1st Grade, 2nd Grade Curriculum, 3rd Grade Curriculum, Curriculum, Education, spelling, Writing

Reading Kingdom: Spelling Ninja Review !

Little Learner and Mom

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

We were sent a 1 year subscription to Reading Kingdom Spelling Ninja for us to review as a supplement for some interactive spelling fun!

Spelling Ninja is an online spelling program that encourages students to use their phonics skills to help them decode words to spell. The program is for children ages 5-10 years and the program does have a prerequisite that students need to have completed Level 2 in Reading Kingdom or be able to read. There is a parent dashboard so you can make changes to your students settings. From the parent dashboard you can also print diplomas, progress reports and track your students progress.

How Spelling Ninja Works

Spelling Ninja gives students a sentence and picture for them to copy. The system reads the sentence to your student and then the students have to copy it. The sentence or parts of the sentence is still visible to the student as they type. Students have to make sure they are adding capital letters where needed and spaces between words and correct punctuation. The words, spaces and punctuation are colored coded as a helpful alert to the student that they are missing a letter or space as they type. The pictures matching the sentences feature diverse graphics, the screen isn’t very busy so it is not distracting to those students who are easily distracted. Before students start playing they can choose between and on screen or off screen keyboard.

Now my son wasn’t not really eager about Spelling Ninja because he didn’t like the timed response time and how it would ding him. He became quite discourage by this and didn’t want to continue the program. I was able to slow that timer down, but personally I wish it could have been turned off. Spelling Ninja also requires that your student has some knowledge of keyboard typing. I found this a little odd especially for a program targeted at students as young as 5yrs. Without a student having some basic knowledge of typing your student will be discourage.

The overall concept of using decoding and phonics is a great way strengthening spelling skills. We will use this program as a way to supplement spelling and give him some typing practice. The cost of Reading Kingdom Spelling Ninja at the time of this review is $19.99 for a years access. Be sure to check out the other crew’s of Reading Kingdom programs by clicking the banner below.

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

4th Grade, Critical Thinking and Logic, Homeschool, Reviews, Science

The Critical Thinking Co.™: Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles Review!

Little Learner and Mom

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew

We are a science loving family, This year we took science to a new level and we are using an box curriculum and the Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles from The Critical Thinking Co.™ is the perfect extra fun we needed.

We were sent the Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles hard copy book for us to review. I have always been a fan of crossword puzzles myself and my son recently has taken a liking to them. Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles are a great way to combine science and critical thinking skills in one. What I love about these puzzles is that they cover topics that we are studying about this year.

Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles cover the the following areas of study:

  • Living Things
  • Earth’s Land, Water, and Resources
  • Weather
  • Our Solar System
  • Matter, Energy, and Forces
  • The Human Body
  • Science and Scientist
  • Inventions and Discoveries

There are 25 puzzles that will help your students learn or review science vocabulary. The book is designed for grades 4-6th and covers basic science knowledge for those grades. You will find that some vocabulary terms your student may know and some they may need to review.

We used the Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles according to what we are studying in our science curriculum. I was really happy to see how well he retained his lessons because he was blazing through the vocabulary. The words he didn’t know the definitions I made note of them and we looked them up later.

Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles include a vocabulary list and answer key in the back of the book. The book is paperback with perforated pages. The company does offer ebook version of the book you can make copies of the pages for your own family use only. I definitely took advantage of this option because will be using this book again another year.

We are taking our time using Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles because I am lining it up with his science curriculum. We are working our way through the animal and mammal currently puzzles. He is really enjoying them and so am I.

The Critical Thinking Co.™ is a wonderful company we have had many of their books in our home and we several we are using also this school year along with the Science Vocabulary Crossword Puzzles.

Be sure to check out the other crew’s of the different The Critical Thinking Co.™ books they are reading by clicking the banner below.

Social Media Links:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheCriticalThinkingCo
Twitter: https://twitter.com/criticalthinks
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thecriticalthinkingco/
Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/criticalthinks/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsVEVNa6UpVqXxo_t5sbb7Q

4th Grade, Family, Homeschool, Mom Life, Morning Basket, Reviews

Plan Prep and Pray: Busy Bee Student Planner Review !

Little Learner and Mom

Complimentary product received through the Melanated Gold Review Squad, in exchange for my honest review.

This year we have been trying out a few new student planners trying to find the one that works best for us. One the planners we had the privilege of trying out is the Plan Prep and Pray : Busy Bee Student Planner.

I am a huge fan of Wendy from the Plan Prep and Pray Youtube channel and her Instagram. I love all over her organization tips, meal planning and creativity. I was super humble when she let the Melanated Gold Review Squad review her latest planner the Busy Bee Student Planner .

The Busy Bee Student Planner is a 12 month planner, The planner comes to you in a digital download, that you can print or upload to a tablet. Each sheet is 8.5 x11 students are given the option to select monthly, weekly, or daily views. I really liked the cover of the planner, but what stands to me is the affirmation at the bottom “Bee Yourself; Everyone is Taken” students will find affirmations throughout the planner along with some Bible scriptures. I decided to print the monthly sheet and the daily sheets for my 4th grader. If you have a student that gets overwhelmed seeing so much to do I would recommend printing the daily sheets double sided. I like the note pages a lot I used them for his daily pages because they have sections for:

  • Prayers & Praises
  • Homeschool Checklist ( I used for that days lessons to complete)
  • Daily To Do List
  • Daily Goal
  • Reminders
  • Parents Love Note

One of the things I would love to see added is area for writing spelling/vocabulary words. There are mindfulness sheets for drawing, writing, and a beautiful butterfly to color I added this page at the end of each week as a reflection page for him . The planner also features a

  • Goal Setting Sheets
  • Password Tracker
  • Reading Goals
  • Goal Trackers
  • Field Trips
  • Wish List
  • Mini Games

There are alternative monthly and daily views. The alternative daily view has view divined into times from 7a.m. to 11:30 p.m. I used the alternative daily view as a suggested schedule for us.

The Busy Bee Student Planner has 1 Bible scripture in it, but the notepad sheets do have pray and praise section. If you aren’t of the Christian faith these can be easily covered with washi tape or stickers. The planner can be used by both parent and student, I recommend using the Busy Bee Student Planner with students 4th grade and up.

How I Used the Planner

I printed out 5 sheets of the note pages, as I planned for the upcoming weeks lessons I would write out his lessons for the week on the first 3 pages. I only did this for 3 because sometimes our lessons change slightly mid-week. I arch punch his sheets and put them in his arc binder. I always leave room for him to make his own notes to the sheet. Sometimes he will do some unschool learning on his own and he will write down what he did. He looks forward to the parent notes and praises each day. I have noticed that I dont have to remind him about some of his chores, because I will write one that needs to be done on his sheet.

Busy Bee Student Planner is a student friendly planner with the cute bees buzzing around the planner, affirmations and extra activities students will find this planner easy to manage. I highly recommend this planner to anyone who is looking for a simple, customizable, and reasonable priced planner. Be sure to check out the other squad’s reviews by clicking the banner below.

Until the Next

Mom

4th Grade, Curriculum, Homeschool, Math, Reviews

Math Essentials: Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2 Review !

Little Learner and Mom

Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

This year has been tough on the math curriculum choices. My son did exceptionally well in a curriculum we used for 2 years, but this year the company decided not to update the 4th grade book and we were devastated and had to make a lot of changes. With these new changes came some new challenges, but we were fortunate to receive Math Essentials: Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2 to review.

Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2 are mastery math skills books, the goals are to help students master all 6 basic math skills in order to be successful in algebra. Each book is divided into 3 math skills area.

  • Whole Numbers & Integers
  • Fractions
  • Decimals & Percents
  • Geometry
  • Problem Solving
  • Pre-Algebra

Each books gives you free access to the online video library for grades 3 thru Algebra. The lessons in the books gives your students detail instruction and practice problems. Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2 allows student to do a few practice problems as a warm up and then they start to work the non practice problems. What I like about the books is that I can use them along side my son’s math curriculum as away to help better understand concepts or to give him more practice. Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2 goal is to give your student a strong understanding and mastery of critical foundations of algebra.

We have been using both books along side our math curriculum, we first started using the books to help him better understand integers. We recently have been using it to help him better master geometry. I wanted him to have more practice and so we worked on angels and geometric terms. I was very happy we had these books because he has light bulb moment and completely understood the concept and we were able to keep moving along in his math curriculum.

I really like Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2 books they really work on mastery and ensuring that your student will have a full foundation in basic math skills. You can work the books from front to back or you can use them to help you review skills.

Be sure to check out the other crew’s review of Math Essentials: Basic Math Skills Rescue Parts 1 and 2 by clicking the banner below.

1st Grade, 2nd Grade Curriculum, 3rd Grade Curriculum, 4th Grade, Curriculum, Education, Homeschool, Language Arts, Math, Reviews, spelling, Writing

Reading Eggs and Mathseeds Review !

Little Learner and Mom

DISCLAIMER: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

Reading Eggs and Mathseeds has been one of those programs that have been around for a very long time in our homeschool. Reading Eggs and Mathseeds were my son’s first online programs when he was 4 years old. The crew was given the opportunity to review Reading Eggs and Mathseeds I thought this would be a great time to revisit one of our old favorite online platforms.

Reading Eggs is online phonics, grammar, and spelling program. Recently the company introduced a new area called Fast Phonics and before this program, the company released Reading Eggs Jr for ages 2-4 years. The original Readings Eggs (ages 3-7) and Eggpress (ages 7-13) has been a frequent flyer in our home. Mathseeds is another great program that is on the platform it is for ages 3-9.

We have used Reading Eggs and Mathseeds in our home school for many years. Both of these programs provide a great foundation for literacy, grammar, and math skills. The lessons are fun, quick, and easy for the kids to maneuver with little parental assistance. Reading Eggs offers parents placement so the system can place your student in the best place on the map. Reading Eggs is a literacy program that will take your student from the very basics of lof letter recognition, sounds, blends, sight words, and reading. Students will have opportunities to earn golden eggs, students have tons of activities to keep them busy with learning and reading. One of the features I really liked about Reading Eggs is the driving test and story factory.

Mathseeds works very similarly to Reading Eggs the students can take a placement test or they can just start from the beginning and move through the path. Parents can also manually place their students in the lesson they think best for them from the detailed parent dashboard. Students will work on number recognition and mobe through topics covered up to 3rd grade.

Reading Eggs and Mathseeds is a wonderful introduction to online learning for younger students and there is something for everyone. We have really enjoyed using these programs over the years. The parent resources offer full curriculum printables and they also include a wonderful scope and sequence you can follow. The company has excellent customer service. Just when I thought my son had outgrown Reading Eggs he was able to use Reading Eggpress for higher-level grammar and spelling to review.

I highly recommend Reading Eggs and Mathseeds for homeschooling and for those students who attend traditional school. Be sure to check out the other crew’s reviews by clicking the banner below.

Social Media Links

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/readingeggsUSCA
Twitter: https://twitter.com/readingeggs
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/readingeggs/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8ED-7e2xA3fxgrM7Wq2XGQ

Education, Family, Geography, Homeschool, Reviews, Spanish

Underdog Games Trekking The World Review!

Little Learner and Mom

Complimentary product received!

Have you ever wanted to travel around the world? Well, your family will get that opportunity while playing Underdog Games Trekking The World. It was a great honor to be able to try out this fabulous game and go on an exciting adventure right from the comforts of my own home. Trekking The World is for ages 10+, 30-60 mins gameplay, and for 2- 6 players.

Trekking The World

From the moment you unpack this game, you are captivated by its bold and vivid colors. Trekking The World comes with :

  • 1 World Map Board
  • 48 Oversized Destination Cards
  • 5 Trekker Meeples (wooden)
  • 48 Souvenir Cubes (wooden)
  • 1 Custom Bag
  • 5 Suitcase Mats
  • Most Souvenir Tiles
  • 12 Journey Cards
  • 75 Trek Cards
  • 10 Region Bonus Tokens
  • 5 player Aids
  • 1 Score Pad (several sheets)

All of the items for the game can neatly be stored in the convenient box and game piece sorter. The game board and the pieces are made from sturdy cardboard and wood. The games come with complete instructions on how to play. If you don’t want to read through the instructions and need more of a visual approach to gameplay the company provides a step-by-step video link in the box and on the Trekking The World product description on the Underdog Games website.

I am a visual person when learning how to play new games so before we played as a family I watched the video so I knew how to set the board up properly. The video was great because I could stop and play as I needed. After I learned how to set up the board and play the game we set down as a family and watched the video and played. My son loved just exploring the board on the initial set-up. I let him flip through the beautiful “48 Oversized Destination Cards”. I noticed that once we finish playing the game as we were cleaning the game he separated several of the cards and asked if we could look these places up.

Trekking The World gameplay was easy for us once we got the hang of it. We played 3 times over the course of a week. I really loved how we could start the game on any continent then trek across the world. Trekking The World is not just a game for entertainment this game teaches geography, history, and cooperative learning. The game also gives you a great adventure of traveling the world.

I highly recommend this game be added to your homeschool geography gameschooling. If you are new to the gameschooling trend this would be a great way to add a geography game for the entire family.

Be sure to check out the other squad member’s reviews of Trekking The National Parks and Trekking The National Parks Trivia by clicking the banner below.

Critical Thinking and Logic, Education, Family, Geography, Parenting, Reviews

World Watch Review!

Little Learner and Mom

DISCLAIMER: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew

We have been watching WORLD Watch videos on Fridays as part of our current events. WORLD Watch was given to us to review with the crew. We received a six-month subscription for the whole family.

WORLD Watch is a online news program meant for families. WORLD Watch provides news coverage of current events. Events are updated throughout the week. You can watch video coverage of these events.

“WORLD Watch is a video current events program designed for students that develops critical thinking, biblical discernment, and news literacy.”

We watched videos about the Olympics and most recently we watched a video about hurricane Ida outage. It was nice to see a nice of variety of news coverage around the world. There are some political coverage in the videos. My son was intrigued by the triceratops coverage in Paris France and this is from a kiddo that isn’t a huge dinosaur fan.

WORLD Watch videos average about 5-10 mins and they cover single topics or variety of news coverage. We did see videos that offered viewpoints from christian prospective. I personally prefer not to see religion mixed with news. I would have also liked to have seen news reporters that were diverse especially those who are covering more ethnic regions.

WORLD Watch not only covers current events there are also topics that are historical. My son also found interesting the coverage of Nairobi, Kenya about the issues that the hearing and death community having issues with masking wearing that doesn’t allow them to read mouths.

WORLD Watch does have bloopers at the end of the videos that we found to be funny. If you are looking for a clean current events news outlet that allows for the entire family to watch this is a good option. The religious focus isn’t heavily present in the videos but you will hear and see some mentions.

Be sure to check out the other crew’s reviews of WORLD Watch by clicking the banner below.

Social Media Links

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/worldwatchshow
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/worldwatchnews/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLhlnq_RLfpSdQ8Fm6VEEjw

4th Grade, Art, Geography, Homeschool, Reviews

Eat2Explore Review!

Little Learner and Mom

Disclaimer : This is a contribution post for the Melanated Gold Review Squad all the statements are my honest review and products were purchased with my own money.

Cooking is a favorite activity in our home and anytime I can pair a unit study with a Eat2Explore box I jump at the opportunity. When the Melanated Gold Review Squad was given the opportunity to review Eat2Explore I was more than happy to contribute to the team. We have been Eat2Explore subscribers since 2019 and we really enjoy receiving these boxes. Eat2Explore is an award winning culinary box subscription for families. The boxes are sent out monthly or you can select individual boxes to purchase. Families are taken on a culinary adventure to learn about the country of interest . I love when these boxes arrive, they smell so good. The authentic smell of spices kickstart your adventure and then you dig into the box and find all these exciting cooking supplies and lessons.

Each Eat2Explore box comes with:

  • 3 Recipe Cards
  • Spices/Sauce/Grain Mixes
  • Shopping List (LOVE THIS!!!!)
  • Informational Country Card
  • Educational Lessons
  • Special Cooking Tools
  • Country Passport

I love how the company uses stickers on the outside of the box to remind you what country you are visiting that month, this makes for easy organization. Can you believe you get all those items in that one box, just add the fresh ingredients needed. Eat2Explore offers a option to reorder the spices, sauce and grains. We loved the Ethiopia box so much we defiantly took advantage of the box refill option. Having the option to order extra supplies is great if you have a large family or just don’t want the hassle of trying to find the spices yourself. We are a family of 3 and boxes can feed a family of 4. The company does offer vegetarian option boxes and the boxes are easily modified to fit your dietary restrictions.

How I Use:

We use the Eat2Explore as part of any of our geography unit studies. I look to see if we have a box to that fits our geography unit study. If we dont have a box I look for a box in the region of study. We have several of the boxes on hand but there have been a few times I needed to grab a box from the Eat2Explore website. Eat2Explore has excellent customers service and shipping time. We dont cook all three recipes in the boxes every unit study, Let him pick which one he wants and we plan the day for cooking. The recipes we love we keep them in rotation for our monthly “International Dinner Night” and I purchase a spice package from the company. The Eat2Explore boxes adds that extra twist to our units and we look forward to trying new foods and learning about the culture and foods. There have been a few boxes we have had to add some extra seasoning to it for our own taste.

In April we cooked from Singapore box and made the Soy Chicken for dinner and the Ethiopia box is serious hit in this house. My son is learning about Kenya this month so we will taking out our Kenya box picking a something to make. One of the biggest reasons why we have continued to patronize the company is their commitment to detail and diversity.

Eat2Explore boxes can be purchased in bundles or annually subscriptions, the monthly cost of boxes are $24.95 plus shipping. You cancel or pause your subscriptions at anytime, the company also has an add on binder to help you store your recipes. September box is Israel and the October box is Singapore.

Don’t forget to check out the other Melanated Gold Review Squad members reviews by clicking the banner below. You can also check out Eat2Explore Instagram , Facebook , and Pinterest social media pages.

Curriculum, Education, Language Arts

It’s NOT Greek to Me…Review!

Little Learner and Mom

 DISCLAIMER:  I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew

Have you ever struggled with the meaning of words or do you have student that is getting ready to prepare for college entrance exams. One of my most memorable lesson in high school was learning how to decode words using their roots, prefixes and suffixes. I have been reviewing over the summer vocabulary resources I would like to use with my son to get an early start on vocabulary building. One of the resources I was fortunate to be sent is It’s NOT Greek to Me! from Ready to Teach to review with the crew.

It’s NOT Greek to Me! is a vocabulary building curriculum that uses Greek morpheme. What is a morpheme “A morpheme is the smallest unit of meaning in a language. We often call them roots, prefixes, and suffixes.” Students will work on the first set of 140 in It’s NOT Greek to Me! Students will embark on a fun-filled adventure of vocabulary building, with the use of historical background information. It’s NOT Greek to Me! includes stories, comics, coloring, flash cards and colored power point lessons for each lesson.

It’s NOT Greek to Me! curriculum comes with:

  • Instructor Manuel comes completed with 126 pages of 12 lessons, introduction, lesson plans, flash cards, answer key, lesson and review test.
  • Student Book with 12 lessons, colored blank flash cards, Greek morpheme index
  • Book binder ring
  • Paper hole puncher
  • Flash drive -Power Point Lessons

It’s NOT Greek to Me! appeals to all the different learning styles. The curriculum is meant for students in 7th -12 grade. My son is in 4th grade so we did the lessons together and because the curriculum is meant to be done at student own pace we can take our time. Students are able to learn a little historical information about they the Greek system. I did see mentions of Egyptian contributions it would have been nice to see more historical accurate information. The power point lesson were vibrant and my son enjoyed those they helped him better connect to the curriculum. I do like that there are review after every 2 lessons.

Students will work on :

  • Vocabulary building
  • Context clues
  • Creating words
  • Analyzing words

It’s NOT Greek to Me! is a nice curriculum if you are looking for an exciting way to teach roots, prefixes and suffixes. We found it enjoyable and we probably put this in our rotation as we continue to home school through out the years. Be sure to check out the other crew’s reviews on It’s NOT Greek to Me! from Ready to Teach by clicking the banner below.

4th Grade, Critical Thinking and Logic, Education, Family, Homeschool, Language Arts, Morning Basket, Uncategorized, Writing

The Fallacy Detective Review!

Little Learner and Mom

Disclaimer: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew

My son is very inquisitive and we have make a point for him to always search for the truth of the world around him. We are also continuing to incorporate logical thinking skills in our home school lesson. One thing that has been helping us the last few weeks to help feed his need to search for the truth of events and improving his critical thinking skills/logic is the Fallacy Detective .

If you aren’t familiar with the term fallacy “A fallacy is an error in logic – a place where someone has made a mistake in his thinking.” Fallacy Detective is meant to be used with students with students ages 12 and up (but can work with as young as 8 IMO). The books has 38 lessons that are divided up into 5 areas of study.

  • The Inquiring Mind
  • Avoiding the Question
  • Making Assumptions
  • Statistical Fallacies
  • Propaganda

Fallacy Detective starts with a brief introduction about the book and how to use it. Students are given a short passage about the topic of study for that section along with examples of the topic. Students move onto the 1st lesson in that unit and they are given short scenarios and then they have to decide which behavior best fits that scenario. The book have fun illustrations and some are comic strips.

How we used the book!

My son and I do the book together during our table time. I refresh his memory about the unit topic and then I proceed to the lesson with him. The answer key to all the lesson questions are located in the back of the book. What I like about this book is that it provides excellent conversations for him and I. There were times when he felt that the answer key was wrong and he defended his reason why he felt this way. To be honest with you I also found myself thinking the answer to a few of them didn’t fit well. On those days we felt that the answers could have went one way or another I put stars next to the suggested answer and our answers.

I love how this book really got my son to thinking and asking more questions. He also took a lot away from each lessons. I heard him one day tell Francine a character from the cartoon Arthur she wasn’t using an inquiring mind. Lesson 2 hit home for him and I it was about “Love to listen. Do we struggle in this area in our home absolutely….LISTENING IS A DAILY STRUGGLE FRIENDS…. We read the exercise and he said mom this kinda sorts sound a little like how I do things sometimes. I reassured him and that even adults struggle with listening and we all need to continue practicing this skill. I was very happy to see him make the connections to real life situation.

Final word!

The Fallacy Detective in my opinion is a book best done along side a small group and family. The lessons are great conversation starters and I feel like they can lead to further deep discussions. The unit topics can be applied to everyday life happenings. The book really encourages the student to us their critical thinking skills. It also teaches student to look at situations from a different prospective.

I really like Fallacy Detective it will be in rotation for our table time activities. The cost of the book at the time of this review is $9.99 plus taxes/shipping. Be sure to check out the other crew’s reviews by clicking the banner below.

Social Media Links:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fallacydetective
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hansbluedorn/