TOS Review: A Journey Through Learning

When we were asked if we wanted to review the lapbooks and unit lessons from A Journey Through Learning, I almost said no.  I have been trying to really limit our review products to ones that I feel can truly mesh well with a Montessori home and I just couldn't quite figure out how to mix lapbooks with our style since they contain lots of papers and what some would call 'busy work.'  Then I got an idea :).

There are a couple of things I had been having a hard time working into our Montessori learning: work plans and journals.  I felt that I didn't have enough options to provide a good work plan, and I didn't have a clue how to start journals.  But, when we were offered not one, not two, but THREE different lapbook/units a light bulb went off!!

We were sent three download units: Knights and Castles, Astronomy and Space, and The Earth.  What I did was to go ahead and print 6 sections of each unit and put them out on the shelf.  Then, I added all three units to the work plans.  As Mustang worked through a section of the lapbook, she marked it off on her work plan and also had her lapbook to use as her journal of her work!!  

Each of the lapbook units are laid out in such a way that they were perfect for my idea.  The units are broken down into small sections that are easy to understand and hold attention.  After the section, there is a portion of the lapbook to create, or a few questions to answer.  At that point, the student could continue on to the next section, or spend time digging deeper into that section.  Let me use some examples to help explain :).

The Astronomy and Space unit is not a lapbook, it is a unit that fits into a 3 ring binder.  The first 5 sections are:  

• Genesis 1
• Where Do You Live?
• The Solar System
• Constellations
• How Do We Have Day and Night?

Genesis 1 simply is a reading and copywork of Genesis 1 where the heavens and earth are created.   YES!! A Journey Through Learning is written by Christians who use the Bible for their creation source-which is important to me!  

Where Do You Live?  Is a quick look of the planet, galaxy, universe.  

The Solar System-A one page summary of our Solar System, planets, and other items to be found here (like the Kuiper Belt)  This was one place where I expanded the unit.  I found some great 3 part cards to help the kids memorize the planets.  

Constellations-Again, just like all the other sections, there is a small one page summary introduction to the constellations, followed up with questions to help with retention.  We expanded this one a bunch!!  

We purchased a copy of Find the Constellations by H A Rey, made constellations, did some star watching, and more.  You can read about our Astronomy and Space unit in this blog post of mine.  Mustang got quite stuck on Constellations, wanting to research and read about them whenever she could!

The first 5 sections of the Knights and Castle's lapbook are:

• The Fall of Rome Paves the Way to the Middle Ages
• How to Become a Knight
• A Knight's Weapons
• Knights in Shining Armor
• A Knight Dresses for Battle

I found lots of extra add ons for this one, too!  We watched a video of a guy getting dressed in Knight's armor, found a set of 3 part cards for the pieces of a knight's armor, and another site that let the kids joust online! There were also a ton of great books that we read. I will do a post on our Knights and Castles lessons very soon, but in the meantime, you can check out my Pinterest board of resources.  

The Knights and Castle book really sparked Mustang's interest and I found her voluntarily taking notes one day while reading a book on Knights!

Due to the way that I have presented our lapbook units, (and the amount of time Mustang wanted to spend on each section) we did not finish any of them.  And, sadly, the Earth book wasn't even touched!  Even though I have some great add-ons for that one, too!!  You can see them on my Pinterest board.   Mustang DID complete all but one of the 10 units listed above. 

The units will all stay on the shelves and work plans until they are completed.  Then, I will replace them with another. I plan to keep 3 or 4 different ones out at a time to offer a solid variety.  We got the Journey through Learning Pioneer Days lapbook at their recent Facebook party and I'm excited to add that one to the shelves, so I am hoping Mustang starts moving a little quicker through the units :).

Overall, I am very pleased with how my 'experiment' is going!  The Journey Through Learning units turned out to be a PERFECT fit for how I wanted to use them.  They are so easy to work with, have little prep required, and have just the right amount of information for my 2nd grader {just for reference she reads at about a 4 grade level}.

I did not help Mustang put her lapbook together.  She was able to follow the instructions given on the page and do it herself!!  This was an extra bonus because I wanted this to feel like it was her work and not a lesson.  

A Journey Through Learning Units are also affordable, ranging in price from $1.00 and up depending on which unit you want to do-they offer TONS of them!!  The ones we received all run $13.00 for the instant download.  You can also order the lapbooks already printed in black and white or color (prices vary).  

A Journey Through Learning company was founded by two homeschooling moms that wanted to create hands-on lessons for homeschool students.  They didn't set out to start a company, but God certainly had a different idea!!  You can read their whole story on their website.  (warning tissue may be needed)

Now, as much as we love them, A Journey Through Learning's units are designed for students up to 7th grade.  I am a little curious if the content could actually hold up to a 7th grader's academic level, so I am off to check out the reviews that my other crew mates have written.  I suggest you do too!

Thanks for stopping by and God Bless!!

Lisa

BFIAR: Jesse Bear Lapbook

Charger, Mini Cooper, and I are SLOOOWWWWLLYY rowing a few Before Five in a Row Books.  Mustang is rowing FIAR books.

Our first book was Jesse Bear What Will You Wear.  Super cute and one of our favorites.  We made lapbooks to go with it.  I find lapbooks to be the best cutting, gluing, and coloring practice.  They offer lots of opportunities and, at the end, you have something worth saving.

The lapbooks we made aren't terribly creative, but I know I like looking inside other lapbooks, so I thought you might enjoy seeing ours.

We found all our printables at Homeschool Share and Homeschool Creations.

Charger's lapbook:

Mini Cooper's Lapbook-she didn't have copy work from Homeschool Creations.

Have you done any lapbooking yet this year?  I'd love to see yours!!   We will be finishing Goodnight Moon and The Story of Ping very soon.  I'll try to share those, too!

Thanks for stopping by and God Bless!

On the Farm Tot Book

During our trip to the farm last week, we had a rainy day, so we had Tot School inside. We used our new lapbook from 1+1+1=1. You can find it here. It is so very cool!

We put together the barn puzzle


Put the tractors in order (though Mustang noted that the tractors were not green)




Colored our little books-This was the only part I had Charger try. He lost interest quickly.


And matched the animals


This is a very cute tot book and is perfect for ages 3 and up. My DD, 48 months, loved it and found that she could do most of the games very easily. My nephew, 38 months, also loved the book. He tried and succeeded at most of the games as well. I am sure this tot book will come out again soon!

Thank you to Izzie, Mac & Me & to Me & Marie!!

I won, I won, I won!!! Where are those little jumping smilies when you need them? I am by no means tring to brag, I am just beyond surprised, thrilled, and thankful that we were the winners of an AMAZING learning tool this week. I never win anything, except the occasional free soda from a bottle cap-which says one in 8 wins and it takes me about 29 bottles Mbefore I win.

I have been doing a lot of homeschool blog surfing this week, and I stumbed upon Izzie, Mac & Me. She has tons of creative & fun ideas to do with your tot at home. Its a great blog and I highly recommend it.

Just so happened that the day I came across Izzie, Mac & Me, there was a give away for a fantastic color learning packet. She did a post about the color green packet HERE. I loved the package and though, what the heck, I will enter. Wont win, but I am going to try any ways.

The package is made by Me & Marie. She is a former teacher and is now a SAHM that teaches her tot at home. She makes really cool educational tools and sells them on Etsy for a VERY resonable price. Her Etsy store is HERE .

Fun enough, we won this cool pack on Mustang's 4th birthday, so she got to pick the color. I knew for sure she was going to pick the pink package and I was WRONG! She says her favorite colors are pink and purple, but apparently when given a choice between the two, her favorite color is purple. So purple is the pack that we ur actually she chose. I have looked over the pack and boy is it cool!

We will be using the package and blogging about it VERY soon, but right now we are out of black ink and nearly out of color so everything prints green. A fugly shade of green I might add. So, as soon as Daddy replaces the cartridges, we will be learning all about purple.

THANK YOU so very much Izzie, Mac & Me for the awesome give away! And THANK YOU to Me & Marie for the awesome color package. We are in love!

Jesse Bear Lapbook

I will be adding to this post daily until we get our lapbook done.

We are reading "Jesse Bear, What Will You Wear?" by Nancy White Carlstrom, and each day we are doing parts of our lapbook as time, energy, and interest allow. See the previous post for our paper bear.

We are taking our lapbook idea from Homeschool Share: http://www.homeschoolshare.com/b4_resources_jesse_bear.php

Friday we made our 'B' Book. The book has pictures of things that start with B. Mustang colored them and identified them. She also traced the letters of each word and I helped her glue the words to the pictures.




With Charger's B, I glued his Jesse Bear inside. He can say B and bear, so he has fun opening his B and saying bear.

A bit MIA

Sorry that I havent posted as much the last few days. I have been reading on another site. Its a really cool homeschool site!! It is all free and has tons of unit studies and Lapbooks! I have been staying up late nights reading all of its awesome content.

I found a lapbook for the book Corduroy. We are just on the first part of it, making a little rhyming book. Mustang was happy to play with her scissors today. She also got to play with glue-until she glued one of the pages to the wall when I was busy with Charger.

We own the book Corduroy and I raided my scrap book stash to come up with materials to make the book. I will take pictures of it when we are finished-which should be tomorrow.

The website is HERE (click on here) and the Corduroy unit is HERE