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Stephen Talks About Construction

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We first met Stephen and his family (including his sister Rachel, who also modeled for us) when our church joined with theirs in feeding local hungry families. One of the things we absolutely love about these siblings is their sense of humor. We seem to spend as much time teasing each other as we do working! Here is what Stephen had to say about construction after modeling one of our new construction kits:

Stephen with Zometool Molecular Mania

What was your favorite construction kit growing up?
I absolutely loved Legos! I liked following the instructions and building something amazing.

If you could build anything for your house, what would you build?
I would build a swimming pool. I love to swim!

What skills (building, repair or otherwise) do you most want to learn?
The skill I most want to learn is knowing how to write computer programs.

Do you think that there are any construction-type skills that a man should have before he marries?
Whether a man is married or not, it’s probably helpful to know how to fix anything in your house that might break.

What skill do you already have that most people would be surprised to find out about?
People who don’t know me very well, might be surprised to find out that I rarely forget the sound of a person’s voice or what they look like.

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Ethan Chats About Being An Artist

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Ethan is big brother to Alea and Mia, and younger brother to Caleb. One of the items he modeled for us this time was the Djeco Abstract Art Kit. We knew we’d chosen the right person to demo it when he asked if he could keep working on it after we finished the shoot!

Ethan completing Djeco Abstract

In your family, who is the artist?
My grandma, my dad, myself and my brother.

What do they do that’s artistic?
My Grandma drew beautiful pictures, my dad makes works with wood and also makes furniture.  My brother and I draw and make Lego sculptures and work with wood also.

What’s the smallest/largest piece of art you’ve done?
The smallest was burning a name into wood, and the largest was turning a baseball bat on a lathe.

If your Mom said to spend an hour on art, what would you do?
I would like to make a treasure chest out of wood.

Have you ever done art that you didn’t enjoy?
Only if I’m forced.  I prefer to be spontaneous.

What’s your favorite color?
I like a lot of colors, but if I have to choose I can only narrow it down to blue or green.

Do you have any ideas for making money with art?
Yes.  Turning bowls and pens on a lathe and selling them:)

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Alea on Traveling

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Sweet Alea is one of almost a quarter of our Timberdoodle models who have been adopted. Alea was born in Kazakhstan and now has two loving brothers, Caleb and Ethan and a little sister, Mia. Alea has always been a great model, but her pictures from this shoot were absolutely amazing. One of our favorites was this one of her with the GEOpuzzles, so we asked Alea to tell us a little about her traveling experience. Geopuzzles Set

What is the first airplane trip you remember?
When we went to Nashville when I was five years old.

What was your favorite part?
My favorite part was flying in the air and eating the snacks.

What was the scariest part?
There weren’t any scary parts!! It was all fun!

What is your favorite food to eat while traveling?
My favorite food was the gummy bears. I saved some for my sister too.

What is the most interesting thing you’ve seen while away from home?
My Nonnie and Papa and GG, and my friends from Kazakhstan and Taiwan.

What is the best place you’ve ever stayed while you’re on a trip? Why?
At the hotel with the pool. 🙂

What do you like to do in the car?
I like to read and color.

If you could go anywhere you wanted, where would you go? How would you get there?
I would want to go with my mommy and daddy to Kazakhstan on an airplane. Because that’s where I was born. And I would see the babies and kids in the orphanages and I want to love them.

And here’s her adoption testimony as her family shared it on her recent TN trip, posted here with her parents’ permission of course! Alea and her younger sister Mia are shown at 1:43 but if you back up a few seconds you’ll also recognize Ana and Abi, previous Timberdoodle models who’ve now moved out of state.

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Mia on Animals

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Mia and her family joined our portfolio of local models before Mia even came home from Taiwan. At an adoption fundraiser we began talking about Timberdoodle photo shoots with Mia’s mom as their family  jumped the last few hurdles to getting Mia into her forever family. They volunteered to participate and we found at our next shoot that the kids (Caleb, Ethan, Alea and, of course, Mia) are naturals! One of our favorite pictures of Mia this time was the one below, of her testing the On The Farm Threading Game, so we asked her mom to tell us a little about Mia and animals.

What was Mia’s first animal sound?
Woof woof. She said it more like uff uff!

What is her favorite animal?
Doggie

Does your family have any pets Mia likes?
We have two miniature wire-haired dachshunds that she loves.

What is your favorite animal-related Mia story?
She loves to pet our dogs and kiss them. You’ll always find them on their back, paws in the air and her bent over them blowing kisses. She says MUH when she blows her kiss:)

Does Mia take a stuffed animal to bed?
Yes, she has a black fuzzy puppy dog that her big brothers and big sister gave to her for her first birthday. She loves that puppy!

Are there any animals that scare Mia?
Nothing so far. She just wants to kiss every animal she’s sees:)

Does Mia have any animal songs that she particularly enjoys?
The Itsy Bitsy Spider is her favorite song, if that counts for a favorite animal song:)

Haba On the Farm Threading Game

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Meet Rachel – All About Brains

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We first met Rachel and her family (including her brother Stephen, who also modeled for us) when our church joined with theirs in feeding local hungry families. We have loved getting to know them by working alongside them, and the weeks that our schedules overlap have totally become a highlight for us!  We recently interviewed Rachel about the brain; here are her brilliant answers:

What’s the smartest thing you’ve ever done?
The smartest thing I’ve ever done would be the decision to help out at my church’s feeding ministry –
that’s where I first met the Deffinbaughs!

The least smart?
The least smartest thing I’ve ever done would definitely be the time I drank three sodas within a few hours. I felt pretty lousy.

How do you exercise your brain?
I love to do sudokus . It’s fun to time myself to see how fast I can finish them.

What career could you see yourself in that would use your brain?
I can see myself as a doctor, specifically a neurosurgeon. That career would definitely not only use my brain, but include other peoples’ brains as well. 😉

Or is there a career you would enjoy that would not use your brain?
No, I don’t like to not use my brain. I enjoy things that make me think and learn.

What part of your brain is the strongest?
I’m definitely a left-brained person. I can’t draw to save my life, but I’ll gladly tell you how E. coli helps to break down the enzyme lactase in people who are lactose-intolerant. 🙂 I’m also good at memorizing.

The Big Book of Brain Games
Watch for more Timberdoodle Model interviews, we can’t wait to introduce you to the rest of these fantastic kids!

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9 Tips for Homeschooling Gifted Children

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We had an email asking for tips for homeschooling a gifted daughter which prompted us to compile all our very best tips and tricks learned over the past decades. What would you add?

1. Disdain Busy-Work
Your child wants to learn, so don’t slow her down! If she has mastered multiplication, why are you still spending an hour a day reviewing it? Yes, she does need some review, but we’ve seen way too many families focus on completing every problem rather than mastering the material. One way to test this is to have her try doing only every other review problem and see how she does. If she can prove she’s mastered it, she doesn’t need to be spending quite as much time on it.

2. Go Deep
Allow breathing room in your schedule so you have time to investigate earth’s gravitational pull or the advantages/disadvantages of hair sheep vs wooly sheep. Once again, your child wants to learn, why pull her away from learning something she’ll never forget to focus on material she won’t be able to recall next week?

3. Go Fast
If your child wants to take 3 science courses this year, or race through 2 math levels, why not? Homeschoolers can absolutely rock this, because there are no peers holding them to a “traditional” pace!

4. Encourage Completion
Sometimes I think there is a touch of ADD in every genius. Give your child as much flexibility as you possibly can, but also keep in mind that you’ll be doing her a disservice if she never has to tackle something she doesn’t feel like working on at the moment. Sometimes she may even be surprised to realize that the very subject she dreaded is the springboard for a whole new area of investigation!

5. Give Space & Opportunities
If you can keep mandatory studies to a minimum you’ll give your child more opportunities to accelerate her learning in the areas she’s gifted at. Common sense perhaps, but also worth deliberately thinking through as you plan out your school year.

6. Work on Weak Areas Carefully
While you definitely want to work with her to help her overcome areas she’s just not as strong in, you also want to be careful that a weakness in one area doesn’t impede her progress in other ways. For instance some children struggle with writing simply because their brain works much faster than their hands. While I encourage those families to work on handwriting skills, I also suggest that they try teaching their child to type and allowing her to complete writing assignments on the computer. This lets her continue to build her writing skills instead of holding her back because of her lack of handwriting speed.

7. Emphasize Humility & Service
We have met way too many children who are obnoxiously convinced that they are a genius, and everyone needs to be in awe of their abilities. Your child will be much healthier (and happier!) if she realizes these 4 things:

1) Her identity is NEVER found in her brainpower.
2) Even as gifted as she is, there are many things that others do better than she does.
3) She could lose her edge at any point by something as simple as a car accident. (So again, she is much more than her brain!)
4) Her gifts are not for herself alone but for serving God and His people.

If course the goal is never to insult or degrade her, but to give her a framework from which she can truly thrive and be free to learn. With a proper perspective she’ll be able to enjoy learning without the burden of constantly assessing her genius or studying based on what people will think of her. Don’t weigh her down by constantly telling her how big her brain is either. Encourage her learning to be sure, but don’t forget to cultivate her character at all costs. In 10 years her response to rebuke will be much more telling than her test score this year so don’t put an inordinate stress on intellectual pursuits.

8. Talk
Talk about what she’s interested in. Talk about the theories she came up with today. Talk about her daydreams. Talk about what she wants to study up on. Talk about why she may actually need to master that most-dreadful-of-subjects, whatever that may be to her… Not only will you be able to impart your years of wisdom to her, but you’ll also know well the subjects she’s interested in and be able to tie that in to her other studies, the places you’re visiting next week, or that interesting article you read yesterday.

9. Relax!
Your child is a wonderful gift, don’t feel that every moment must be spent maximizing her potential. As a side benefit, just relaxing about her genius may in fact increase it. Our own family found that some our best test scores came after a year off of most formal schooling! Not what we would have planned, but a very valuable insight. Living life=learning, maximize that!

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How do I Catch My Child Up in Science and History While Using the Timberdoodle Cores?

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The following are excerpts from an email conversation here this week. Andrea asked such a great question that we are sharing it here, with her permission of course!

From Andrea in CA:
Love, love, love your curriculum. Keep up the good work. My 3 boys and I are into our 4th year and loving it, well after the initial first month hurdle. ha.

Anyway, for various reasons we missed grade one with you. So, when we picked you back up for grade 2 I had the question what to do with history and science as they had begun building on themselves starting in grade 1. So, starting in grade 2 we began with the Astronomy and book one in Story of the World and would just be a year behind your curriculum suggestions in those two subjects. I love both of these book and I just use the same book for all 3 of my boys despite the age differences. It seems to be working well, although at what point I may need to start splitting up those books I’m not quite sure yet?

My main question and advice I would like from you is looking ahead since we will be a year behind in history and science I imagine at some point I will need to skip a year to catch up with your recommendations especially once we get to high school as there are more specific requirements needed to graduate. Do you have a recommendation that if I have to skip over a history book and science book at some point which ones those would be or maybe even just combine two years into one? Wonders of Creation look like maybe they would be good to not skip but use as supplemental reading that the boys and I read on top of what we would currently be doing? What about History?

 

Our Response

Fantastic question!

Science
I completely agree with you. 8th grade science is review/expanding upon earth science so could be easily skipped/used as reading material if needed. However, if you really wanted to do that year another option would be to combine 9th and 11th grade science since the biology and anatomy courses were initially designed to be used in the same year. We split them apart in order to add Body of Evidence and Biology 101, but you could remove those DVDs, or if you’re really ambitious, complete all of those courses in a single year. Personally, I would prefer your solution, but if you get up to that year and feel that they need the time on review and earth science you won’t be out of options!

History
There are a couple options here. One would be to switch from All American History (included in 5th and 6th grade) to AGS United States History. AGS takes the same information and compresses it to a single year, and adds in lots of full-color elements. The only negative is that AGS is not from an explicitly Christian perspective, and I know that is a deal-breaker for many families. If you would prefer to stay with AAH than you may find it entirely reasonable to just not complete the British History course in 12th grade. Take a look at your local high school requirements but it looks to me that California does not require a British History course. Also, if your students were suddenly to want that information they could simply read through the book that year alongside their other history course.

We are so delighted to hear you are all enjoying the curriculum!

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Why and How to Combine Science and History for Multiple Grades

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We believe that history and science are best studied as a family, especially in the elementary grades. Not only will it promote family unity, but it will also take pressure off you since you don’t need to teach multiple science programs or portions of history at the same time. On top of that you’ll save money since you aren’t purchasing science and history textbooks for every child every year. (You may still want each one to have their own workbook or notebook though.) Need help deciding which programs to go with? Here are some starter hints.

Science
Apologia Elementary Science
Apologia Elementary is suitable for grades 1-6, so just pick the subject that most interests you or your children: Astronomy, Botany, Zoology 1, Zoology 2, Zoology 3 or Anatomy & Physiology. Children in 1st and 2nd grade will want Jr. notebooks while 4th-6th graders will prefer the more advanced notebook. 3rd grade students are at a transitional age. We recommend the advanced notebook unless they are still a budding writer and would benefit from the increased spacing and decreased writing in the Jr notebooks.

For older students you can either have them work on their own science track or you can coordinate so that you are covering related subjects for the older and younger students. For instance using Anatomy & Physiology with your 1st-6th graders while your teenagers use Body of Evidence and Precepts of Anatomy & Physiology.

History
The first question is whether you would like to study USA history or world history this year.
All American History
USA history is typically covered in our 5th-6th grade kits using All American History. It is recommended for 5th-8th grade but they now have a digital workbook/supplement available that includes pages for 1st-4th grade. It will be on our site soon.

We have 3 great options for world history:
Story of the World history program
Story of the World is written for 1st-4th grade students in book one. Book 2 is for 2nd-5th, and so on. It is our most young-child friendly text, and we typically include it in 1st-4th grade kits. If you’re looking to involve a young child, I’d pick this Story of the World.
Mystery of History from 7th Grade Homeschool Curriculum Kit
Mystery of History
is my personal favorite of all three options. The text is engaging and Christ-centered. (Story of the World treats the Bible as one of many historical documents, which is something to discuss and not something to fear, but I prefer the straight-up Christ-centered approach of Mystery of History.) Best of all though, Mystery of History includes activity ideas for younger students, middle students and advanced students, which really broadens the scope of the text. If you are working with a wide range of ages, this is the series I’d use. The text itself is written at a 4th-8th grade reading level so it’s not quite as ideal for a 1st-3rd grade student, but if you opt to read the lesson aloud it usually works well even for them.
homeschool high school history curriculum
History Revealed is our newest addition, and quite simply the most versatile history program we’ve ever used. It includes many different types of activities from cooking to film making, music and much, much more. Because it allows so many options History Revealed is perfect for the older student or the one who find more traditional projects boring. It is also a little more confusing at first glance, simply because you have so very many options but is well worth the effort! Designed for 6th grade and up.

Want to Combine More?
I’d suggest you consider also doing spelling and geography as a family.

Sequential Spelling
Sequential Spelling is broken down by levels not grades, so it is entirely suitable for the whole family (2nd grade and up) to start with book 1 and work your way through the series.
A Child's Geography: Explore His Earth
Daily Geography is included in 1st-6th grade curriculum kits but if you’d rather study geography together then take a look at Ann Voskamp’s A Child’s Geography. We love her practical family projects that could make geography one of the highlights of your year. Written for 1st-6th grade.

Now What?
I hope this is helpful whether you are assembling your own curriculum or buying from us. If you are ordering complete curriculum kits from us and want to make changes based on these recommendations simply drop us a line using the simple form here and let us know what grades you want, and which books you want for each subject if you’ve reached a decision. IE, “I’m looking to combine 1st, 3rd and 4th grade. Let’s use Zoology 1 for science, Story of the World 1 for history, Sequential Spelling 1 and A Child’s Geography.” That will let us get back to you as fast as possible with a custom curriculum. If you still have questions or would simply like to discuss your options with someone don’t hesitate to use the form to just let us know how we can help and the best way to contact you and we’ll be in touch ASAP.

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How do I Pick the Best Curriculum Kit for My Family? A 12 Question Checklist

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Every Curriculum Seller Has a Wonderful Plan for Your Life
As summer draws to an end I am amazed with the inundation of emails I receive advertising curriculum kits; each of which claims that their package will solve all your problems and leave you with a magical, happy school year. Your children will skip out of their room every day and beg to do their school work. You will never be confused about what to teach next. Messes will clean themselves up, and the dog will probably learn to read too! If you believe all the claims you will be sorely disappointed next month when you realize that you are still the same people you were before the new curriculum and still have many of the same struggles.

And Then There’s “That Mom” in Your Homeschool Group
Or, perhaps closer to home, there is that friend who uses ___ and is absolutely convinced that everyone should do the same. This claim is not the kindly recommendation of someone sharing what made all the difference in their family but is instead a demand made with no respect to their friends’ budgets, time frame, personality, or even the needs of their children.

How Do I Sort My Options?
We offer our own curriculum kits and do so because we truly believe they help families in a unique way. Yet no curriculum kit is perfect for every family. So is there a simple, practical way to navigate the options, keeping in mind your family’s unique needs? We think so. Here is a simple checklist to use in comparing your options. Try it and see if it doesn’t make “The One” pop out of the sea of curriculum options!

  1. How does this curriculum align with my beliefs?
  2. Does this meet my educational goals?
  3. Is it within my budget?
  4. Does this fit my student’s learning style?
  5. Is it designed for independent learning?
  6. How does it fit with my daily schedule?
  7. Is the manual easy for me to use?
  8. What do reviews say?
  9. Does it emphasize rote memorization or comprehension?
  10. How easy is it to reuse with a younger student?
  11. How does it compare to what I’ve used before?
  12. Does it work well as a whole-family curriculum?

Choosing the Best Curriculum Kit

1} How does this curriculum align with my beliefs?
Think beyond Creation vs. Evolution, and ask how the essentials align with your family’s beliefs. A handful of things you’ll want to discuss with your child is much different than spending as much time unteaching the lessons as you spend teaching them.

2} Does this meet my educational goals?
It is worth pondering what your real goal is for your child this year. Learning to read, cultivating curiosity, passing the state test or learning to work independently are all valid answers. In our family education was geared around life-learning. Thinking skills, reading, math and writing were always our biggest priorities since they are so essential. Science, history, geography, art and foreign languages were icing on the cake: wonderfully fun and productive, but not on our schedule every day. You may find that you want to emphasize something else, such as literature, academically advanced curriculum or to primarily immerse yourself in history.

3} Is it within my budget?
Many families are on a tight budget, this year more than ever, and you’ll need to be reasonable about what you buy. Think it through, pray about it, discuss it, and then get ruthless with your options. (BTW, average private school tuition for an elementary grade was $20,617 in 2011-2012! Makes every option I’ve seen look downright cheap in comparison.) Some families also opt to work with a charter school in order to expand their budget. It is a controversial choice, since you are opting to allow the government to oversee your homeschooling, but we have seen it work well for many of our customers in this tough economy.

4} Does this fit my student’s learning style?
A visual learner will do well with almost every program I’ve seen.
An auditory learner who is given permission to read his lessons aloud will find most curriculum choices manageable, but will thrive with audio books, computer lessons, and discussion-based learning.
The kinesthetic learner is the hardest child to shop for. Many of these bouncy learners are boys, though there are plenty of kinesthetic girls too. Their curriculum needs to include as much hands-on, exploratory learning as possible. When book work is required, it will help to use real-life problems, short lessons, and a non-distracting fidget “toy” for them to fiddle with.

 

5} Is it designed for independent learning?
Some moms want to hold their child’s hand in every single step of their education. Others, like my Mom, would rather teach us how to learn and watch us take off. Of course the early years are always mom-intense but once your child’s reading skills blossom you will be amazed at how much they can accomplish on their own, if that’s your goal. Some curriculum kits do depend on you to read and oversee lessons for hours a day at every grade level. Make sure this is what you want before you buy!

 

6} How does it fit with my daily schedule?
Just because your school district usually has children in class, on a bus, or doing homework for 8 or more hours a day is no reason you need to. If your family is juggling a newborn, rowdy toddlers, a child with special needs, the family business, or a special ministry opportunity; if you’re planning a move, planting a giant garden or any of myriads of worthwhile time commitments then look reasonably at your schedule and see what would work best for you. Our family used 1-3 hours a day as a rule of thumb for the early grades, often broken into much smaller chunks throughout the day. This will vary depending on the child and their age. An older child will reasonably take longer since they have more to accomplish. A younger child will do best if their learning is broken up into shorter chunks throughout the day. (We’ve also heard from some of you who are in an apartment and finding a productive use for the hours is tricky. In your case programs that require long hours would be more of a blessing than a burden!)

7} Is the manual easy for me to use?
Don’t confuse this question with asking if the manual is beautiful, immense, or worked well for your friend. The question is will it really work for YOU, or not?

8} What do reviews say?
There are few things more insightful than reading the perspectives of others who have used the program. They are putting the curriculum to work in a real homeschooling family, and while you may not agree with their perspective, it will be invaluable in discerning what will work well for your child. In fact you may find that the reason another family despised it (too much Bible, or not enough writing) are exactly the reasons it will work well for your family.

9} Does it emphasize rote memorization or comprehension?
I can’t think of anyone who would say they only want their child to memorize without understanding. Yet if the curriculum teaches memorization of multiplication facts without teaching why and how we multiply, sight reading without phonics, or historical times without context, then your child may simply skip over understanding, busily memorizing what he needs to know to fill out this week’s worksheet. In the years to come both of you will be distraught to find he forgot all that he never understood, and has to go back and relearn introductory level information in order to continue his education.

10} How easy is it to reuse with a younger student?
If you are blessed with multiple children it will be helpful to know in advance if you’ll be able to use the curriculum again with younger siblings.

11} How does it compare to what I’ve used before?
If you and your student loved last year’s curriculum why are you changing? Or if you hated it, is this really much different? Does it keep the best parts of last year and discard the worst? If this is your first year homeschooling consider what you dislike most about public school. Does this curriculum use the same approach or does it really break that mold to teach in the way that best suits your family?

12} Does it work well as a whole-family curriculum?
It is more fun and much easier for you if you can combine at least a few subjects to study as a family. We liked to combine history, science, art, geography foreign language and electives in our family. Naturally this will vary depending on the ages of your children – I don’t know of a single science program that would work as well for a 1st and an 11th grader together – yet they could both study anatomy at different levels and still enjoy the camaraderie and shared interest of doing so.
See All Timberdoodle Complete Curriculum Kits
And just for fun, here is how Timberdoodle’s Curriculum Kits line up, just to get you started!

1} How does Timberdoodle’s curriculum align with my beliefs?
Only you know your beliefs but I can tell you that our family is a rather conservative Christian family, and we won’t include products that we ourselves wouldn’t use. Yes, there is an occasional page we’d skip (noted in the guides) but these are all items that we are honored to include as part of our curriculum. (If you are ordering with a school district and cannot include Christian materials you’ll be delighted to know that we’ve also made non-religious kits available for 0-8th grade.)

2} Does Timberdoodle’s curriculum meet my educational goals?
This of course depends on your goals. We kept in mind state requirements/standards while developing our course, but our primary goal is to cultivate life-long learners with a particularly strong foundation in the basics of thinking, reading, writing, and math. Beyond that, science and history/geography are thoroughly and engagingly covered, along with introductory art concepts, basic Latin, beginning electronics, economics, and more.

3} Is it within my budget?
Prices range from $299-$595 depending on the grade level.

4} Does this fit my student’s learning style?
Almost every curriculum is easily mastered by a visual learner, and Timberdoodle’s curriculum is no exception. Auditory learners will love the Teaching Textbooks math in grades 3+ and usually find that if they are given permission to read their work aloud, they thrive. Our specialty is really in the hands-on portion of each grade. Make your own history projects, assemble geography puzzles, complete 3D brain-teasers and much, much more! We’ve also included a Thinking Putty in grades 1-12 so that even the bouncy livewire will have what he needs to help him concentrate!

5} Is it designed for independent learning?
Yes, decidedly so. Read more here: Why Timberdoodle Encourages Independent Learning

6} How does it fit with my daily schedule?
We figure 1-3 hours a day for the elementary grades. Younger students will almost never sit down and do all the work at once, instead we suggest doing it in multiple short sessions throughout the day. Read more on our approach here: How Do You Schedule Homeschooling?

7} Is the manual easy for me to use?
We think so, but the real question is how it will work for you, so pop on over to here and you can see for yourself. We include a weekly schedule for you so that you know exactly how many pages/chapters/lessons to complete every week but don’t have the stress of having to do precisely __ on Monday.

8} What do reviews say?
We have received very high reviews. Check them out on our website.

9} Does it emphasize rote memorization or comprehension?
We are all about comprehension and believe that if you really understand something you’ll be able to use it, and if you can use it, you can remember it.

10} How easy is it to reuse with a younger student?
We offer refill packs for each grade, making it easy to purchase only the workbooks and kits you need to use it again next year.

11} How does it compare to what I’ve used before?
That is a question only you can answer. I can give you a broad-brush idea of how it compares to Sonlight, but beyond that we wait to hear from you!

12} Does it work well as a whole-family curriculum?
We prefer that families do science, history, spelling, and sometimes geography together. However, you may have noticed that there is no easy way to implement this online. Every method we considered for doing so would have been so confusing to read through, that we have instead opted to hand-customize each kit for your family’s needs. This is of course free, and all you need to do is drop us a line here and let us know what grades you are combining. We will get back to you with any questions we might have (World or USA history? Which science did you want to use this year?) and then send you a quote with a price and list of all items included. When you decide you are ready to order, just give us a call with your payment information and the quote number and we’ll process it immediately and ship your custom curriculum right out to you. 

Other Links You May Find Helpful

 

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Homeschooling Your Baby – Learning Styles

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PART 1 OF 2 ORIGINALLY WRITTEN IN 1993, SHORTLY AFTER THE ADDITION OF PEARL, BABY #5.

Having a newborn has reminded us again of why we teach our children at home. Teaching your child does not begin with kindergarten curriculum, nor does it begin with a preschool program, or even with your baby’s first step. Home education begins shortly after birth; it can begin with a cuddle.

Baby Pearl
Doesn’t it seem that after you have your baby, friends and foes alike will rush to hold her? Our baby Pearl is no exception. She loves all the attention and seems to adore everyone who dotes on her. However, do not put her on your shoulder to cuddle. She will arch her back and let you know clearly that that is NOT where she belongs. Is she being difficult, acting spoiled, showing her sin nature already? If we had assumed that, then we would have missed a wonderful opportunity to nurture our baby. Instead we recognized that Pearl is a visual baby, which means that God has made her to learn best by seeing the world around her. When an individual puts Pearl on her shoulder, it limits Pearl’s field of vision and thwarts her primary objective of seeing everything. In other words, they are incapacitating her learning agenda. But by holding her against themselves, face forward, she gets to see all that they see and she is not only contented, but is still able to fulfill her consuming passion to learn. Babies are born “learning machines,” and learning is their first priority. But not all babies are visual babies.

Abel
Abel was an auditory baby, which means he learns best by hearing and experimenting with sound. As a baby, he loved to be cuddled on our shoulders, as close to our voice-box as possible. To soothe him we would merely hum and he would be so fascinated with the sound he would soon forget his discomfort.

Auditory babies are frustrated by a lot of noise because they want to sort out each sound and the combination of sounds is overwhelming. When things are dull, auditory babies can create their own excitement with various chirps, coos, and patter. Even at this tender age they delight in listening to themselves “speak.” Get used to the sound of their voice, because you are going to hear a lot of it!

Hope
A third type of baby scholar is the hands-on learner. Whereas the auditory or visual learner can accomplish their enthusiasm for investigating by sitting in your arms, the hand-on learner needs to be doing. Our Hope was such a learner and she would wiggle and squirm and moved about just for the sheer pleasure if brought her. The saying “motion stops commotion” particularly suits this style of learner. She did not want to sit quietly and had she been forced to it would not have been best for her. Bear in mind, we are not addressing areas of discipline here. There will undoubtedly be times when your wiggler needs to sit still for an exam, your auditory baby will need to be quiet during church, and your visual baby may need to duck under a blanket to be nursed. However, for the nurturing parent these times should be the exception and not the norm. The wiggler should not only be allowed to move about freely, they should be encouraged to do so. Again, thwarting this God-given drive will impede the learning process.

The first step to teaching your baby at home is to let your baby teach you. What makes your baby laugh? All sorts of tickles will amuse your wiggler but leave your auditory baby sober. However, he will squeal with delight whenever Grandpa makes a funny sound. Your visual baby will love contorted faces and other forms of slapstick humor. By doing your “homework” and studying your infant, you will discover what sort of learner he is. By determining what will soothe your baby, and what amuses your baby, you will not only have one of your biggest clues as to what style of learner he is, you will be well on your way to nurturing a lifelong love of learning.

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