Wordless Wednesday: costumes!

Happy Halloween!

 Aric is Minecraft Steve

Alex is a Minecraft Creeper

Math-Whizz (A REVIEW)

I love having a lot of options for math in our homeschool day to supplement their lessons, and Math-Whizz by Whizz Education is a perfect way to do that. Since it is an online math tutoring program I don't have to plan or figure out what they need to work or focus on, this program does it all for me beginning with an assessment to see where they are at. As the child moves through the program it can adjust to exactly what the child needs to work on by either letting them skip ahead once they have something down, or focusing on one concept that they really need to get down better before moving on.

This is the screen my kids see immediately after logging in. They can choose to go straight to the studying/tutor part, or they can go to the "Console" which has all their information such as weekly usage and their profile.

I was given a 12-month subscription to Math-Whizz by Whizz Education to try out with my kiddos, and it is all done online. The child can log into their own account to do their studying, and the parent can keep track through a parent account.

The parent dashboard

Before the child does anything they have to take an assessment. This is a series of tests and teaching that assigns the child to a "math age" so the tutor knows where to start the child. The assessment is long (at least that's what the kids say), but it's using that information to figure out what the child knows and what he/she still needs to learn. Once the assessment is completed the student then has access to the console, and can start the tutor. There are also games that they can earn credits to play, buddies, challenges, etc, but the main goal each week is to get at least 30 minutes of tutor time (they can do much more if they/you want to). There is a bar that shows exactly how much time the child has spent each week. This usage time also resets each week.

This is what the student's console looks like.

The student's study room. It's all decorated for a fun holiday right now.

So what does it actually look like when the student is working through the concepts with the tutor? It's a series of questions, games, and fun little mini lessons all done in colorful animation. It is very interactive, and is constantly asking for the child to put a number somewhere, or complete a series, or click on something (the right answer). It takes the child step by step through a complex problem such as long division. It will start with the first step, and take them through each step, having them put the numbers in as it goes on. I also noticed it teaches the new way, which is different from how I learned it, especially in things like division, but it helped my son to finally grasp the concept of long division. He finally gets it now, and he told me that. My way (the old way) was very confusing to him.

This is the tutor/study part of Math-Whizz. This was at the beginning of a session for my 2nd grader.

Since this is online I loved that we could access it from any computer, anywhere that has an internet connection. I didn't try it on any devices, only laptops and computers, so I don't know how it would work on those with all the interaction that is needed, but we could take it on our laptop. Both my 2nd Grader and my 5th grader used this program, and I could see improvements in focus and understanding concepts in both of them. Also, it helps with a lot of mental math, and facts. Both of which my boys could use more of, so it's also a great program for that!

My 5th grader taking the assessment.

My 2nd grader working on it at our main computer. He was using some counters to help him one day. These were just something we had for him to use. The program really encourages them to think and do a lot of mental math, but they might need a scratch paper or some other tools on occasion.

Overall I was very pleased with this online math program. It is fun, interactive, and helped my kids to progress even in the short time we've had it. I highly recommend it for any math learner whether struggling or one who loves math because it can be challenging either way. This is a fun way to supplement, and can be just a few minutes a day.

If you'd like to see what the other crew members had to say about this program you can click on the banner below.

Wordless Wednesday: grinding wheat

We spent our Tuesday morning grinding wheat for the first time. Amazing!

Elephant and Piggie: We are in a play

We had a fun field trip opportunity on Friday to go see the play Elephant and Piggie: We are in a play! with our charter school. We love the Elephant and Piggie books by Mo Willems, and the play was just as fun.

I had only bought 4 tickets for the play thinking that April wouldn't want to go, and I'd just take the 3 boys. Turns out I should have asked her. She says "I want to go!" But by the time I found that out there were no more tickets available for our group. Thankfully Aaron said he didn't care about going, and would be willing to give his ticket to April. So, April, Aric, Alex, and I set out for Portland on Friday morning after dropping Aaron off at a friends house.

Alex read all the Elephant and Piggie books we own on the way. 

Driving in Portland is always an experience, but we arrived well before the show started despite missing our turn and other various traffic issues. So, we took some pictures while we were waiting. Alex was so excited for it to start.

The stage looked fun. They asked us not to take pictures of the show, so I don't have any pictures of the fun characters.

I thought Alex might burst with excitement.

After the show we picked up a program. They don't hand out the nice programs to all the school group shows, but they said we could pick one up if we wanted.  Alex really wanted to buy a poster.

It was a fun show. I love experiences like this. We don't go to plays very often because they can get quite expensive, but I was grateful we made it to this one.

Wordless Wednesday: A Fall walk

The weather and the leaves have been so beautiful here that I just had to get outside last Friday. Especially since it was just a hard day after a long week. Walk location: Sunset Blvd in Sherwood Oregon...

"A Canada leaf"

 Then we played at the park afterward.

 

Science fun: focusing the sun

We are learning about the solar system in our co-op class. This past week our topic was the sun, and each week we'll focus on a different planet for the rest of the semester. One of the projects from the Apologia Elementary Astronomy book is focusing sunlight with a magnifying glass onto a leaf to burn a hole in it. This was an object lesson to prove a point about why it's important we don't look at the sun because our eyes work the same way. My class full of boys LOVED this, and they could have done it all day, I'm sure. I had to drag them away when it was time to go back inside to paint our suns.

We were pretty successful with our leaf burns. Some of the boys had said they've never been successful at doing this, so it made me happy to see all of them burn at least one hole. Most of them several.

 The regular magnifying glass worked pretty good...

 But, the best and most surprising tool was this magnifying sheet from the dollar store. I stopped on the way to class hoping to find some regular magnifying glasses. They didn't have any magnifying glasses of the traditional style, but they did have this magnifying sheet. I just grabbed one thinking there was no way it would really work, but was curious to try anyway.

It turns out the sheet was the best, most effective at getting the sun to focus on the leaf. This became the favorite tool among the boys, and we had to take turns.

In case you are wondering what it looks like...

So, if you're planning to do some science fun with leaves and burning holes this is the best tool! A magnifying sheet from the dollar tree. Be cautious, this does get very hot, and supervise your children when they are doing this science experiment!

Wordless Wednesday: A violin!

Introducing our newest violin player!

His first time playing it when we got home...

His second time pulling it out within the hour of the first time. This is before he had started any lessons yet.

Lets just say, he's excited!