Believe it or not, I found even more books on my shelves that we don't need anymore. If you're interested in purchasing any of these books, please contact me through this form at the bottom of this page. If you have further questions about any of the books, you can use the form to ask those questions as well.

If you'd like to see a larger photo of a book in the listings below, you can click on the thumbnail image to see a larger image.

If a book is pending sale, I will attempt to note that in the listings below. Sometimes sales fall through, so if you are interest in a book that is pending sale, go ahead and let me know and I'll put you in line for that item if the book becomes available again. If a book sells, I will remove the listing entirely.

All books will be shipped media mail, and I will charge you only actual shipping costs. Payment is accepted via PayPal (Note: You do not have to have a PayPal account to pay via PayPal.)

Math

Math Word Problems, by Anita Harnadek (Critical Thinking Books), 312 pages, $8

Science

A History of Science (Beautiful Feet), $9
Science Experiment Pamphlet (used with A History of Science), $4

Explorabook: A Kids' Science Museum in a Book (used with A History of Science), $5

Science Scope (Design-a-Study), by Kathryn Stout , $6

Language Arts

Wordly Wise Book 5: Test Booklet (3rd Edition), $8

Wordly Wise Book 5: Answer Key (2nd Edition), please note that this is NOT the same edition as the test booklet listed above, $2

Social Studies

Early American History for Intermediate Grades (Beautiful Feet), by Rea C. Berg, $10

I Can Read About the First Thanksgiving (around 2nd grade reading level), $1

…If You Lived at the Time of the Great San Francisco Earthquake, by Ellen Levine (3rd+ reading level), $2

The Columbia History of the World, edited by John A. Garraty and Peter Gay, $10

George Washington the Christian, by William J. Johnson (Christian Liberty Press), probably jr. high to high school reading level, $5

The Life of J.E.B. Stuart, by Mrs. M.L. Williamson (Christian Liberty Press), probably jr. high to high school reading level, $5

The Story of the Rough Riders, by Zachary Kent (Cornerstones of Freedom), $2

The Story of Ellis Island, by R. Conrad Stein (Cornerstones of Freedom), hardback, $4

The Story of Mount Rushmore, by Marilyn Prolman, hardback,$3

Hinduism, by Premesh Ratnakar, $3

Islam, by Azra Kidwai, $3

The Sikhs, by Gurbachan Singh, $3

Buddhism, by Pushpesh Pant, $3

Francisco Pizarro (History's Villains), by Scott Ingram, $4

Foreign Language

English Grammar for Students of Latin, by Norma Goldman and Ladislas Szymanski, $5

The Random House Basic Dictionary Spanish-English-Spanish, $3

Miscellaneous

Baking Illustrated by the editors of Cook's Illustrated Magazine (my family is almost entirely gluten-free now, so this cookbook was never used!), $12

Shepherding a Child's Heart, by Tedd Tripp, $6

The Myth of the Perfect Mother, by Carla Barnhill, $3

Submit the Book(s) You Are Interested In

Homeschool Curriculum Book Sale is an original post from Five J's™.

I was recently introduced to a great art & drawing lessons resource for homeschoolers called The Virtual Instructor. The site offers both free and premium art lessons via video tutorials.

The instructor, Matt Fussell—who is not only an excellent artist but a wonderful teacher—contacted me a few weeks ago to let me know about his website. He also graciously agreed to give my family a complimentary membership so I can look over everything the site has to offer and review it for my readers. And I must say, I was quite impressed!

The Review

The Virtual Instructor is a website full of video-based art lessons and tutorials, many of which are accessible for free. There are plenty of videos to watch for free, but if you want even more, the reasonably-priced annual membership option gives you even greater access to the site (and it also has a 30-day money back guarantee). Members can:

• watch and/or download each video ad-free
• access The Virtual Instructor's weekly live lessons where students can even interact with Matt and ask questions.
• access the 28-lesson "The Secrets of Drawing" course which even comes with an accompanying ebook for each video lesson.

The Virtual Instructor website is very user friendly and is organized quite well so you can find exactly what you want. If you want to watch drawing lessons, painting lessons, digital drawing lessons, or even art lessons based on medium (graphite, watercolor, acrylic, ect), you can find them easily through the menu bar on the left.

And if you like to use the site as a formal curriculum as many homeschoolers might like to do, he even offers free art lesson plans.

Here's an example of one of his free art lessons about drawing hands. (NOTE: If you're reading via RSS or email, you may need to click through to the post to watch the video):

My 10-year-old daughter Joely has been poring over the site for the last few weeks. She has completed "The Secrets of Drawing" course and has been watching as many of the other videos as she can as well. She's thoroughly enjoyed the lessons, and even though it's been a short time since she started The Virtual Instructor, I've already noticed a marked improvement in her skills.

Here's what Joely says about The Virtual Instructor.

"My favorite thing about The Virtual Instructor is that whatever you want to learn about, he has a video or a live lesson on that topic. There is watercolor. There is acrylic painting. Graphite. Anything you want to learn! I've been at it for a few weeks and I've improved a lot."

Review: Art Lessons & Tutorials from The Virtual Instructor is an original post from Five J's™.

I mentioned in my curriculum post that next year my children will be tutored in Spanish by a friend of ours who is just about to graduate from college with a Bachelor's degree in Spanish. I also mentioned that in addition to tutoring my kids, Mary is also going to be offering Spanish I classes online next year for homeschoolers.

At this point, she is offering both a Middle School and a High School class. Both classes will be using the BJU Spanish I curricululm, but the Middle School class will be moving at a slower pace and will cover the first half of the curriculum.

So if you have a child who is motivated to learn Spanish and you'd be interested in receiving more information about the Spanish 1 classes that will be offered online for the 2013-2014 school year, please fill out the form below. By filling out the form below, you are simply letting Mary know that you are interested in getting more information about the online classes, you are not actually signing up for classes. Mary will correspond with you about more details in the next few weeks.

There are only a limited number of student seats available in the classes, so Mary will probably not be able to accept every student who applies. But if you're interested in learning more about the classes, please submit the form below.

* (denotes required field)

Name:*

E-Mail Address:*

Age(s) of interested student(s)?

At this point, would you be interested in the Middle School or High School course?

Any more info you'd like to add?

CAPTCHA Code:*

Online Spanish 1 Classes for Homeschoolers is an original post from Five J's™.

There are a lot of changes going on at the Five J's home. For starters, my husband is retiring from full-time music ministry in a few weeks and will be working from home with me at Five J's Design (and helping me develop a curriculum we hope to have out by the beginning of 2014!).

As far as homeschooling goes, since he'll be available during the day to help with the homeschooling (and because our income will be substantially less than it has been) we won't be doing any online classes this next year. Consequently, our curriculum plan is quite a bit different from previous years.

Here's our planned curriculum for the upcoming school year. As always, it's subject to (a lot of) change.

6th Grade Girl

• Language Arts: Cover Story (for composition and grammar—we are SO excited about this!), Wordly Wise Book 6 (vocabulary) and additional independent reading. If you're wondering why Joely doesn't have spelling, it's because she's never done formal spelling and doesn't seem to need it. I've periodically 'tested' her, and she spells beyond her 'grade level' probably because she's a pretty big reader and a visual learner. As a result, we don't use a formal spelling curriculum.
• Math: Finish the rest of Singapore Math 6B, Challenging Word Problems 6, and Key to Percents, and then move on to Chalk Dust Basic Math
• Science: God’s Design for Chemistry & Ecology (a set of 3 books) She's almost done with the Properties of Matter book this year, so she'll only have two of the three books to work through next year.
• Social Studies: Read Student News Daily every day (which we've done for a couple years now), finish book 2 of Uncle Sam and You, then move on to Uncle Eric books (at least What Ever Happened to Penny Candy?, Whatever Happened to Justice?, Are You Liberal? Conservative? or Confused?)
• Foreign Language: Español Para Chicos y Grandes (Level 2) She'll be tutored by Mary, a friend of ours who is a college student majoring in Spanish. Mary went through Level 1 with Joely this year and we are very pleased with the curriculum.
• Music: Drums, using Alfred’s Beginning Drumset Method and theory using Practica Musica software.
• Physical Education: local judo classes 2 times a week.

9th Grade Girl

• Language Arts: Excellence in Literature: Literature and Composition (we purchased the ebook edition so that doing the web research will be a little easier), Wordly Wise 9, and additional independent reading.
  
• Math: Chalk Dust Algebra 1
• Science: Exploring Creation with Biology
• Social Studies: Exploring Government
• Foreign Language: BJU Spanish 2. Jerah took Spanish 1 this year through The Potters School, but next year she'll be tutored by Mary, our Spanish major friend. (And by the way, if you might be interested in having your middle school or high school student take an online beginning Spanish 1 class next school year, send me an email. Mary is planning to teach Spanish 1 online next year and would like to get the word out to interested students.)
• (Elective) Entrepreneurism: Venture Academy Online, plus additional reading including, but not limited to, Business by the Book, Small Time Operator, and EntreLeadership
• Music: Bass guitar, using Hal Leonard Bass Method, and theory using Practica Musica software.
• Physical Education: local judo classes 2 times a week.

11th Grade Boy

• Language Arts: Lightning Literature: World Lit 1 & 2
• Social Studies: World Geography using BJU Cultural Geography in combination with the World Literature course above.
• Math & Computer Science: ACT-SAT Math Review by Chalk Dust and Computer Science (Computer Science is replacing one of Jaden's math credits) using TeenCoder Java & Android Programming
  
• Science: We're making our own course in electrionics & audio engineering technology. We're not doing a typical 'science' curriculum like Marine Biology or Astronomy since we want to make it more applicable to what Jaden is interested in and will likely be using in his future line of work. For his senior year, he'll do Physics, but for his junior year we're breaking out on our own. We'll be using MAKE: Electronics, CASTLE (Capacitor-Aided System for Teaching and Learning Electricity) ( the CASTLE curriculum itself is free), YouTube tutorials, tutoring from my genius father, and Lynda.com for the Audio Engineering Technology courses. This is our tentative plan for the course, but our final syllabus and resource list won't be finalized until July or August.
  
• Economics: Exploring Economics (finishing up the last few lessons)
  
• Foreign Language: BJU Spanish 2. Like his sister, Jaden took Spanish 1 this year through The Potters School, but next year he'll also be tutored by Mary, our Spanish major friend. (And again, if you are interested in having your middle school or high school student take an online beginning Spanish 1 class next school year with Mary, send me an email.)
  
• Music: Guitar, using A Modern Method for Guitar, Reading Studies for Guitar, Melodic Rhythms for Guitar, Coursera.com courses, and theory using Practica Musica software.
  
• (Elective) Entrepreneurism: Venture Academy Online, plus additional reading including, but not limited to, Business by the Book, Small Time Operator, and EntreLeadership
• ACT Prep: using Cracking the ACT

Our 2013-2014 Homeschool Curriculum Plan is an original post from Five J's™.

Starting today and lasting through May 4th you can buy this incredible bundle of 97 ebooks and ecourses for just $29.97 (that's less than 31 cents per ebook/ecourse!). The bundle has a value of over $600, so this is truly an awesome deal.

The ebook bundle includes books on the following topics:

• mothering
• home education
• home organization and cleaning
• recipes and kitchen helps
• spiritual growth for both moms and kids
• marriage & romance
• home decor and DIY
• pregnancy and baby care
• frugal living
• health, fitness & beauty
• budgeting both time & money
• working from home & blogging
• holidays & special events

When you purchase The Ultimate Homemaking eBook collection, you will get instant access to all of the 97 eBooks and eCourses listed below plus over $140 of FREE Bonuses.

Here are the ebooks and ecourses included in bundle.

Home & Property {Cleaning, Organizing, Decor}

• 31 Days to Clean by Sarah Mae @ SarahMae.com ($4.99)
• Getting it Together: Your Guide to Setting Up a Home Management System that Works by Kayse @ kayse pratt ($3.99)
• Pulling Yourself Together: Implementing a Cleaning Routine that Sticks by Becky @ Clean Mama ($10.00)
• Simple Living by Lorilee @ Loving Simple Living ($2.99)
• NOT a DIY Diva by Melissa @ The Inspired Room ($3.99)
• One Bite at a Time: 52 Projects for Making Life Simpler by Tsh @ Simple Mom ($5.00)
• 28 Days to Hope for your Home by Dana @ A Slob Comes Clean ($5.00)
• Organizing Life as Mom by Jessica @ Life as Mom ($9.00)
• Clean Enough: Simple Solutions for the Overwhelmed by Jenni @ Live Called ($4.99)
• 10 Steps to Organized Paper by Lisa @ Lisa Woodruff.net($5.00)
• Handmade Walls by Jamin and Ashley @ the handmade home ($9.95)
• Easy Peasy Chores: An Easy-to-Use Chore System That Brings JOY Back Into Family Chores by Alina Joy @ The Good Old Days Farm ($17.99)

Educational Children's Resources

• Princess Training by Richele @ Under the Golden Apple Tree ($3.99)
• The Armor of God by Richele @ Under the Golden Apple Tree ($2.50)
• My Bedtime Learning Book by Richele @ Under the Golden Apple Tree ($1.00)
• Think Outside the Classroom by Kelly @ Generation Cedar ($6.97)
• Raising Rock Stars — Kindergarten Bundle by Carissa @ 1plus1plus1equals1 ($10.00)
• The ABC's For Godly Boys Curriculum by Lindsey @ Road to 31 ($8.00)
• The ABC's For Godly Girls Curriculum by Lindsey @ Road to 31 ($8.00)
• K4 Curriculum by Erica @ Confessions of a Homeschooler ($15.00)
• Write Through the Bible (print) by Trisha @ Intoxicated on Life ($5.00)
• Write Through the Bible (cursive) by Trisha @ Intoxicated on Life ($5.00)
• Balcony Girls (books 1 & 2) by Sandy @ Reluctant Entertainer ($19.90)
• The Dig for Kids: Luke (Volumes 1 and 2) by Patrick, husband of Ruth @ The Better Mom ($5.98)
• Music: An Essential Ingredient for Life by Ryan @ Resound School of Music ($6.99)

Budgeting {Finance & Time}

• From Debtor to Better by Barry @ From Debtor to Better ($10.00)
• Tell Your Time by Amy @ Blogging with Amy ($2.99)
• The Homemakers Guide to Creating the Perfect Schedule by Amy @ Raising Arrows ($4.99)
• Your Grocery Budget Toolbox by Anne @ Authentic Simplicity ($7.99)
• Finding Financial Freedom by Kelly @ Generation Cedar ($5.97)
• Become a Frugalista in 30 Days by Susan @ The Confident Mom ($3.99)

In the Kitchen {Recipes and Cooking}

• Crock On by Stacy @ Stacy Makes Cents ($5.00)
• Real Food, Real Easy by various bloggers @ The Humbled Homemaker ($9.95)
• Wholesome Mixes by Kristy @ Little Natural Cottage ($4.00)
• 20-Minute Meals by Leigh Ann @ Intentional by Grace ($4.99)
• Restocking the Pantry by Kresha @ Nourishing Joy ($9.99)
• Money Saving Mom's Guide to Freezer Cooking by Crystal @ Money Saving Mom ($3.99)
• Simply Summer by Kate @ Modern Alternative Mama ($7.95)
• Do the Funky Kitchen by Laura @ Heavenly Homemakers ($4.95)
• Real Food Kids: In the Kitchen plus 1 month access to select Real Food Kids eCourse videos by Wardeh @ GNOWFGLINS and Jami @ Eat Nourishing ($20.00)
• Seasonal Menu Plans on a Budget: A Month of Meals from My Humble Kitchen to Yours by Diana @ My Humble Kitchen ($4.99)
• Just Making Ice Cream by Marillyn @ Just Making Noise ($12.00)
• The Curative Kitchen by Susan @ Handy Pantry ($20.00)

Pregnancy & Baby Care

• First Bites by Hilary @ Accidentally Green ($9.99)
• Confessions of a Cloth Diaper Convert by Erin @ The Humbled Homemaker ($9.95)
• Stress-Free Baby Shower by Sara @ Your Thriving Family ($4.00)
• Unbound Birth by Jenny @ The Southern Institute ($2.99)
• My Pregnancy Journey by Mindy @ Simply Designs ($9.99)
• My Buttered Life Baby Edition by Renee @ Made On Hard Lotion ($5.00)
• The Minimalist Mom's Guide to Baby's First Year by Rachel @ The Minimalist Mom ($5.00)
• Redeeming Childbirth: Growth & Study Guide by Angie @ Redeeming Childbirth ($3.99)

Holidays & Special Events

• Festive Traditions by Jill @ Modern Alternative Kitchen ($7.95)
• Holiday Mixes: Gifts in a Jar by Kristy @ Little Natural Cottage ($4.00)
• Flourishing Spring by Michele @ Frugal Granola ($5.95)
• Family Camping Handbook by Katie @ Kitchen Stewardship ($6.95)
• Truth in the Tinsel by Amanda @ Oh, Amanda! ($7.99)
• Plan a Fabulous Party by Mary @ Giving Up on Perfect ($4.99)
• iPhone Photography: The Visual Guide by Alli @ Alli Worthington($9.97)

Spiritual Growth

• Pursuit of the Proverbs 31 by Amy @ Amy Bayliss ($3.99)
• The Best of Visionary Womanhood by Natalie @ Visionary Womanhood ($5.00)
• God's Word in my Heart: A Scripture Memory Learning Guide with Verses {all 4 versions} by Jenn @ The Purposeful Mom ($3.99)
• Kept: a 13-Week Inductive Study on 1 Peter by Lara and Katie @ Quench Bible ($4.99)
• Love Like Him: an 8 week Inductive Bible study on 1 Corinthians 13 by Lara and Katie @ Quench Bible ($2.99)

Marriage & Romance

• Rekindling Romance by Jason & Jami @ A Biblical Marriage ($4.99)
• Good Wife's Guide by Darlene @ Time-Warp Wife ($2.99)
• 31 Days to Build a Better Spouse by Ashley @ Ashley Pichea ($4.99)
• 31 Days to Great Sex by Sheila @ To Love, Honor and Vacuum ($4.99)
• Entangled: Recognize Your Emotional Affair by Amy @ Amy J. Bennett ($4.99)

Motherhood

• The Heart of Simplicity by various authors @ The Heart of Simplicity ($9.99)
• True Christian Motherhood by June @ A Wise Woman Builds Her Home ($7.00)
• Hula Hoop Girl by September @ One September Day ($4.99)
• When Motherhood Feels Too Hard by Kelly @ Generation Cedar ($4.97)
• Mindset for Moms by Jamie @ Steady Days ($4.99)
• From Cube to Farm by Heather @ From Cube to Farm ($2.99)
• 4 Moms of 35+ Kids Answer Your Parenting Questions by various authors @ 4 Moms, 35+ Kids Parenting E-book ($7.99)
• That Works for Me! by Kristen @ We are THAT Family ($8.00)

Health & Fitness

• 100-pound Loser by Jessica @ Muthering Heights ($4.99)
• Honoring the Rhythm of Rest by Danielle @ Domestic Serenity ($2.99)
• 42 Days to Fit by Brandy @ The Marathon Mom, Emma @ Real Fit Moms and Stacy @ A Delightful Home ($4.99)
• Healthy Homemaking by Stephanie @ Keeper of the Home ($12.95)
• Personal ePlanner by Jennifer @ ListPlanIt ($5.00)

Beauty

• Frumps to Pumps by Sarah Mae @ SaraMae.com ($4.99)
• The Cottage Mama's DIY Guide by Kristy @ Little Natural Cottage ($4.00)
• Simple Scrubs to Make and Give by Stacy @ A Delightful Home ($3.99)
• The No Brainer Wardrobe by Hayley @ The No Brainer Wardrobe ($7.99)
• Embracing Beauty by Trina @ Trina Holden ($9.00)
• Reuse, Refresh, Repurpose by Kristen @ The Frugal Girl ($3.99)

Working from Home & Blogging

• Your Blogging Business: Tax, Talk and Tips by Nikki @ Christian Mommy Blogger ($4.99)
• The Bootstrap VA by Lisa @ The Home Life {and Me} ($12.99)
• How to Grow Your Blog and Manage Your Home by Jacinda @ Growing Home ($4.99)
• How to Have Your Cake and Eat It, Too by Mandi @ Life Your Way ($12.00)
• Simple Blogging: Less Computer Time, Better Blogging by Rachel @ Small Notebook ($8.00)

Ecourses

• Learning in Love: The Preschool Years by Renee @ FIMBY ($7.99)
• Homeschooling from the Heart by Renee @ FIMBY ($7.99)
• Grocery University by Carrie @ Colorado Bargains ($24.95)
• Vibrant Living Strategies for Moms by Lisa @ Well-Grounded Life ($59)
• You Can Do This! The First Five Steps to a Real Food Kitchen by Laura @ Heavenly Homemakers ($5.00)

PLUS, You will receive FREE Bonuses from these companies…

A FREE Two-Month Membership to Fit2B Studio, where their wholesome workouts for the whole family are tummy safe and particularly target Diastasis Recti (split abs). ($19.98 value. No shipping restrictions.)


A $15 store credit to TruKid. With products like their aware-winning sun care, they are dedicated to providing all natural skin and hair care for kids, babies, and now pets. ($15.00 value. Standard shipping applies. International shipping available.)


Your choice of incredible natural products like sea salt and clay for FREE. Choose from the Redmond Trading Earthpaste Bundle ($24.90 value) or the Facial Mud Bundle ($26.90 value). (Standard shipping applies. Continental US only.)


Your choice of a FREE heirloom sourdough starter or FREE yogurt starter from Cultures for Health, the leading supplier of starter cultures and supplies for making cultured and fermented foods ($12.95 value. US & CAN addresses only. Standard shipping applies.)


Your choice of: a FREE 3-Month Subscription (for new accounts) or 30% off a One Year Subscription. Plan to Eat is an online menu planner that uses your recipes, scheduled for the days you want them. ($15.00 value. No shipping restrictions.)


A FREE Culinary Herbs Assorted Seed Pack Check just in time for spring planting from www.wheatgrasskits.com, a living whole foods company. ($11.95 value. Standard shipping applies to all US states and territories- no international shipping for seeds.)


Get $10 off Union28's original "my husband rocks" tee. Their marriage apparel lets you celebrate your spouse in style. ($10.00 value. Standard shipping rates apply. International shipping available, but free shipping only available within USA.)


A $10 store credit plus 1 FREE lip balm from Bee All Natural. Their whole body products nourish and heal, and are made using only the highest quality, food grade, organic ingredients. ($13.49 value. Standard shipping applies. International shipping available.)


A FREE 2 oz. bottle of your choice of liquid herbal formula from TriLight Health. They specialize in fast acting, great tasting natural herbal remedies. ($12.95 value or more. Standard shipping applies, within the USA only.)


Your choice of 3 FREE ePlanners OR a 3-Month FREE Membership to ListPlanIt, whose mobile lists will help to organize your life. ($15.00 value. No shipping restrictions.)

The fine print:

Please note: This collection is only available from 9 a.m. EST on April 29th to 11:59 p.m. EST on May 4th. There will be no late sales offered.

Bonus Offers

• Each bonus offer can be redeemed once only per eBook Bundle purchase.
• For each bonus offer, transaction numbers or proof of purchase may be required at the time of redemption.
• All bonus offers are free gifts from the bonus sponsors, are their sole responsibility to provide, and are subject to availability.
• All bonus offers expire at midnight on May 19th, 2013 (2 weeks from the last day of this sale).

General

• It is your responsibility to download and back-up your purchase within the 1-month download time-frame. With proof of purchase, we can renew download links up until August 1st, 2013. After this date we will no longer have access to the books and will not be able to provide any new links to download.
• Due to the nature of this sale, there will be no refunds available. However, we would invite you to read the Frequently Asked Questions page to learn more about the file types, the download process, how the bonus offers work, etc.

Particularly for those wanting to read these ebooks on their mobile devices (iPhones or iPads, Android, Kindle, etc.) you will want to learn more about the file types, how to download them correctly, and how to transfer them to your device.

This post includes affiliate links, and I make a portion of the sale of each ebook bundle. Thanks for your support of this site!

EPIC DEAL! The Ultimate Homemaking Ebook Bundle Available now. is an original post from Five J's™.

If you're in the market for some unique, video-based homeschool curriculum, now's the time to get it! Compass Classroom is currently having a big spring sale and is offering 30% off all their products (except for online classes) when you use the code CCSPRING30 at checkout.

Compass Classroom is the company that created the Visual Latin and Economics for Everybody curriculum which our family has used and loved, but they also produce an array of other curriculum for history, filmmaking, and Bible as well. (I also help design their graphics. You could definitely say I'm a big fan of Compass!)

Compass offers free sample lessons of each of their products so you can see what the curriculum is like before you purchase. Here's a rundown of some (but not all) of what they offer:

Modern Parables

An original film-based Bible study series on Jesus’ parables. It uses short films combined with teaching by pastors and in-depth study materials to create an entirely new learning experience. Watch a sample trailer here.

American History

A comprehensive history of the United States with a Christian worldview of the characters, events, theology, literature, art, and religious beliefs of the nation. Watch a sample trailer here.

Filmmaking from the First Directors

Teaches the basics of filmmaking and early film history. It takes students through a unique journey starting in the late 19th century when film was invented, then guides them through the steps first directors took in creating the modern language of film. Watch a sample trailer here.

Visual Latin

A video-driven class taught by veteran Latin teacher Dwane Thomas. It’s quite unique. Three short videos are paired with three sets of worksheets to guide students from grammar concepts, to practice sentences, to reading in Latin. Watch a sample trailer here and read my review of Visual Latin here.

Economics for Everybody

An insightful and entertaining exploration of the principles, practices, and consequences of economics. Thoroughly unconventional, this homeschool economics curriculum links entrepreneurship with lemonade, cartoons with markets, and Charlie Chaplin with supply and demand. Watch a sample trailer here.

Big Homeschool Sale! 30% Off Compass Classroom Curriculum is an original post from Five J's™.

This is my husband Jeff's third post in his series How to Raise & Encourage Your Young Writer.

I made mention last time of ways to encourage the young writer in your household. One of the things on my list was something to not do, namely trying to offer critiques during the creation stage. There’s ample time to give your advice, but the fragile beginning stages of a story is not one of those times.

Think of it this way. Imagine an architect has been tasked with drawing up the plans for a new building. He sits down at his desk, pulls out paper and pencil, and proceeds to draw a quick sketch of a structure that he's pictured in his mind. Now imagine that he takes that sketch and shows it to a close friend or his spouse to get their reaction.

How do you think that architect would feel if those he showed it to criticized the fact that his sketch is still rough? It doesn’t reflect perfect, real-world perspective and proportions. It has extra lines here and there where he didn’t erase cleanly, if he erased at all. They say a construction crew could never use his drawing to build a building.

You get the point. It’s a rough sketch, a first attempt, not the finished product.

Your writer’s work during the creation stage is the same. No one writes a perfect first draft. In fact, it's hard to write an acceptable first draft.

So then, how do you critique your writer’s work when the time is right? That can be a touchy proposition, and the answer is that it’s all about trust and honesty.

Critiquing is About Trust

You’ve probably heard it said that with children—or with people in general really—you should give two or three positive comments for every negative one. For writers, and pretty much for anyone who delves into a creative art, theirs can be a somewhat fragile ego. Your praise to criticism should probably approach something like a 5-to-1 or 10-to1 ratio.

The truth is you have to build and keep your writer's trust. You build it by letting them know above all that you love them, and you love their creativity. They've trusted you enough to let you read their creation; make sure you understand and stay worthy of that trust by nurturing and protecting their art first, and critiquing it second.

The reality is this. How do you feel when your mother-in-law criticizes the way you take care of your children? That’s how your writer feels when you criticize his writing.

Ouch.

Always remember first and foremost, your critiques are meant to help your writer. Give your writer concrete reasons why you’ve found a problem with their writing.

Grammar, punctuation, and spelling mistakes are easy to point out and justify why they need to be corrected. The easiest thing you can do is simply point them out and let them make the corrections. Don't turn it into a lecture on sentence structure; let them take the opportunity to figure it out. Self-correction is often the best way to learn the mechanics.

For other issues such as plot, dialogue, characterization, pace, setting, and so on, you need to be able to tell your writer why you think it needs to be rewritten. You’ve got to be able to justify the reason. If you can’t explain what’s wrong with it, then you can’t expect them to fix it.

Here's an example. Instead of telling them that a section was "slow" and leaving it at that, tell them why you thought the pace was dragging. Show them where their sentences were a bit too wordy, or where they could use less description of the setting. Demonstrate, if you're able, how shorter sentences help quicken the pace for action sequences.

Critiquing is About Honesty

Don’t blow smoke. Make sure you give only honest praise. Frame that praise in such a way that you reinforce those things they’ve done well so that they replicate those traits. Keep in mind that, even though you mean well, and even if your critiques are valid, they can still sting.

Having said that, realize that sometimes you’ll be required to sting. If you don’t, you run the risk of falling prey to what I call American Idol Syndrome. If you’ve ever watched the auditions for American Idol, you know what I’m talking about. There are always people who try out for the show who are horrible singers, but they think they’re wonderful. It’s too bad that no one in the family was brave enough to be honest with them and tell them they need voice lessons.

Do everything you can to not crush the spirit of your young writer, but don't lie to them or keep silent about issues with their writing or storytelling that needs work. Just like those kids who should have gotten some voice lessons, get your writer the help they need. If you can't help them, try to find someone else who can.

Tips for Critiquing Your Young Writer

1. Point out one issue that needs correction at a time. Don’t try to raise everything you found wrong all at once. This is why writers go through multiple revisions of our stories. We correct issues with each successive pass, often focusing on one problem at a time.

2. Demonstrate alternate solutions. If a sentence, paragraph, or section needs work, offer them some ideas on how to correct their problems. When you give only one way to fix the problems, it may come across that your way is the only way. You don’t mean to come across that way, but you very well might.

3. Praise what’s done well often. Don’t just offer general statements like, “That’s good.” Tell them specifically what you thought they did well and what you liked about the story.

4. Try to know when enough is enough. It’s possible to rewrite the life out of a story. Sometimes the best told version of a story is the one that’s poorly written. Writing is an art, and it will take your writer time to learn the balance between following the mechanical rules and writing an engaging story.

How have you found success critiquing your young writer's creative works? Please share in the comments.

How to Critique Your Young Writer is an original post from Five J's™.

Change is in the air! And for us, that means changing up our homeschool calendar yet again.

If you're a regular reader, you know we've tried several different ways of organizing our homeschool year. We've done almost-year-round schedules (12-week terms with one week off in between and 6-week terms with two weeks off in between).

But our favorite school year schedule up to this point has been 6-week terms with one week off in between.

But now it's time for a change again.

My children have been taking online classes with The Potter's School for the last two years, and our 6-week/1-week schedule worked very well with the school's schedule. But next year they won't be taking any online classes, which means we can be much more flexible with our school calendar.

The Plan for Our New Homeschool Calendar

So the plan for now is that we'll be doing 4 full days of school each week (Monday through Thursday), and then Friday will be a more abbreviated day, probably with just Spanish tutoring or music lessons. The kids can also use Fridays to finish up any work from earlier in the week.

We won't be taking the week-long breaks every six weeks like we have been doing for the last couple years (and in case you're wondering, yes, the kids are all fine with this change since they'll have long weekends every single week).

We're hoping this new schedule will allow us to be more flexible, give us more time for family activities, and make balancing design work and homeschooling a little easier.

If you're curious, here's what our homeschool calendar looks like for this upcoming school year (you can click the image to enlarge).

Download a Free Printable 2013-2014 School Calendar

If you'd like to print out a 2013-2014 school calendar to use for your own homeschool planning, you can download the printable calendar here.

You might notice I've tweaked it a bit from previous years to hopefully make it more useful to my readers. Instead of just one calendar, I've included three versions of the the 14-month calendar so you can choose one that starts either in June, July, or August. That way if your school year starts at a different time than ours does, you'll be able to use whichever calendar suits you best.

Using the calendar is quite simple. You can fill in the key at the bottom to indicate different types of days such as field trips, holidays, full days, half days, or whatever you want.

To mark the days themselves, a couple of years ago a reader suggested using highlighters (which I think is a brilliant idea!). Here's an example of using a highlighter on the calendar.

Download the 2013-2014 printable school calendar here.

I'm curious to hear how all of you schedule your school year. Please share in the comments!

Free Printable School Calendar for 2013-2014 is an original post from Five J's™.

My family is so incredibly excited about the brand new middle school writing curriculum called Cover Story coming out this summer. The curriculum was created by our favorite writing teacher, Mr. S, who is the brains behind the incredible One Year Adventure Novel curriculum which I constantly rave about. Joely will be using this curriculum next year for 6th grade.

My kids with Mrs. and Mr. S the first year they attended the OYAN Summer Workshop

Like OYAN, Cover Story is a DVD-based curriculum, so it doesn't require a lot of preparation on the part of the parent. If Cover Story is anything like OYAN (and I have no doubt it will be just a great if not better), you and your children will absolutely love it!

Cover Story is scheduled to be released this July 2013 , so you'll want to sign up at the Cover Story website to be notified when it's available for purchase. You'll also want to follow Cover Story on Facebook to stay up-to-date with the progress of the curriculum and see behind-the-scenes of the filming of the lessons.

And don't forget to tell your homeschooling friends about Cover Story! (You can use the links at the bottom of this post to share on Facebook, Twitter, or even email this post to your friends.)

Here's a bit more information about the curriculum:

Cover Story takes middle school students on a guided tour through the universe of Story. Through the process of creating the content for their own magazine in a single school year, students are led, step by step, on a fun, thought-provoking journey of exploration and creation. They write poems, short stories, non-fiction articles, letters, and many other short pieces. They also learn to journal every day by following the creative structure of The Remarkable Journal of Professor Gunther Von Steuben. Along the way, they study not just a story's form, but its execution.

The program covers poetry, short stories, creative non-fiction, interviews, blogs, letters, and much more in video lessons taught by a professional writer.

The informative course is built around the idea that writing is an inherently fun activity when approached through the doorway of a student's creative passion. No matter how much your middle school student might already know about writing, Cover Story will challenge them to go deeper.

Light steampunk themes, writing prompts with a twist, and fascinating concepts all help to keep your student engaged.

Your student will never look at writing the same way again.

New Middle School English & Writing Curriculum from the Creators of One Year Adventure Novel is an original post from Five J's™.

The Reading Lesson

The Reading Lesson: Teach Your Child to Read in 20 Easy Lessons is a phonics and reading curriculum containing 20 lessons that you can cover with your child over the course of several months. Each of the 20 lessons is approximately 20 pages in length, and the authors recommend covering anywhere from 1 to 3 or more pages a day with your child. They emphasize that your child only needs to spend about 10 minutes a day with the curriculum to use it successfully. The curriculum is designed for children ages 4 through 8.

The Reading Lesson is very phonics-based, focusing almost exclusively on breaking each word apart into its component sounds. Letter sounds aren't presented in alphabetical order; instead, the authors introduce the most common letters in the English language first. For instance, instead of beginning with the first letters of the alphabet or all the vowels like many other programs do, the first lesson covers the letters c, o, s, a, and t.

Parents are given clear instructions for how to introduce each letter sound; the parent usually points to the letters and has the child repeat the sounds.

What I like about the curriculum.

For the inexperienced teacher, this curriculum holds your hand. It gives you a solid, sequential roadmap to follow while you're teaching your child to read. While I've not used this curriculum to teach my own children how to read since they are already readers, I think this would be an effective curriculum for many children.

What I don't like about the curriculum.

Special letter forms: Often throughout the curriculum the authors add symbols to the letters to help the child remember which way to pronounce it (for example an empty circle above the a or the i, a 'hat' over the e, or a dot inside a b.)  I freely admit I don't hold a masters degree in phonics education and I might be completely wrong about this, but I question the benefit of changing the look of a letter from its original form to help the child pronounce it correctly. To me this seems like it lets children "read" the words correctly without their really learning how to read them properly if the words were written normally.

Supplementary materials: The full Reading Lesson curriculum comes with a collection of supplemental CDs and DVDs. However, I was unable to successfully review any of the CDs since they do not work on newer Macs (the system requirements were not listed anywhere on the CDs so I had to try to install the software to finally discover that it requires an older PowerPC Mac). This means that most Mac users won't be able to use them. Their CDs have apparently not been updated for quite a long time.

I was able to play the Sounds of Letters DVD, and after watching a few minutes of it, I can say I would not recommend the DVD at all. The authors recommend the DVD for 2-year-olds and up, but the animation is so poorly done, and the script so slow and poorly written, I doubt it would hold the attention of any child for very long. Videos like The Letter Factory are, in my opinion, a much better way to teach the letter sounds through video.

The Verbal Math Lesson

The Verbal Math Lesson: Step-by-Step Math without Pencil or Paper comes in two levels. Level 1 is for children ages 4-7 and covers basic addition and subtraction. Level 2 is for children ages 7 to 8 and covers more addition and subtraction, but then moves on to basic multiplication and division.

Each book has about 30 lessons, and each lesson begins with some exercises, such as counting, skip counting, fact families, etc. Then it moves on to verbal word problems. These word problems are like what you'd see in a regular curriculum, only the teacher is reading it aloud to the student does the work in his head and answers orally.

The Verbal Math Lesson might be a great way to introduce and reinforce math concepts for children who are auditory learners and/or who struggle with writing.

According to the author, your child is ready for Level 1 if he has the following skills:

• Is able to count to 100 (occasional errors are acceptable).
• Can identify written numbers (single and double digit).
• Understands the concept of "same as", "more than" and "less than" when referring to numbers & quantities.
• Knows the difference between right & left.
• Recognizes basic shapes.
• Has a basic, conceptual understanding of measurements of length (inches, feet) and weight (ounces, pounds, tons).

This curriculum is not a complete math curriculum, so you'd want to use a regular math curriculum along with The Verbal Math Lesson to make sure you cover all the necessary concepts.

Big Words for Little Kids

Big Words for Little Kids: Advanced Vocabulary for Elementary School Children is a curriculum which teaches vocabulary through the study of prefixes, suffixes, and roots.

Each two-page lesson presents anywhere from 1 to 3 roots, suffixes, or prefixes. Then the child is guided through short examples and exercises (multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank, sentence building) to learn vocabulary words, all of which are formed by that lesson's word part. There are approximately 74 lessons.

What I like about this curriculum.

I'm an advocate of learning Latin and Greek roots as a means to understanding English vocabulary, so this curriculum is a good introduction to some of the most common words we use every day. Also, this is a self-guided curriculum, so it doesn't require any preparation or instruction on the part of the parent, which is something I tend to look for in a curriculum.

What I don't like about this curriculum.

The amount of study for each lesson is fairly limited, and there are not cumulative reviews of what has been previously studied. Consequently, each lesson's concept is presented only once and not reinforced later, so long-term retention might be limited without supplementary study. Additionally, answers to the exercises are not included in the curriculum which makes correcting the exercises time-consuming for the parent.

Disclosure: I received this curriculum free for review, but my opinions are (obviously) completely my own.

Homeschool Curriculum Review: The Reading Lesson, The Verbal Math Lesson, and Big Words for Little Kids is an original post from Five J's™.