Review: Poetry Memorization from IEW

I love Institute for Excellence in Writing products.  In fact, some of you know that my middle schooler has done some writing for a local new publication, and I credit all of that to IEW and their method for teaching writing.  I was more than happy to try Institute for Excellence in Writing's Linguistic Development Through Poetry Memorization Teachers Manual and Student Notebook.  This course is $65 and comes with a spiral bound book of poems and CDs to help you help your student become and excellent communicator, enrich their vocabulary, and help them learn complex and beautiful organization of the English language by cementing it into their minds through poetry!You can also opt to order the Student Book, which we received with our review materials.

The curriculum comes with 96 poems and speeches which are read on CD.  I really appreciate any curriculum that comes on CD because in our model of homeschooling I do an insane amount of reading and tire of the sound of my own voice.  There are also memory charts, poet biographies, and a CD from Andrew Pudewa's "Nuturing Competent Communicators."  I'm a fan of Andrew in his elephant tie from teaching writing structure and style, but this was fantastic information, as well. This talk really helps you to understand why memorization is vital to your child's success as a communicator, and as a student in general.

In this program you learn that memorization helps students become better writers and communicators because it gives them something to pull from, just like learning vocabulary and spelling words, memorization of great speech, literature, and poetry gives them a background knowledge base to pull their words and structure from.  There are five units of memorization, the first four are all poems which become increasingly more difficult and the last contains speeches.  As your children master the progression they move to the next level, and all students are recommended to begin at level one.

We started in level one, and the kids spent about 8-10 minutes a day working on the poetry without me using the CD.  They practiced the poem alone until they felt ready to recite it to me.  On the first poem this got complicated since with my 6th, 4th, and 2nd grader, everyone felt ready to recite and move on at a different pace so they couldn't work together the way I'd planned, but it still worked very independently for us, they just needed to take turns with the CD.  Once a student masters a poem, they move on to the next one, but continue to practice the poems they've already learned.  At the end of level one, they should be able to recite all of the poems from that level.  The book includes a chart for you to track when you recited your learned poems.

I have enjoyed this program and plan on setting it to the side for summer and then using it as a morning activity next year throughout the school year.  It's a quick "wake up your brain" for us, and I love that it supplements our writing activities.  If you're a teacher (home or school) I really highly recommend all of IEWs programs and approaches.  You can check them out here:
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And if you'd like to see what other crew members thought about this particular curriculum, you can read more about it by using the link below.

Review: Times Tales

More educational supplement reviews!! As we're heading into SOL time here in Virginia, I hope that these reviews will be helpful to all of you, not just homeschoolers! This one is particularly good- The Trigger Memory Co. provided us with the digital version of Times Tales for us to use in our home school, and we have really enjoyed it. I used the product with my 10 year old 4th grader, who already "knew" his times tables and wasn't super interested, but my 8 year old second grader really likes the program and has asked to use it each day.

Times Tales is, admittedly, a little weird at first.  I learned my multiplication tables the old fashioned way- my mom ran through flashcards until I cried, she yelled, and I tried again.  Eventually I got really fast at them, and then the dreaded cards went away, not to be seen or heard from again until my own children needed to learn.  Times tales, however, takes a very different approach.  If you have a learner that doesn't like route memorization or that does better with visual learning, this might be exactly what you've been looking for- whether you need a refresher before testing or you need to teach multiplication from scratch.

Each multiplication fact is told as a story.  In the first CD or digital download, the student is introduced to a cast of characters like Mr. and Mrs. Week (who only go out together).  Once they memorize the characters and confirm they know each one, they are able to move on to learning the "tales" portion.  Here's my daughter explaining a little more:

We've really enjoyed Times Tales for helping Savannah learn her multiplication facts, and we think that it's a great option, especially for kids that have not enjoyed learning facts in more "traditional" ways, or parents who just want to make multiplication fun from the outset! Another thing I really like about this program is that it moves seamlessly from online to offline.  The program includes printable resources that make a lot of sense- they start with the images of the characters your children have learned and then move to math facts with regular numbers, allowing your child to move from the stories to the written math to traditional math easily and without tears.  Additionally, the program is very easy to use- Savannah was able to use this as a supplement to her regular math curriculum without my assistance, which is always nice when you have three learners who need you.  At this point, after being taught how to open and run the program, she can do it entirely independently, although she's quite comfortable with her math facts after only a few hours using Times Tales and doesn't really need it anymore!

You can purchase a digital download of Times Tales for just $19.95 right now, and there's no waiting or shipping because it's instantly delivered to your computer.  If you're a classroom teacher, they also have classroom bundles available that include mini flip charts and a classroom sized flip chart, as well as a CD to print all of the hard-copy reinforcements that I mentioned earlier.  We really liked using Times Tales and think you'll like it, too! It's a little different, but if it's your learning style, it's the perfect way to learn your math facts in a fun way with no tears!

Review: EdTechLens Rainforest Journey

Our most recent Schoolhouse Review Crew opportunity was to check out EdTechLens' Rainforest Journey program.  With three children in various grade levels, I am always interested in trying out digital options that might give me the opportunity to have each child engaged, even if I need to be providing one-on-one support to another child.  Our science coop is studying animals this year, so I thought that the Rainforest Journey would be a great way for my second grader, especially, to dive deeper into learning about animals.  We also received the 4th grade version, but my son wasn't interested at all- he thought that it was "too young" for him, and so we focused on 2nd grade. 

She's really enjoyed exploring the different families and species this year, and the Rainforest has some of the coolest animals on the planet, in my humble opinion. 

Rainforest Journey comes with a teacher account and a student account, and we initially had a little bit of trouble figuring out how to navigate to the student account and I actually had to email tech support for assistance, but they were incredibly friendly and taught me the trick- which was to sign completely out of the teacher version and use the assigned student ID (which was not the ID I gave my child, but a randomly assigned name) and password.  This fixed the problem and we were able to log in successfully.  

The pictures and videos are really vibrant and engaging.  Each lesson is divided into very manageable pieces that took my second grader, Savannah, about 8 minutes to get through.  The course is divided up into 5 units, and each unit is then divided into chapters and each chapter into lessons.  Generally, the lessons start with a picture followed by some information, generally 1-2 sentences, which you can opt to have read to you by clicking on an audio button.  At the end of each lesson, there is the option to print out an enrichment activity.

I like that the program tracks your child's progress for you, so you know where they're at.  I feel like there could be more information provided, especially since there is the capacity for embedded video, so even readers that lack confidence could enjoy more information without struggling. The amount of information is really just a tidbit. 

We think that Rainforest Journey has a lot of potential.  It's definitely not a "use alone" course that my second grader could do without me because it requires a lot of clicking and scrolling.  On page one of the lesson, you have to click up to 6 times to get through the lesson, if you want the sentences read to you, and many of the "pages" end up being several screens.  Also, the enrichment activity isn't on the computer, which I think would be nicer.  If I’m going to use an online program, I would really like it to be an online program, not something that I have to prep for by printing and gathering materials.

At the same time, my daughter has really enjoyed the pictures and will ask to do "that science on the computer" when we have time in the afternoons.  I like that they included primary sources and scientists, and I love the idea of Rainforest Journey as a supplement, but I would invest in it after it’s made a little more user-friendly and requires far less clicking and includes a little more information.