Helpful Homeschool Links and Information

I've been needing to put this together for a long time to share with a couple of friends and also just to have all of these links documented somewhere. I got most of these from trusted homeschooling friends and we stumbled up on a few of them on our own.

If you're going to homeschool, whatever you decide to use, be okay with making adjustments to make it fit you and your child. You're probably not going to find anything that is perfect. However, Teaching Textbooks for math comes pretty darn close! That is my all-time favorite and I can't say enough good about it!

In most communities, you can find homeschool groups to join that enable you to network ideas and also participate in field trips, etc. There are also many co-op options in most areas. Just takes a little digging. The internet might just be your most valuable tool! We haven't participated in the groups or co-ops but they are always an option for something you might not feel comfortable teaching. For me, one of the downfalls of homeschooling is that I lack passion in teaching particular subjects. A trained and educated teacher might have been able to make Julius Caesar come alive for Jakeb or Alegbra 2 be fun or come up with a much better science or history project for a 4th grader. But since I'm not knowledgeable about those things (and other things) I almost feel like my kids are sometimes missing out. This is out-weighed, however, by many, many other benefits.

I'm sure this is not a comprehensive listing. When I think of or run across other helpful information or links, I'll post again. If anyone reading has anything to add, please feel free to comment.

My main pieces of advice for homeschool parents are:
1) If you're married, both husband and wife need to have a strong committment and dedication level. This has been a very challenging year for me (and fulfilling!) but without Tommy's support and help, I would definitely have gone bonkers! If you're single, make sure you have some type of support from grandparents or close family and friends or a homeschool group. It would be so hard to do this alone!
2) Be sure and physically look at your curriculum choices if at all possible. Either at a store or at a friends house. We were headed in one direction with Anna but when I physically saw it, it was absolute chaos on a page and would not have worked well for Anna's learning style at all! Saved us a ton of money!
3) Remain open minded to new ideas and techniques. If something is not working, be willing to try something new.
4) Be flexible but not so flexible that your kids think they are in control and can do whatever they want.
5) Relax every now and then, ditch the lessons and have fun being with your kids! Instead of reading about clouds in your science book, go outside and look at them. What a treasured time!!


Links we've actually used:

http://freetypinggame.net/ This site is tons of fun for the family to play with each other!

http://www.multiplication.com/interactive_games.htm Anna struggled with her multiplication tables at the beginning of the year. She knows them well thanks to this and some other fun math games we found. We love the Jump Start software games and I also found a music cd with the multiplication tables put to classical tunes. She HATED it but it was incentive to learn them when I told her that when she learned them all she wouldn't have to listen to it anymore. :)

Snagfilms (You can find some documentaries here that are hard to find. This has been helpful to enhance history and science lessons.)

The Homeschool Store This is a great store in Houston and the only one I've been to. They have a lot of new and used stuff. It's stuffed from wall to wall so bring your Starbucks and plan on staying for a couple of hours and you might consider leaving your young kids with grandma or a friend. You'll need to be able to focus if you're going to research. They do have a video corner and they welcome kids, of course.

Homeschool Tracker (LOVE this! I could not stay organized without it. I make my lesson plans on this and enter grades. It tracks attendance and spits me out report cards. Wonderful tool! We used the free download since we only planned on homeschooling for one year. I'm sure the one you pay for is much better if you don't mind paying for it.)

A Beka We used this for most of Anna's curriculum. I have some major issues with how "King James" it is but we just made our own adjustments. It was our fall back since we used it when we homeschooled Tori in the 4th grade. I couldn't find anything else that I was happy with so we went with A Beka again. It's laid out well for non teachers such as me with handy lesson plans and answer keys and such. I particularly liked the core subjects in these - History, Science and Language. The reading program has been very helpful for her and she has improved considerably. Anna really enjoyed the science and we liked how it brings our history and creation back to the Creator. Math was okay but we ended up switching to Teaching Textbooks.

Teaching Textbooks (math) My FAVORITE math. We use for Jakeb, Algebra 2 and Geometry. We even switched Anna from A Beka to this mid year. It's awesome for the student and the teacher!! Only starts at 4th grade right now, though.

Rosetta Stone for Homeschool They have a great setup for tracking the kids lessons and grades for homeschool use. You can buy one and the whole family can learn. Can only be loaded onto one computer.

Apologia We used this for Jakeb's chemistry. A challenge but great curriculum. The chemistry home lab kit is even available.

BJU Press We used their World History for Jakeb. We love how it's built around the bible. Very intense, though, and covers a lot of material.

Rainbow Resource This is a one stop shop for homeschool curriculum. We ordered most of what we needed from here when we got started. Their prices are good. It's also a good place to go dig around and see what other curriculum options are out there that you may not be aware of.

Amazon They actually have a lot of homeschool stuff. We order Jakeb's history from Amazon to utilize the free shipping over $25 option.

Christian Book Distributors Same here. Good resource to price compare.

Progeny Press This is what we've used for Jakeb's literature. You can order age appropriate books and a study guide to go with it. I'm thinking of getting one of these for Anna to finish out her year and have something different to do than A Beka. They are very reasonably priced. We also used this for Jakeb's Poetry. He didn't like it but it was a good study.

Wordsmith (Creative Writing) We used this for Jakeb. The A Beka writing program, Penmanship and Language A, was fine for Anna.

Vocabulary from Classical Roots We used this for Jakeb to prepare him for SAT. It's laid out well but is a challenge to teach. He has learned a lot, though, that will be helpful for him when taking the SAT.

Analogies 2 We got this for Jakeb also to use to prepare for the SAT. Again, it's not fun but necessary.



Recommended links that we didn't use:

Kid Test I totally meant to use this and forgot about it until now when I was going through all of my emails to get these links. I may still go do this for Anna & Jakeb to see if they're on track. It's not free but I can't remember how much it is. Maybe $25 or something like that.

Dive Into Math

HEP Bookstore Homeschool Store in Houston. This store offers SAT prep courses and other helpful classes like how to make your student's transcript and such. Great resource but I haven't needed it. I did get some great info from their website when we began though from the FAQ's page. You should definitely check that out!

http://www.bravewriter.com/

http://www.excellenceinwriting.com/

http://www.sonlight.com/

http://www.mathusee.com/


UPDATE
Here are two more links for some good science project ideas that I found. I actually pulled several easy ones to try this week for Anna's study of matter, air and weather but there are lots of others there for young and old kiddos.

http://www.hometrainingtools.com/articles/acat_science-projects.html

http://home.howstuffworks.com/science-projects-for-kids-weather-and-seasons13.htm


UPDATE 2
This is a great resource for parents of children with learning disabilities or issues. They also have a resource for homeschool support. Check it out!
http://www.thewoodlandslearningcenter.com/