CHRISTEPHI

Here on Sycamore Hill we love all kinds of games, but  especially  word games!  Typecrush is a brand new word game with a single rule: whoever solves the first word gets to choose the next word.  And, boy, is it fun!! How to Play  Spell a word making sure no one is looking. Flip the letter circles over to hide your word. The rest of the players try to guess the word using the letter frequency chart.  This chart groups letters by how frequently they appear in the English language and they are the clue you need to solve the word puzzle. This game is wonderful for any age, from the beginning reader to the avid logophile.  It can be made simple by adding extra hints ["it's a color word"] or by more complex by giving no clues as to the type of word.  Hubby and I discovered that longer words are actually easier to guess than short ones!  He really killed us when his word was toe . We've had a lot of fun playing Typecrush!...

What is Ooka Island? Ooka Island is an adventurous computer game that teaches early literacy to kids from Pre-K to 2nd grade.  It's fun and engaging without making any sacrifices on the academic side of things. "Upon arrival on Ooka Island, children customize their own online avatar and embark on a compelling 3D hero-mission to save the Ooka Elves! As young learners follow the Ooka Island Adventure, they travel on their own unique path created by Ooka Island's READirect learning algorithm.  This ensures that they are on the fastest track to reading success!" A Bit of Backstory Ooka Island is based on the work of Dr. Kay MacPhee who developed a successful program for struggling and reluctant readers in the 1990s.  Her program, then known as SpellRead, was the subject of many intensive studies because of its effectiveness, but it was quite expensive.  It became an exclusive product for either the poorest of the poor (by way of government sub...

The motto of our homeschool is: " Learning to Love to Learn ."  One of my overarching goals as a homeschool mom is to teach my kids  how  to learn. I believe that if they know how to acquire and retain information, they will be able to do anything they set their hearts on, both as children and as adults. Veteran homeschool mom Debra Bell believes this too and that is one of the reasons she created The Ultimate Homeschool Planning System.  The Ultimate Homeschool Planning System is more than just a planner , it's a SYSTEM.  There's the mom's planner, the teen planner, and a younger student planner.  The system is designed to grow with your students, teaching them to take on more and more responsibility for their daily/weekly planning, scheduling, and time management.  As early as 3rd grade, students can keep a little checklist for each day detailing what they need to get done.  By the time they're in 5th grade they're able to b...