Home School Product Reviews

My son tried Jensen’s Grammar and found it to be tedious and hard to understand.  I look for material that is good for self-study and this didn’t fit for us.

Why does Timberdoodle give Jensen’s Grammar a positive review? Click here to learn more.

We used Created For Work for devotion time with our boys. We loved it, the material led to many discussions and helped us toward our goal of raising Godly young men. I highly recommend this source.

Betty Lukens Small Felt Set is FANTASTIC!  I have currently loaned my set to my daughter’s Awana teachers to use in Cubbies – and they love it too.  I think they’re going to ask the church to purchase a set of their own (possibly the large set).  Perhaps I read the “official” review wrong, but I had no idea just how HUGE and HELPFUL the teacher’s manual is – not only does it tell you how to use the felts, it gives a narrative to read for each story (which is so very helpful if you’re like me and have a hard time putting some of the “Bible words” and phrases into easier-to-understand language for little listeners), AND it even tells how to coordinate the “Bible in Living Sound” stories to go along with it!  I highly recommend this set; and there’s no way I would recommend it without the file box to hold the pieces in – there are just too many pieces to NOT have it.

Paperback Lightwedge

We purchased the Paperback LightWedge for our seven and a half year old son as soon as he became an independent reader. This has been an excellent investment. He would have nightly bible time in his bed using the lightwedge and also read his personal reading books. It is convenient, long lasting, and easy to use! We are planning on purchasing this for all of our children as soon as they achieve “independent reader” status.

Bloco Marine Creatures Set

These foam puzzles are great.  I had to assist some of my younger kids with the directions but they loved it.  It was a lot of fun to use Bloco Marine Creatures for “Art time” in our schooling.  I think they are the neatest product I have ever seen.

My 13 year old son was extremely bored with history but he loves experiments so when I saw Milestones in Science I bought it right away because it included 100 experiments.  Now he is getting the benefit of studying the history of inventors and recreating some of their experiments.  It’s the only subject he can’t wait to do everyday.

Dozens of science kits to make science come alive.

Daily 6-Trait Writing Grade 5

My mother teaches English at the university level and she loves the Daily 6-Trait Writing. She laughed and said the perhaps her college freshmen would benefit from it.

All Daily 6-Trait Writing levels.

Integrated Physics & Chemistry

My kids have always enjoyed Tiner’s books, so we decided to try Integrated Physics & Chemistry 2 years ago, but we were sadly disappointed.  The first two or so chapters were very interesting, but it began to go downhill until at the end, my 10th and 11th grade children complained that it seemed that the author was being rushed to publish.

It claims to be two credits, but I had a hard time believing that.  The handling of the topic was too light especially of the physics. (Physics is a mathematical subject and this gives no math problems.)

If someone is not headed for college science, then this might be a good overview with historical background.  But if you are headed for the college sciences,   I would recommend Apologia curriculum.  It’s written for individual study,  is easy to understand, and is very rigorous.  (My husband has taught chemistry and physics and wishes he could have used Apologia books.)

(For the record, I have a bachelors degree in Biology.)

Learn to Write the Novel Way

I recommend Learn to Write the Novel Way for anyone who has a writer in their family.  My daughter would write “stories” in her spare time.  When she got into high school and wanted to seriously write a book and didn’t know how to start,  I ordered this product.  She worked through it and started writing some awesome books.  She hopes to get one published soon.  I have already recommended Learn to Write the Novel Way to several people.

Language Lessons for the Very Young

I was searching for a language arts program to meet the needs of a unique child.  My child struggles with her left-handedness.  Anything requiring too many lines of writing in small spaces would leave us both nearly in tears.  But she is also a child who loves poetry and the beauty of language.  I hesitated buying this Language Lessons for the Very Young for two reasons.  First, the price seemed a bit high for our budget, especially since I was ordering on-line and couldn’t actually see the product.  Secondly, since it was so incredibly flexible, I was not entirely sure that I was ordering the correct level for my daughter.  I ordered, trusting in the fact that the folks at Timberdoodle had never let me down in their accurate descriptions of products.

To try to shorten a long story, my daughter went from dreading Language Arts to being eager and excited. In  Language Lessons for the Very Young the lessons are very short and very “gentle”.  Sometimes they are a bit too gentle in my opinion, but that is easily adjusted by doing two or three lessons in a day.  The lessons are very short and we both look forward to the picture studies.  We snuggle on the couch, take time to enjoy the painting and slowly answer the questions.  The copywork is done on simple lines, without an upper or dotted line.  At first I thought I would not like this, but it actually has been very freeing for my daughter, and I am learning to overlook unevenly-sized printing!  I appreciate the fact that the pages are without the distractions of cartoons or decorations.  It helps her to focus on her work.  We will finish this level in about half the time, and I have already ordered the next level.  We do use a separate spelling program.

Queen Homeschool Supplies (publisher of Language Lessons)