TOS Crew Review: KBTeachers (worksheets, printable pages)

This should come as no surprise to my regular blog visitors, but I am not a big fan of using worksheets to teach.  But alas, even I realize there are moment when they come in quite handy.  I especially like the challenge of taking a worksheet and turning it into a learning tool for my children.  So actually, I do find that I can tweak one to get something useful for memory work, or to cement a particular lesson into my kids' noodles.  There are times too-when I want to avoid having an "idle hands and mind" moment with one student, whilst I work with another, and  I much prefer it to be in the educational spectrum. So again, this may mean I need to dip into the worksheet world to prevent this.

The ability to find quality material is a bit of challenge, not to mention a time swallower. Having a membership with a company that already has that done for me, is a fabulous thing.  Enter KBTeachers,  an online smörgåsbord of such things like: a worksheet generator, clip art [original artwork here] that can be used in my own personal projects or on my blogs; as well as a good variety of math, science, and fun activities I can access, and print as needed.

This is a free worksheet on the Rainforest layers. 

  It serves as a great example of how 

I could "tweak" this by having my student complete it, 

to place it in a lapbook on climates, or in a science notebook, etc.  

I was particularly happy to see the sign language section, as we will have that course in our next co-op session. I know that will come in quite handy!  I love how I can type in a message that they will need to decipher, and it is not limited because I can create new ones every time.  They also have a section dedicated to the current month's goings on-and it is prominently displayed in the upper most left-hand corner, so you are sure to see it. Best yet-they have a monthly webquest section, with live links to sites regarding the gem of the day (such as Veteran's Day, Popcorn Day, Gettysburg day and so forth) designed to provide additional resources for our studies.

My example here of this sign language activity.  

Can you read it? 

Look at the bottom of the review for the answer.

I am also impressed to see they have material designed for children in the older grades (Jr/Sr high) which is not an easy thing to find.  Best yet, they still offer up some goodies for the younger set-so this is a nice option for families with all age levels to address, like us.  And although I do not usually budget for, nor purposely seek out such sites to purchase a membership [because we try to avoid having too much paper busywork in our daily studies]-I am very glad I was chosen to be a part of this review.  I can see great potential for supplementing our lapbooks/notebooks for our current and future studies; and look forward to their additions and new material. My best suggestion is for you to sign up for the trial period, to see if the site addresses your family's needs.

An FYI moment: thankfully, the team at KBTeachers is open to many suggestions from their clients, especially one I addressed which was the need for more Christian materials.  I saw a positive response, and hopefully down the road they will have more in their collection to offer us.  Be forewarned here, the majority of the science section is evolution based-so simply avoid those if you are uncomfy with it. There are plenty enough other subject materials to use that are benign. Personally, I would like to see the sciences/geology worksheets become less date oriented-meaning they note the information about the subject, without pinpointing a date in time it was to have occurred.  That way it suits both group's needs, allowing for the teacher to decide what time frame they want to place it in.  Also, it would be uncharacteristic of me if I didn't note that many of the worksheets are typical of what you'd expect to find PS/PS teachers using.  Like I mentioned in the beginning though, these can be used in part, or cut up to create a more "hands on" type of activity for projects and such. Creativity is one of the homeschooler's best weapons to teaching "outside the box" and this is an example of just such a moment.





I didn't put a kid icon on here b/cuz you use this to create material or download it for your students-all ages are addressed though.
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KBTeachers Homepage (currently undergoing major web design changes, so look for that soon)
$29 with trial/then 1 year membership,  $49 for 2 year membership
Try their 10 day free trial  before you buy.
They also have free pages to download without signing up for the trial-just look for those under the specific subjects.

Don't forget to see what my TOS mates had to say about this and many other fine homeschool products over on our TOS Review Crew Homepage. To read the posts specifically for this review, head to KBteachers TOS postings for that info.

**KBTeachers provided me with a 2 year membership so that I could access and use their worksheets to assist in educating my children, and so that I could write this review.  I did not receive any financial compensation for my honest opinion of their product/service.

Answer to the sign language worksheet: This is a fun part of the KBteachers site.

TOS Review Crew: The Corps of Re-Discovery

Oooh, this is a fun one!  Head over to the TOS Crew Review homepage, to find out what my fellow mates had to say about the item they received to review.  This company is perfect for those handicraft needs, history tie-ins and so forth.  I have my mini-review posted in the product description (I was the head First Mate) so you can see exactly what I am talking about.  Just wanted to do a little FYI here.

In a hurry? 

 Then head to the Corps of Re-Discovery homepage to take a look-see for yourself.  

I have created another blog all about Charlotte Mason homeschooling

I found that I simply needed to create a blog dedicated to the CM areas of our homeschool. I hope this will serve as a blessing, and challenge you to try her methods as a part of doing "school" with your family. Even if you are new to CM, or an old timey CMer-I pray something there will encourage you or provide a new idea or two.

I will be adding posts as fast as I can, I have a lot of ideas and also will be cross-posting old posts from my other blogs to this one for you (so you can find the info quickly). I hope to have an intro to CM and how we use it someday soon--but until then, I have linked in many great blogs, sites and companies that are all about CM.

Stop by for a visit and tell your friends!

A Charlotte Mason Homeschool Sampler

TOS Crew Review: Collectorz (Book Collector)

Do you have more books than your local library? Or all the libraries in your county combined?  I do believe that one "illness" many homeschoolers develop, [either out of necessity or just the plain love of the printed word] is the book-bingies. Yes, that lovely, yet overstuffed shelves disease, that plagues many of us.  And how many of these afflicted individuals truly know their actual book count, let alone the titles of them?  And how many long for the ability to pull up that data at the drop of a hat [like when it is a  "need to know now" emergency]; so as to not to plop down more cash on a load of books they already own?

Amazingly, there is a company that provides a nifty product, that can do that and more!  You purchase your desired plan (or edition), log in, scan (or type manually) the bar codes from your book collection, choose a cover picture, file according to your personal organizing needs, mark loaned books, rate the books and so on and so forth!  Quite easy to do, with extremely wonderful results.  No more "me thinks me has that" moments regarding what you own.

Collectorz is a database software which allows for you to play "librarian" so you can track your books.  You can also check your list away from home on your iPhone/iPod touch (if you own one, $9.99 app. fee) so that you won't accidentally purchase books you already own, or pass up one you really needed.  You can see if you have a particular one to loan, or just scroll thru and drool over your vast array to feed your book-bingies itch.   They also offer programs to track your movies, games, music, MP3, photo and comic collections.  The only improvement I think they could add there, would be an edition to track a person's array of Pez dispensers, or a kid's explosion of Matchbox cars; but outside of that I think they have you pretty well covered.

I was totally geeked when I saw that I would be receiving this baby to review.  I quickly decided after punching in a few books manually, that I needed to get myself one of those CueCats [not too spency] to scan the bar codes, to save much precious time when logging in my huge collection.  I highly recommend that extra to anyone with more than a few books, because it is easy to use (be sure it is set to USB ports so you can click it in and go) and will make your log time minimal.  Due to some unfortunate and rather untimely death of my computer-I haven't had much time to play with this.  I was only able to log about a snippet's worth of my books, but from what I did experience, it was pretty nice.  I liked being able to choose a cover icon to have in the data section (since I am a visual person and that just makes it easily identifiable for me), rate my stuff with stars, organize it according to genres, subject, etc.-and best yet, I have an easy way to see what I own.  That is huge for me.  Once I re-establish the system on a new computer, I can get back to business and be all organized like. My CueCat anxiously awaits the day we get going on this project again, and so do I!



Collectorz is the way to go if you have such needs; and with a free trial (up to 100 books), there is no reason not to take a dip into the organized pool of coolness.








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Collectorz Homepage

Standard Edition:  $24.95,  Pro:  $49.95

Don't forget to see what my fellow TOS mates had to say about this and many other fine homeschooling products over on our TOS Crew Review Homepage.

***Collectorz provided me with a free Pro version of their Book Collector to test and use, so that I could not only record my vast collection of books,  but say for the opportunity to write this review.  No financial compensation was received for my honest opinion of their product.