Scott Adcox

Doing More With Less Since 1972

Category: What Others Are Doing (Page 2 of 2)

5 Questions To Ask Before Buying Homeschool Curriculum

August 5, 2008 / / 0 Comments

A new school year means a new curriculum for many families. Whether you are just starting out or you’ve decided to try something new, there’s a ton of curricula to choose from. Although I have my favorites, I don’t like to recommend any particular curriculum to anyone because families and children are so different. What works great for one family (or child) might not for another, so it’s really important that you take your time choosing the one that’s best for you and your kids.

So how do you decide? You can start by asking yourself the following questions about the curriculum you are considering for reading instruction (although these could be used for any subject). I’ve put them in order of importance for me…which of course may be different for you!

  1. Does it fit my child’s learning style? As the learner, your child’s learning styles and preferences should play a major role in deciding what type of curriculum you should buy. Is she more hands on or does she enjoy listening to and discussing stories? Does she do well learning with technology or does she prefer more traditional approaches? Look for a curriculum that uses methods that work best for her.
  2. Does it fit my teaching style? Although your child’s learning style is a really important deciding factor, you are the teacher and therefore must be comfortable in how you teach the material! Do you like to have things laid out for you in a very structured way (day by day plans, lesson procedures, suggested/provided materials, etc.) or are you more interested in having freedom to choose the what, how, and when of it all? You might even fall somewhere in between – check out question # 5.
  3. Are the instructional methods solid? By this I mean…Is it a trusted curriculum that has shown good results for many kids? Is it based on reading research? Is it thorough or does it just skim the surface of what you want to teach? Try to do your own research by visiting curriculum fairs, talking to other parents, and reading reviews online (on sites other than the publishers’!).
  4. Is it fun and engaging? This is huge! This is where schools sometimes have an advantage…there are many fun things a teacher can do with a class of students that parents may not be able to do to at home to keep interest high. So it’s really important that you find something that is fun and keeps your child’s attention. Try to look for curriculum or methods that include things your child loves to learn about. It’s so important for kids to have fun reading!
  5. Does it allow for flexibility? If you home school, then you know this is a must! Flexibility allows you to change, add, or leave out certain things from your instruction. Some programs only work well if they are followed as is, so you may not see the best results if you decided to tweak it. Just make sure you chose something that lets you have some wiggle room if you need it.

Starting a new curriculum can be very exciting for parents and kids, so have fun with it! Check out what these homeschoolers have to say about it:

A to Z Home’s Cool has some great resources put together to help you avoid wasting money.

Home School Curriculum has descriptions of curricula along with comments and input from parents about each one.

PEAH shares great resources to help you save money and keep you updated on the happenings in the world of homeschool curriculum.

Have a great year!

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Back To School, Or Homeschool, Giveaway

July 31, 2008 / / 2 Comments

Summer is flying by, and people are no doubt getting geared up for back to school. Whether your kids go to public school, private school, or homeschool, we want to help you get this year started on the right foot by giving away a $20 Abunga.com Gift Card to one of our new subscribers this August. To be eligible, all you have to do is subscribe to our site through email (it’s free) using the form below. That’s it!

Enter your email address:

Seriously, that’s it! Only email subscribers are eligible, but if you’ve already subscribed in a feed reader you can always subscribe by email too. As long as you subscribe before midnight on August 31, you will be included in the random drawing.

If you don’t know about Abunga, it’s a family friendly, online discount bookstore that gives 5% of its revenues to non-profits.

Thanks, and good luck!

Literacy On the Web

July 28, 2008 / / 0 Comments

One of the issues we’re already concerned about is setting a good reading example for our kids. We feel like it’s important to not only read to them, but for them to see us reading on our own as well. Ana is much more apt to read books than I am. I’ve always been a pretty voracious reader. I’m constantly reading, but 90% of my reading now occurs online. I feel like I need to make a conscious effort to read books when little ones are around because I’m afraid they’ll associate a computer as some type of toy and won’t understand that what I do with the computer is actually reading. But even if they realize that I’m reading, is that the kind of reading kids need?

Yesterday’s New York Times has an excellent article discussing the changing face of reading and how it affects literacy. Reading online is increasingly popular with young people, and the experience of reading online resembles more of a zig-zag-bob-and-weave than the linear beginning, middle, end type reading most of us grew up doing in books, magazines, and newspapers. When I was a kid, I was big fan of “Choose Your Own Adventure” books because they offered a little bit of control over the story, and the story could change. One of the reasons I love reading online is because the experience is similar, and it offers many more tangents. The difference is that those books I loved so much still had a beginning, middle, and end to their stories.

From my own experience, I think the big issue with reading online is that I don’t tend to get as much granularity as I would from a book. I use my online reading as more of a macro view of a subject. Although I can get many more vantage points on a subject, I tend to miss out on the details. I tend to use what I read online as a guide to what I want to read more about in a book; the overview that I get online helps me decide what I’d like to learn about in detail. But, just as the article suggests, I think the way my brain works has definitely been changed by the availability of information we now enjoy.

I think it’s interesting that for kids born in the last ten years or so, this way of getting information is perfectly normal, and for the generation before mine (at least a large number of them), they haven’t really transitioned to life online the way many in my generation have. It’s definitely a strange spot to be in, having experience “extreme reading” both before and after the presence of the web.

Still, I tend to agree with this statement from the article:

Even those who are most concerned about the preservation of books acknowledge that children need a range of reading experiences. “Some of it is the informal reading they get in e-mails or on Web sites,” said Gay Ivey, a professor at James Madison University who focuses on adolescent literacy. “I think they need it all.”

What do you guys think? Does reading online really count as reading?

Reading Phailure?

July 10, 2008 / / 0 Comments

USA Today has a pretty scathing criticism of Reading First in its editorial section. The crux of the argument is that the system has been duped by textbook publishers into wasting a lot of money on a program that has no value. But does that mean the research is wrong? Is the problem with the research or the implementation?

…the studies the panel reviewed show that intensive phonics has little to do with students’ ability to understand what they read. Distinguished literacy experts Frank Smith and Kenneth Goodman have provided compelling evidence that comprehension is the basis for learning to read: We learn to read by understanding what is on the page.

But what happens after we learned to read? How do we learn to stretch our skills? What about reading to learn? Shouldn’t our goal be to eventually learn to understand by being able to read what is on the page? Mr. Krashen’s solution to literacy ills is the mere presence of books.

Instead of wasting billions of dollars more on Reading First, let’s invest much more in libraries in low-income areas. Let’s make sure all children have access to books, and solve the real literacy crisis forever.

Great. Now what do we do about the kids who don’t live next door to the library?

Whether taught at school or at home, with books paid for by the parents or provided free for loan by libraries, using researched based techniques or trial and error, children are ultimately going to be affected more by their parents’ attitudes toward literacy and reading than anything else.

Family Friendly Online Bookstore

June 27, 2008 / / 0 Comments

The other day I happened to run into Gavin Baker of Abunga.com at an informal entrepreneur’s meetup. Abunga is a family friendly online media store that actually uses the input of its community to decide what they should sell. Abunga isn’t Amazon, and they aren’t trying to be either. They are built around the idea of not only providing family friendly products at great prices, but they also have a program that donates money back to worthy causes.

Gavin and I had a really good conversation about the directions they’d like to go with Abunga and new services they have in the works to enhance the experience of their user community. We talked part technology, part marketing, and part “you know what would be cool”. I don’t want to give away any of their plans for the future, but those guys are working feverishly to add more and more to Abunga.

Check them out if you have a chance. We’re constantly looking for cool things like this in the community (especially our local community) that are good resources for parents and kids!

Outside The Box Reading Ideas For Summer

June 13, 2008 / / 0 Comments

So the year is winding down and many parents and kids are getting ready for some summer fun around the pool. But we parents know that learning is year round (and hopefully life-long)! So in the spirit of learning, I’d like to share a couple of cool ideas for summer reading that others have put out there for us to use.

Kelly invites us to join her for a Summer Reading Theme-a-thon over at Little Homeschool On The Prairie.

This fun and simple program is designed to encourage families to enjoy reading together and extending favorite stories into togetherness-building activities as a family.

Summer Reading Theme-a-thon begins Monday, June 23 and will extend through the end of August.

I can’t think of a better reason to join in! She will post different themes bi-weekly and encourages you to create family activities and/or trips to make the themes come alive. Then she’ll be posting pictures of participating families and their creative journeys with each theme. This can be great fun for all ages!

HomeSchool Journey has some great ideas for curing what she calls “Imboreditis”.

One thing I noticed about home learning in our own environment, is that the children seem to function better when a specific level of routine remains consistent over the long summer break. If that routine is broken over the summer break, the children seem to develop what I call: Imboreditis. The symptoms of Imboreditis include: persistent whining, the droning sound of I’m bored, lethargic lying about, the dragging of feet, and of course: lots of sighing. If you begin to hear the dreaded I’m bored, I’d encourage you to think creatively.

Be sure to check out her ideas to cure these dreaded symptoms. She includes weekly visits to the library and joining a summer reading program.

Have a great time reading this summer!

COH Issue For June 10

June 10, 2008 / / 0 Comments

The Carnival of Homeschooling is up–thanks to The Common Room for hosting! Just a few of the interesting posts that caught our eye here at RCO:

Hands on ABC Order — some activities you can do with your child to exercise their alphabetizing skills.

First Grade Curriculum Review — great insight from a first year homeschooler on several subjects (not just reading)

There’s More to Education Than Smarts — an interesting post about the social responsibilities that come with an education.

And take a look at the test Phil gave his 4th grader.

There are several other great posts in the carnival for homeschoolers–check it out!

Around The Table We Went

May 20, 2008 / / 0 Comments

It’s been a long time since I’ve been able to do a workshop or presentation about reading instruction, so I was happy to finally get the opportunity to do one last night.  I truly love the process involved in sharing valuable information with people for the sake of helping kids read. We had our first Reading Roundtable Workshop for homeschooling parents in our local community of Knoxville, TN.

I’ve done plenty of workshops and presentations about reading in my career, but this one was different. I think my natural tendencies as a presenter to include and interact with my audience, combined with my own desire to learn from others led me to offer a different type of workshop. I’ve dubbed it a Reading “Roundtable” because I had the desire to do more than just the typical dissemination of information to a group of people. Instead I wanted to present the information to the group (with questions and answers inserted as they came up, of course), but then opening up “the floor” to the participants in the hopes that they would share their knowledge, experiences, and/or concerns as they related to reading, curriculum, and homeschooling. Well, the results were awesome!

Although there were few in attendance for our first Reading Roundtable Workshop, the amount of information that flowed freely between everyone in the room was amazing! Connections were made, suggestions were taken, experiences were shared, concerns were aired, light bulbs were turned on, and ideas were born. I’m really excited about how it all went down and the possibilities that are possible!

I’ve had plenty of responses and requests for future sessions, so I’m happy to report that there will be many more of these in the future!

Comic Books Don’t Teach Anything

May 13, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Or do they? Many may not consider comic books to be quality literature, but they are. They’re actually really cool pieces to use to create an interest in reading. While they may appeal to both girls and boys, comic books have been shown to be very useful in sparking an interest in reading in reluctant male readers. It’s no wonder since they’re chock-full of awesome illustrations, unique story lines, short text boxes, and speech bubbles. They’re definitely not like your everyday picture book or text, so some may not see the educational value they hold. You might have to dig (through different genres and titles), but if you look closely you’ll find a valuable resource for your child. Chris Shave definitely found them helpful when teaching his boys:

Shave said that comic books are very visual and these images are enough to drive the story forward alone, even without text. The pictures help actively involve the reader in the story.

“There are short bursts of dialogue, speech, and thought bubbles. Because of that, readers who might feel bogged down by long text and big paragraphs will experience success (reading comic books).”

Iliad Comic BookMore reasons why comic books are great selections to encourage reading:

  • They are high interest so your kids will want to read them. This is huge when trying to instill a love for reading in your child! They may start out with comic books and end up with Shakespeare, you never know – at least they’re reading! Read how Taylor put this theory to practice with high schoolers.
  • The characters tend to use a rich variety of words which helps kids expand their own vocabulary. You can do some interesting vocabulary lessons using comic books.
  • Did you know that Marvel (and other companies) make comic book versions of classical literature like The Iliad, Treasure Island, and The Man in the Iron Mask? These would be a great way to introduce the real books and to provide your child with some background knowledge. Or you can use them after reading the real ones to expose your kids to a different version.

All in all, comic books shouldn’t be overlooked when choosing reading material for your child. You never know what will be that one thing that will motivate your child to read until you try it!

Seven Year-Old Super Reader

May 7, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Here’s an example of a child who reads to learn and shows it off. Gary from Homeschoolbuzz shares a story about seven year-old Emily Salva, a homeschooled student from Franklin, TN, who decided to make a film for her history project on Ancient Greece. This seven year-old narrated and created all of the graphics for her film, Odysseus and The Cyclops, with the help of her dad (a fellow film maker). Her film was so noteworthy that it was accepted into Nashville’s Film Festival. Very impressive indeed!

Most impressive is the fact that she understood The Odyssey. I know high schoolers who didn’t get it! Check it out and pay attention to her effortless reading…great fluency!

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