Friday, December 19, 2008

Sharing the love...

Okay, listen up folks. I am about to share some serious and I mean serious love with you. Big Discovery!!!

This is not a homeschooling blog by any stretch of the imagination but I did want to share with you 2 things that could be incorporated into the day of a homeschooling mom or added to the education of a brick and mortar school.

We have hit the dreaded learning of multiplication tables. Oh how I hated memorizing the times tables. Could've had something to do with the fact that I had a serious disdain for math during all my school years. Then I spotted this post on Books and Bairns. And now I have hope again.

We've been using the K12.com program and it's much like a traditional school. Lots of workbooks and moving from workbook to computer a lot. I think the curriculum of K12 is excellent but trying to get it into her head is a totally different story. It's a daily power struggle.

Then I found this post also on Books and Bairns regarding Time4Learning. Now I admit that I've read Mary Grace's posts on Time4Learning before. I viewed the Time4Learning website and wasn't really impressed. This time I actually did the 14 day free trial to see what all the fuss was about. OHHHHH...now I get it! Oh my holy heck! This is fun! It's so much fun I want a version all for myself. It is completely interactive, fun and hilarious. J has gone to school for the past 2 days for 9 hours straight. I literally have to convince her to move away from it. She is loving it and having so much fun in the process. Plus I don't have to sit with her and feel like I'm drilling everything into her head. She can do it all on her own!!!!! Yeah for me. It recommends printing out a report card every week to track progress but to allow them to do it on their own and it's set up for that completely. This is also helping with control battles. Yeah for me again!

Anybody that would've told me that studying plane and solid shapes, obtuse and acute angles and congruency would be fun, I would've called them insane. Not anymore...

This program can be used as full homeschool program or to accentuate brick and mortar schooling. Right at this moment she is BEGGING to hurry up and go to school. This is a first. I'm such a bad mom....I'm 44 minutes late starting school because I HAD to share the love with all of you. ♥ If your kids are in a brick and mortar school you could EASILY use this program as a reward for them instead of video games and they would actually be learning something in the process. LA, Math, Science, Social Studies and LA Extensions. All in the same price!!!

So I'm giving it a shot for the 14 days and we'll see then what the decision will be but so far Time4Learning is winning by a landslide. Plus it'll be $52 a month less than k12 not to mention I don't have to buy the books and everything which is over $800 a year. Everything is online and printable if needed.

I'm hopeful this may be a huge step for us in the control/education department. Now I'm off to "not" teach school.

8 comments:

Corrine said...

Thanks for sharing.
Your awesome to give your children this experience.
And any $$$ saved in the long run...GREAT!

Viva Las Vegas said...

I love it, I am going to look into it for the future, as soon as i get some sleep.. You sound happy again,, WOO HOO!! You still need a night out, in my book!!

Meg an Aggie in Frisco said...

Yea for you! That is a huge savings for you! :-)

Anonymous said...

That's great advice and I really appreciate it. Even though I don't anticipate homeschooling, good suggestions always help.

Kristina P. said...

These sound like great progams, Lisa!

mary grace said...

Glad you gave it a try! I say ... anything that keeps your kids interested in learning is a good buy! :-)

Kelly said...

Very cool. I have wished so many times that I had started my kids out homeschooling but now that they are older and in honors and advanced placement classes I could not do it. They do well in public school so we are here to stay but I am glad you found something that works so well for J.

Holly said...

Wow, that's great, I'll have to check it out since as of Christmas break Butterfly will be coming home to school.