As We Bloom: SchoolhouseTeachers.com Review

I was offered an opportunity to review the Yearly Membership on the website SchoolhouseTeachers.com with my children. I have often felt like we need a little more variety in our curriculum; sometimes our main choices feel a little...repetitive. It seems this will be a great way to put a little oomph back into our learning!

The Yearly Membership has a lot to offer. Looking over the website, I felt lost because of all the choices! So I tried to control my excitement and read over the New Members Hub, which is suggested as the best place to start. It really helps explain what the site has to offer and how to find what you need. I discovered many courses available for all of my children, plus other exciting things which I'll explain in a bit. From the New Members Hub I was able to make a list of what to start right away, and what we may want to use in the next couple of months.

Online Classes

Under the Courses tab you will find a few different ways to peruse what is available, such as by age/grade or by subject. The course details are descriptive, including information about how long the course should take and what ages it is appropriate for. Also included is a short biography about the teacher. There are certificates to print upon completing the course and, where appropriate, how many credits the course counts for. All the courses we looked at had PDFs for the lessons so we could either print them out or read online. Some of the courses include online videos. I asked my children to pick one course to begin now, and I made my own list of what to have them start using next. Here's what we chose:

Me:   Keyboarding
          Health 101 or Middle School Health
          Whole Foods Cooking
          Foreign Language (choices such as Hebrew, ASL, Spanish, etc.)
          Charlotte Mason helps and courses
          A variety of Language Arts topics such as Copywork, Daily Grammar, Penmanship, Literature Kits (even lapbooks!), and more.

Kids: Recorder Lessons - My kids have their own recorders but play them like train whistles. I am so happy they want learn how to play correctly!
          Guitar lessons - My son wants to expand his baritone ukulele skills but I only know the very basics of playing the guitar. These lessons are comprised of plenty of images and videos to help the student, as well as pdf downloads... perfect for my little visual and auditory learner!
Everyday Copywork - My 2nd grade daughter thought the grocery list was especially fun. She picked some others as well, like bible stories, China history and geography, Spanish phrases and words, pronoun list,and Silent Night. She said she is glad there is a choice of manuscript or cursive so she can practice her cursive.
Shakespeare - My 7th grade daughter wants to learn more Shakespeare! We are studying As You Like It right now so she wanted to start there as a supplement.

Web Game Design - My 5th grade son has been spending his spare time working on this. He's working hard on it so he can show his Cub Scout Pack what he's learned. It's recommended for middle school, but so far he's been doing fine.

Focused Learning Centers

There is also an area called Focused Learning Centers. It is intended to provide new ideas for teaching a skill or help when a child is struggling. This has already been helpful with math, though there are many subjects included. There are games, practice worksheets, videos, and drills available. My son needed some review multiplying multi-digit numbers and after practice with me and a worksheet we downloaded he understood it better. The reading section has monthly book lists arranged by reading level. Each month is a different topic. I LOVE reading lists!

High School Help

I was excited to find the section on High School Help. I like to feel prepared well in advance and have been trying to figure out how to create transcripts, although my oldest is only in 7th grade. This section has helped me understand this, and it has sample templates. I also plan to look over the College Choice Guidance course soon.

Other neat things we found

This website isn't just curriculum though! Some of the other membership benefits are monthly e-books to download, leveled planners (these are very thorough!), motivation and help articles (I enjoyed the 12 days of Christmas), recipes and menus, AppleCore access for record keeping, and the RightNow Media library. My kids were excited to find familiar videos included such as VeggieTales and NEST (Living Scriptures bible videos). I was excited to find Dave Ramsey videos. We've already made a list of things to watch such as The William Tyndale Story, who we will be studying soon. You also receive online access to The Old Schoolhouse magazine and archives. I've read this magazine in the past and found it inspiring.

Where to sign up!

SchoolhouseTeachers.com costs $139 for the Yearly Membership. I feel like that is a very reasonable price for what is offered. You can also pay by the month for only $12.95. But, right now they are offering half price membership on a one year subscription with the code CREWFOLLOWER. This code is good through 1/31/2016.