Progeny Press~TOS Review

Progeny Press Study Guides has over 100 guides to choose from!

Written for children in grades Kindergarten thru High School

Cost: $10.99 for the younger student thru $21.99 for the high school student.

Progeny Press study guides for literature are designed to help your student enjoy the classics.  Not only will your student learn about the story itself, but also how a book was written.  Each guide is written from a Christian Perspective.  Showing your student how to go back to the Bible in a parallel with the story they are reading.

The goal of Progeny Press is to teach children to think clearly, understand literature, rely on Scripture for truth and values.  They also want children to have FUN while doing it.

We were sent via email a download of:

Pride and Prejudice is one that we have read over and over here.  So when we were given the guide to go along with it we were thrilled!  Not only did we get to re-read one of our favorite books, not we will be diving right into it...studying it!

Each study guide has a way of transporting the reader right into the story by making you really think like the characters in the story.  I love how these did that.  We had so many wonderful discussions about how they lived and acted back in the day the story took place.

BEST of all...we enjoyed the Scripture searching we did!  We talked about pride, humility, judging others and much more.

We also were sent:

I have to admit.  I had never heard of this book until this review.  I was thrilled to get this one because our son love everything Civil War!  And I knew he would be more than happy to pick up a book and read more about it. 

This book was about the Creighton family as the war between the states approaches.  The Creightons and their neighbors in southern Illinois have friends and relatives on both sides of the war.  The younger sons look forward to the war and all the excitement that comes along with it.  But the older sons know better.  The war breaks out and all the sons head off to battle.  Sadly they find that the war has divided their family and friends.  When tragedy strikes the family nine-year old Jethro finds himself in the position of man of the house. 

This was a great book!  One that we really enjoyed reading. 

The beginning of the guide has a "Prereading Activity" page.  Here is where we talked about the civil war.  We researched the causes of the Civil War.  After each chapter section we have vocabulary words we go over.  I like how they are broken up into small groups.  That way the student is not overwhelmed with the words.  It gives them a chance to actually learn them.  The most difficult part of this study was putting the book down. 

We talked about the characters of the story.  The setting where the story took place.  We tried to make ourselves feel what the characters were feeling.  Then again as I mentioned in the Pride and Prejudice study, we also "Dig Deeper" into Scripture.  I cannot say enough about how much I love this.  If we can always point our children back to Scripture then we know they will have that great foundation to handle what they will face.

You can see a sample of the kinds of questions in the guides on their website.

You can also view their online catalog for more information.



Stepping back into the 1800's

If you have been a reader for any length of time you know how much we love this place.  It's the Genesee Country Village and Museum.  When spring rolls around we are all anxious to go back.  The museum is closed during the winter months.  Today we went out to their Maple Syrup festival.  Although I have to say it felt more like June here in NY than mid March.  I did not get many picture of the Maple syrup making...it was very busy there.  But that is a great thing for the museum...just not for my readers. 

The day started out with a wonderful pancake breakfast.

With R.E.A.L maple syrup!!

The museum's CEO.  He was there waiting on tables.  I love that about him.  He gets right in there with his employees.   How many CEO's do you know that do that?

Our not-so-littles heading into the village.  I truly love those three!!

Table set up for mid day meal.

Such a simple time.  Oh how I long for a simple life.  We are always caught up in getting things done...now.  High speed this and that.

How can you not fall in love with this place.  Just look at the beautiful homes.  I must say...if you are ever in the Western NY area you HAVE to visit here.

Making candles.  Usually this is done in the cold months.  But today they had to improvise.  It was around 70 degrees today.  So she had to put the candles into an ice bath.  Otherwise the wax was way too soft to hold.  This really makes me want to do this with the kids.  I think we just might!!  Ours will be a little different because we have many candles that have a little in the bottom of the jar.  We will just melt the wax and then dip.  Oh that makes me so excited.

Hanging to dry.  Waiting on their next dip into the wax.

Blacksmith...Andrew's favorite building.

This was just like stepping back into Laura Ingalls Wilder's book.  I would much rather come here than to Disney.  So simple and peaceful.

The ladies have gathered at the Jones farm to make some crafts.  They were sharing a meal and making things.  The woman in the picture was working on her spring bonnet.

She was making a card holder.  So cute!!

We were able to taste a homemade cough syrup.  I got the recipe that we are going to try.   I'll post it here later in the week.

The kids were able to go on a hunt for a yarn doll hidden in different locations throughout the village. 

Brooks Grove Church...this is where my husband and I were married!

She was making Maple Syrup cookies.  OH did they smell good.  Each visit to the museum makes me want to come home and bake.  Perhaps that is why hubby takes me there often. 

Making bread.  There is nothing like it...homemade bread.

Found one of the yarn dolls.  In the boot maker's shop.

We also saw how chocolate is made from bean to bar.  It was pretty neat.

Crushing the beans.  If you like the smell of chocolate then this was the place to be today.  Me not so much.  :-)

Found another one!  In the Physician's office. 

I hope you have enjoyed your journey back into the 1800's with us.  There will be many more trips back through out the summer. 

Creative Slow-Cooker Meals

I love my slow-cooker!  No matter what the season, I use it all the time.  We even have 2 now.  It's such an easy way to cook up a lot of food to freeze for later.  So when I was asked to review this book I could not say YES fast enough.

Written by Cheryl Moeller who is a mom of six children.  She used them as taste testers for these recipes.  So you can imagine if they passed the kids test they must be good!  She shows cooks everywhere how to use slow-cookers to create healthy, delicious meals your family will love.

The hardest part for me was picking recipes to uses for review purposes.  So I handed the book over to my wonderful husband and said pick two for me to make.  I anxiously awaited his choices.

Here is what we settled on:

Farmer's Market Stew (page 49)

This was SO easy to make.  I am not what you call a fussy cook.  I do not like to make recipes with a lot of steps or ingredients.  The above recipe called for ingredients you can find every day.  I like that this particular recipe is easily changed up.  You could add noodles or rice to it.  Substitute any different types of vegetables...the sky is the limit.

The next one we chose was:

Chicken Rice & Veggie Soup (page 184)

This is another winner in our house.  This is also another one you can add whatever your family likes.  These are soups you can make year round.  We love soup no matter what the season is.  I grew up eating soup.  These recipes remind me of being with my grandparents. 

This book is full of great recipes like the ones I've told you about....over 250 to be exact.   Recipes like: Loaded Baked Potatoes, Sweet & Sour Hot Broccoli Salad, Seafood Lasagna or even Tangy Peanut Soup are just a few!!

You can purchase this book through a number of online resources for around $10.00.  YUM!

***I was provided this book free from Harvest House Publishers in exchange for my honest review.***

The Art of Argument~TOS Review

Classical Academic Press publishes different curriculum.  Their moto is "Classical Subjects Creatively Taught".  The company was formed in 2001.  In the following year they published their first book "Latin for Children, Primer A.  The rest they say is history.  The curriculum they publish are Latin, Greek, Spanish, and French.  They also publish Bible, Logic and Poetry.

As a part of TOS Homeschool Review Crew we were sent The Art of Argument an Introduction to the Informal Fallacies.

We were sent the student text.

And...

Teacher Edition

This curriculum is designed for Junior High students.  The Art of Argument is designed to teach the argumentative teenager how to reason with clarity, relevance and purpose. This is the time in their life when they really want to know the how and why.  Children in this age group are a target group for advertisers.  The Art of Argument teaches your Junior High student to recognize and identify 28 fallacies.  They will also be taught how to recognize the sneaky way companies use words to trap them into purchasing their product.

The student text includes:

Dialogs

Worksheets

Real life application

Phony Advertisements

Dialect discussion questions

Tests

Many fun extras like: skits, and famous short stories

We were also sent a DVD that showed the first 6 chapters and an introduction.  The DVD has 4 very eager students and three logic teachers.

You can view a sample chapter here.

WHERE TO PURCHASE:

The Student Text sells for $21.95

The Teacher Text sells for $24.95

You can also purchase a DVD set to go along with this curriculum.

OUR THOUGHTS:

This was the first time we had tried a Logic course.  I figured my children argued with us enough.  They didn't need to learn how to do it better!  I have to say I loved this course.  This course is very well written!  It's easy enough to grasp, but not so easy you will not be challenged.  I've mentioned before that we have 2 with learning disabilities.  So I've often stayed away from the "extra" courses that are not required by our state.  This really is more than just a logic course.  This course is teaching us all how to see through the glitz and glamour of advertising.  We are also watching the politicians with clear eyes thanks to Classical Academic Press.

My kids love to "act" out things.  So they were very thrilled to see that this course would have them doing skits.  They are also working on their own different kinds of fallacies, they will then make up skits or commercials to go along with them.  If we have a chance I will record them and post them here as an update.  I am really surprised how much they really got into this!!

This course also comes with a "warning" from the publisher:

"Parents and Teachers beware~~students may use these skills against you."

OH great!  Now they tell me.  We are having a lot of fun with this one.  This is going on our schedule for next year.

**As a part of TOS Homeschool Review Crew we were given the above free in exchange for my honest review.**