A Fabulous Reading Find!

Take a Look, It's in a Book, A reading Rainbow Book!   I have been feeling so guilty.  I don't read to my kids enough. I read to them but not enough. I suspect it will never be enough. With so many having a difficult time with reading I am always reading everything to them.  This has really taken the pleasure out of cuddle reading baby books with the little ones.  I know that reading to them will drastically help them all with their reading. 

The last few weeks have been fantastic with reading improvement.  I have been searching for something to build on that.  Looking for something to help keep reading fun, so that the desire stays with them.   I found that there are a few Reading Rainbow episodes on Amazon the other day.  It is only one episode per season.  I thought they were just trying to get you to buy the entire seasons.  We watched a few but they did not keep the kids attention.  I think the graphics are just too old. 

 

At Mom's Night Out this week two of us were talking about how much I have loved the Immersion Reading available on some books on the Kindle.  As you know we got each child their own kindle this school year.  At times I am a little sad because there are not as many of the learning apps out there.  This can be a very expensive option.  You first buy the book from Kindle, then you also purchase the audio version from Audible.  I have found that the Books + Audio can get pretty pricy.  Spending a money of books isn't a bad thing to spend money on.  I just can't afford getting it for each child over and over again. 

 

That is when another mom mentioned how much she has loved the Reading Rainbow app.  I almost let it go without asking more about it.  What a huge mistake that would have been.  Thank you so much Mrs. Julie C.  As it turns out RR has a beautiful app for the Kindle and one for the Ipad.  Either version is wonderful.  The app is free but that will leave you limited.  The paid content has been a God Send.   For a nominal fee you can become a member and then have access to so many books and videos.  I like the set up as well. Readers and Nonreaders alike will enjoy this set up.  It brings books to life and can read to the children if they just click an icon.  My two year olds are hooked.  My only issue is that memberships are limited to 5 family identities.  This is probably only an issue for a family as big as mine.  Engaging, fun yet functional.  I can't describe it well.  Just download the app and it will show up.  Click here for the website. (although you must purchase membership through the app.)  The site describes what is available much better than I did, but as LeVar says, "Don't take my word for it!" but go check it out for yourself. 

 

My sincere thanks to LeVar Burton and the Reading Rainbow Team.  You have helped me insure that my children will love reading.  The T-Family Kindle Method just keeps getting better and better. 

New Way to Homeschool With Kindes

This is a project really.  I have never really been thrilled with my reporting ability.  I work with kids all the time with little to show for it at the end of the day.  All those coloring sheets just get thrown away.  I have such dyslexic kids that they end up feeling very unaccomplished.  We needed something new.  After 18 years of homeschooling, I am bored, I am tired and I am feeling like I have failed. 


So as I have stated I was reading about Ron Paul's curriculum.  I know nothing about the content but I was loving the concepts for highschool.  How can adapt his ideas into what we do?  I also don't have the money to buy each young child a computer or an ipad.  In trying to figure all this out, dad came across a great deal for Kindle Fire.  We went ahead and invested only $60 each for 4 units for Pickle, Princess, Bagel, and Jumba.  In our minds the twins are too young and Possible as a nicer Kindle Fire HDX from Christmas.  These units have internet ability but so we can visits all the math sites from practices but they don't have the cool apps like the ipads do.  That might someday be worth the investment.  For now we are trying to get this ball rolling. 

We have started the 2014-2015 school year very early this year.  For the first month is will be just trying to figure out how and getting into the practice of our new methods of being accountable.  It is lots of work right now but I know that eventually it will relieve so much of the stress on me.  My goal has always been to get the kids to be self sufficient. They need basic educational skills, they need to be able to apply them and they need to have motivation to keep at it.  I have seen so many families push and push the school work only to have the children shy away from school all together later. 

I want to encourage the independence while still keeping track.  I will always hold out hope that we will move north.  Texas is very homeschool friendly, and I love that about being here.  I need to get back in the habit of better record keeping in case we get to move into a state with much stricter guidelines. I must admit that it took a lot of time (several hours over the course of everyday for three weeks or do.)  I established a homeschool blog for each child.  They will use this to report into each day instead of handing me a stack papers that I am supposed to grade and record somewhere.  I used blogger because that is what I am familiar with.  (I plan to keep them private for a few months until we work out the kinks. I also am not sure how out there I really want to be with the kids.  It would be really bad if their friends got at look at their work and started teasing them.  To be honest I am not sure they will be public until much later. I guess time will tell.)



We started by getting the kindles hooked up and going.  Set them up and downloaded and note taking app.  Setting each child up with the right font and colors etc.  They will be using this for their writing each day and each week.  It was very time consuming setting this up on all five devices.  We are still waiting on the arrival of the cases and I will also be getting each child head phones.  I had each child write an opening post for their blogs.  This was just three or five sentences.  It was a lot for some and nothing for others.  For the first month I will not be pushing too much with the writing but there will be several things due each week.  I am trying to find a routine and get the kiddos in the habit of using the "note" app. 

Homeschool Connections

 

 

Online Classes
for Homeschoolers

Complete live online classes
for middle and high school students --
Educating the heart, mind, and soul
in the Catholic tradition.

My last post was about the Ron Paul Curriculum and I still have to say that I love the model and set up.  That particular program is not for this Catholic Homeschooling Family.  I love the model though.  I can't just use textbooks anymore.  My older kids were bored and lost interest. The model of a video class to keep them connected and engaged is so intriguing.  Due to the amount of learning issues we have worked with in the past and that we still have with rest of the bunch, I know that offering a book and expecting a report and test is not the way to gauge how much they learned. I saw this even with the on-line with audio version of Introduction to Catholicism that we did this year through My Catholic Faith Delivered (I should offer a review for them but in a later post).  We were hearing the material but not necessarily comprehending it.  So even offering the audio version is not completely engaging.  The truth is I do not have time to sit with each child and present each class with the enthusiasm they each deserve.

I have never liked just offering the books, even if they come with audio.  That has been a great option considering the kids long for some independence for high school.  I was so drawn to the Ron Paul set up because it really does offer the video and the independence.  I just need it to be a little more cost effective and a little more Catholic.  I attended the homeschool conference and once again got into a nice discussion with Walter Crawford.  He is one of the individuals behind Homeschool Connections. I really want to see if I can take the archived classes offered through Homeschool Connections.  I want to offer a Catholic alternative but loosely following the Ron Paul model.  I am not sure how this will all work but we will try to get started by June 1st and that will allow us to tweak it until we get it going.

I can't wait to see if we can make this work.