked that the words were being used within the context of a story.

   

 Overall, I found this to be a great vocabulary program and I am excited to continue using it with McKenzie. I do plan to set it aside until January as we work on completing her current vocabulary program but we are both excited to pick this back up in January. Be sure to click the banner below to read the thoughts of my CrewMates who reviewed this curriculum and the following others; Building Thinking Skills® Beginning 2, Tell Me a Story , Science Mind Benders®: Animals, Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles, and Understanding Fractions.  

 Company ~ The Critical Thinking Co.™

 Product ~ Vocabulary Virtuoso: Mastering Middle School Vocabulary 

Format ~ digitial eBook

 Price ~ $16.99

Ages ~ 6th - 8th grade

 

Find The Critical Thinking Co on these Social Media Links:

Facebook
Twitter
Instagram
Pinterest
YouTube

© 2008 - 2021 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author. 

http://astablebeginning.com

Wordless Wednesday

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http://astablebeginning.com

Basic Math Skills Rescue from Math Essentials ~ a TOS review

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Disclaimer: I received a Complimentary copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. All opinions I have expressed are my own or those of my family. I am disclosing this in accordance with FTC Regulations. 

Morning friends! I hope your school year is going well! We are finishing up our first 6 weeks this afternoon. During these last 6 weeks, Montana and McKenzie have been working in the new books from Richard W. Fisher called Basic Math Skills Rescue Part 1 and Part 2. If you have a student who needs some extra practice with math skills I would see about getting your hands on these books from Math Essentials. 

The Basic Math Skills Rescue books do just what the title says. They each highlight and focus on the critical math skills that many students struggle to master including: Whole Numbers & Integers, fractions, decimal & percents, geometry, problem solving, and pre-algebra sills. 

Both books have roughly over 240 pages each and include an answer key for all the problems. The pages are printed on heavy weight paper and have a nice grit to them. There is space to work some of the smaller, less in-depth problems, but using a separate sheet of paper would work better for longer multi-step problems. There is also a space to write your answers. The glossary in the back includes a list of math terms, multiplication table, important symbols and more in the back of both books. 

My girls have enjoyed using these books and filling in the gaps that they may have. McKenzie is actually using Part 1 to work ahead in math while Montana is using Part 2 to get extra practice on the geometry skills she has not fully mastered yet.

Basic Math Skills Rescue Part 1 and Part 2 from Math Essentials is great for making sure there are no math learning gaps! Bottom line, we will be making room for these books on our bookshelves. II would recommend both of these books for anyone looking for extra, focused math practice. But don’t just take my word for it! Some of my CrewMates also reviewed these books so be sure to click the banner below to read their thoughts.

 

 Company ~ Math Essentials 

 Product ~ Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2 

 Format ~ paperback book 

 Price ~ $31.55 each 

 Ages ~ middle school and up

© 2008 - 2021 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author. http://astablebeginning.com

Wordless Wednesday

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© 2008 - 2021 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author. 

http://astablebeginning.com

Learn to Read with Reading Eggs ~ a TOS review

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Disclaimer: I received a Complimentary copy of this product through the HOMESCHOOL REVIEW CREW in exchange for my honest review. All opinions I have expressed are my own or those of my family. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. 

Since everyone needs to learn to read, why not make the process fun and engaging? With Reading Eggs you can do just that! Reading Eggs offers online learning games and activities with Reading Eggs and Mathseeds to spice up the learning process.

Reading Eggs program provides a fun and interactive way to get kids to learn how to read and how to practice math with their new Mathseeds program. By introducing beginner readers to the world of reading through interactive stories and games with fun characters your child will be soaring off into their reading adventures in no time! 

Reading Eggs has five distinct components to the program including: 

 ~ Reading Eggs Junior for children aged 2-4 years: Reading Eggs Junior is the perfect amount of stimulation for your young toddler who is just beginning their learning journey. With a huge library of read-aloud books, songs, alphabet games, and the all-important phonemic awareness activities your toddler will be engaged from day one. 

~ Reading Eggs for children aged 3-7 years: With Reading Eggs your children aged 4-7 will learn everything from letter recognition, phonics, to reading early readers while using this program. To capture and hold a young child’s attention and make the reading experience multi-sensory there are also puzzles, games, and songs to make the process F-U-N! Not to mention the chance to win golden eggs and rewards to help the child progress toward the end goal and feel proud of themselves. 

~ Fast Phonics for children aged 5-10: Most beginning readers need a little bit more practice with phonics when learning to read, so the creators created Fast Phonics to focus on building phonics instruction. The Fast Phonics program helps children to learn the 44 sounds of the English language. The program moves quickly but helps to reinforce reading and spelling skills. 

~ Reading Eggspress for children aged 7-13: Do you have an older child or want to continue on the reading journey? No problem! Reading Eggspress {a sister part of the Reading Eggs World} is geared towards older children, aged 7-13, to encourage fluent reading. Using real books for reading this program is jam packed with hundreds of interactive reading activities and games to encourage fluent reading! 

~ Mathseeds for children aged 3-9 years: Mathseeds teaches kids 3-9 the core math and problem solving skills needed to be successful. Through highly interactive lessons, Mathseeds keeps kids interested in completing math skills. Mathseeds is also available to play on a tablet so you can take the learning on the go if you have internet connection. 

 

Micah, my 7-year-old 2nd grader focused on the Mathseeds portion for the program. I have the program scheduled out in his school planner to complete 3 sessions a week. It typically takes him about 10-15 minutes to complete a lesson. The lessons are engaging and fun so it keeps him interested. 

For this review we received a 12- month subscription and Micah has been enjoying it from the start! We will definitely continue using the program for the rest of our subscription. All in all, we highly recommend Reading Eggs for anyone looking for a fun and exciting reading or math supplement. Be sure to click the banner below and read what 20 of my CrewMates thought of this program from Reading Eggs.

   

 Company ~ Reading Eggs

 Product ~ Reading Eggs and Mathseeds

 Format ~ online  

 Price ~ Free for 30 days and $9.99/mo afterwards 

 Ages ~ 2-13 years old

Find Reading Eggs on these Social Media Sites: 

Facebook  ~ Twitter ~ Instagram ~ YouTube

© 2008 - 2021 A Stable Beginning. All rights reserved. All photographs, text, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written permission of the author. 

http://astablebeginning.com