It’s that time of year again when we are all looking over tons of different school materials and trying to narrow our choices down. If you are like me, this is a very difficult thing to do. Occasionally on our blog we like to give reviews of great materials we come across. I wanted to share with you two great products that would be helpful throughout your entire school year.
The Old Schoolhouse Digital Magazine
The first is The Old School House Digital Magazine. This great magazine has gone digital and I am thrilled! This is a magazine I have subscribed to in the past because it has such wonderful articles. It covers a wide range of subjects, age groups, and different styles of learning. To me, the digital version of this magazine makes it even better for a number of reasons. First of all, when I said I have subscribed to it in the past, that is because I haven’t always been able to afford it after buying all of my curriculum. Now that it is in digital format, the price is affordable for everyone, even after coming home from a convention with one too many items. Another aspect which is appealing to me is that I am not cluttering my house up with magazines. While I love them, they do tend to take over the house after a while. And let’s face it, homeschoolers tend to have lots of things that can take over the house! This is one way I can keep magazines under control. I was a little leery as to whether I would enjoy reading it on the computer or not. I was pleasantly surprised to see how easy I could navigate through the magazine. There were many features on the digital magazine that actually made it easier to use than the print version. For instance, you can click on a button and have all the links from that page at a mouse click. You can bookmark a favorite article. If you don’t like how you are looking at the pages, a few quick clicks and you can change from double to single pages, make the pages smaller or larger, and even turn the pages faster or slower. In addition, you can zoom in or out for those of us who are getting older and need to have the print up close. There is even a button that shows all the pages in a picture index, which I thought was a great way to quickly find something you had seen in the magazine but couldn’t remember where it was. I would recommend the digital version of this magazine to all homeschoolers. They have taken an already great magazine and made it even better! It’s a wonderful resource to add to you list of essentials for this year.
The Schoolhouse Planner
The second product that would be a great asset is The Schoolhouse Planner. This is an amazing tool! I could not have sat down and thought of all the ideas these ladies have included. Not only does it help you organize your life, school, and home with tons of forms to use, but it also includes many other extras as well. There are two wonderful recipes each month. I can easily see how these could become family favorites in my household. There are helpful articles from some of the best homeschool curriculum authors in the industry giving you great advice or ideas that you can take and incorporate immediately into your school day. There is a great resource list each month that takes you right to The Old Schoolhouse Store to purchase any supplemental materials that go along with that month’s theme. This saves you from having to search for materials. One of the neatest features is that you can change text right on the screen before printing to customize this planner to meet your individual family’s needs. While this book is 247 pages long, you will not need to print all of the pages you see. Many of these are just great resources you can refer to. You can print each month as you go and select only the forms that are necessary. They have tried to include a little of something for everybody. I can definitely see how this would be useful to me and my family in the upcoming school year. Perhaps this year, I will finally get my home and school records organized and know what I am cooking for dinner each night!
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