Super Teacher Worksheets Review

One of the great things about homeschooling is the flexibility. Whether it's the hours you keep, the place you study, or the topics you learn, you have the ability to choose what is best for your family. The bulk of our family's schooling is based around reading and hands-on activities. While some families might thrive on workbooks, I would be tempted to all but forgo their use, that is if my little ones would allow it. You see, two of my children love worksheets. They enjoy having their own fun papers. They love coloring. They like sitting at the table and completing a sheet. They are proud to show off their work. I knew they would be pleased that we received a year-long Individual Membership to Super Teacher Worksheets.

 

Super Teacher Worksheets is a websites devoted to providing teachers with printable worksheets. Not just a few worksheets, mind you, but thousands. Pretty much, if you need a worksheet for a certain topic, they have it. Counting quarters? Yes. Fact or opinion? Yes. Finding letter Q words? Yes. Learning landforms? Yes. Labeling body organs? Yes. Identifying verbs? Yes. Counting by 8s? And yes. The list of topics is impressive. Of course, each topic is filled with many subtopics, as well. 

• Math
• Reading & Writing
• Phonics & early Literacy
• Handwriting
• Grammar
• Spelling Lists
• Science 
• Social Studies
• Holidays
• Puzzles & Brain Teasers
• Pre-K & Kindergarten

 

 

There is also a Teacher Helpers section that is full of resources to help keep you organized and provide some fun extras. There are dozens of awards and certificates (from reading 25 books to zipping a zipper), crafts (like building a neighborhood diorama and creating a feathered turkey), electives (such as learning the parts of a computer or labeling musical notes), and even reminder wristbands (for things like lunch money and field trips).

 

Along with those aids, there is an entire section dedicated to worksheet generators. You have the option to easily create a worksheet using your own information. You can make bingo, flashcards, crossword puzzles, word searches, multiple choice, matching, short answer, and more. If you can't find what you're looking for already on the site, you can make it yourself quickly and easily with these resources.     

 

One of my favorite aspects of this site is My File Cabinet. You can save your favorite worksheets with a click of a button in a digital file cabinet. This feature is especially helpful for me. The best time I have available to browse the worksheets is when my baby is napping. The problem with that is that our wireless printer is in our bedroom, the room where he sleeps. If I try to print while he sleeping, well, let's just say naptime--and my time to browse worksheets--is over. I can save the worksheets I need in one place and then just print when he wakes up. I love it!  

Another exciting part of this site is that it's up-to-date. They are coming up with new worksheets every week! It's easy to find the latest pages by clicking on the What's New tab. Need a page that's aligned with Common Core? They have that, too. The homepage also features worksheets that apply to the current time. Weeks ago there were Back To School pages; now there are autumn printables. The site is current. It's fun to see what changes each week. 

My two little ones (7 yr, 5 yr) that I said love worksheets are enjoying all the fun things I've printed. They ask all the time if I'll print more. My other kids are enjoying the work, as well. My oldest (9 yr) has never been a worksheet-lover, per se, but he does like puzzles. I've been giving him pages like graphing to find a hidden picture and coded messages. My other child (3 yr) has been using resources like the letter wheels and mini books. There truly is something for everyone here.

We have used so many sections of this site already, and I have plans for even more.There is so much more here than typical worksheets. They do offer hundreds of FREE printables that can be found in each category, but a membership provides any worksheet or the ability to make your own that you might possible need. At $19.95 a year, it's completely worth it. These printable online PDFs are a great resource for any teacher to have.

You can connect with Super Teacher Worksheets on the following social media sites:

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

Pinterest

If you'd like to see how other homeschool families used this resource, please head to the Schoolhouse Review Crew blog to read more reviews. 

Field Trip: The Henry Ford (2012 Yeah, Really)

First things first, I have to admit that this trip to The Henry took place quite a while ago. I'm not very good at hopping on posts very quickly. This Blog was originally my idea, but I have the most trouble getting anything up on it. Either way its just a notice to you, but hey at least I am writing the post. (unlike our trip to Somerset Mall for the grand opening of the LEGO store where we helped build a ten foot Buzz Lightyear.) Well, on to The Henry Ford.

Amongst Erika's blog reading and deal searching she came across the fact that Target, the store, was paying for entrance to The Henry Ford certain days this year(2012). It so happened that when she discovered that one of those days was fast approaching. I requested the day off work and on Presidents Day we went to The Henry Ford.

For the sake of those who don't already know and those who have not yet gone to do a search for it to find out, The Henry Ford is a museum in the Detroit area. It houses many things. I first thought it was just cars, You know "The HENRY FORD". But when I went this past summer for Maker Faire Detroit, I discovered that there is lot of other stuff. Mostly it is a way for us to look back at many ways of life from the past. From cars to tractors, dollhouses to real houses, even planes to trains. There is a lot to see and even some to do. (Did you notice that?)

I won't give you a complete walkthrough of everything, but I'll hit most of it and show a lot of pictures. When you first walk in the door you are welcomed by the Oscar Meyer Weiner Mobile. Now that is just cool. Who doesn't want to see that thing up close?

Very shortly after that we ended up looking at dollhouses, no where near like the one I made for Alyssa. Much bigger and a lot more detail. Alyssa of course loved it. Jake though, very quickly turned to the tractors on the other side of the aisle. When Jake and I made it back to the others we had come across a friend of ours and her daughter who hung with us the rest of the day.

We found a little play house to hang out in for a while.

We meandered through bedrooms of old and then found LEGOS, Tinker Toys, and K'NEX to play with as well as crayons and paper.

We walked among some "engines" that, honestly, you have to see for yourself.

And then we found airplanes. It turns out Henry Ford dabbled in airplanes and commercial flying for a bit. Some of what he did and other history significant planes are on display. Then there is a place with lots of paper and an airstrip.

Now is where honesty has to kick in. I'm sure you can already tell that this visit to The Henry Ford is from over two years ago. This was one of a few posts that Erika has asked me to write. As you can see it has taken me a while to do. There have also been quite a few that she has wanted me to do but I never did get to. This one I am going to finish and maybe even do others in the future.

At this point I'm not entirely sure how that day ended at The Henry Ford, but we have gone many times since then. We even had a membership this last year. We've been for just the museum and we've been for Maker Faire Detroit. Every time is fun though. The Henry Ford is a great place for adult and children alike. There are quite a few things to draw the kids into learning about our history in so many aspects of life. Yet each display has detailed info for a curious adult to spend days reading each. The Henry Ford is gold mine of learning in the Detroit area. It's probably the closest you can get to Smithsonian quality museum in our area that I know of at least.

I could keep going on for quite a while but I'll leave it with this:

If you are in the Detroit area and want to spend a day learning and experiencing our past go to The Henry Ford. And if the season is right come back the next day to check out Greenfield Village next door. The village is another experience in and of itself that I would suggest to anyone.

Talking Fingers

My kids love using the iPad. I love when they're learning. So when we can put the two together, everyone's happy. That's why we were excited to review the Talking Shapes iPad App from Talking Fingers, Inc..

The Talking Fingers, Inc.'s goal is to get children to realize that text is speech made visible. We use our mouths to make the sounds of words and our fingers (writing or typing) to represent the sounds on paper. Once children see the relationship between the sounds and letters, they can use that code to write the words they say. They'll make their fingers talk.

Talking Fingers, Inc. has created a new, interactive learning app for preschool readers. This app teaches that letters are "talking shapes" that represent sounds. It is divided into 3 parts: Read to Me, Draw Letters, Play Game.

Read to Me

The Read to Me section uses 3 made-up stories, to teach how two sisters invented the alphabet. The Fat Cat, The Silly Hen, and The Dancing Pig introduce 6 speech sounds and their letters. Each letter is drawn as a picture, or talking shape, to help the child easily remember both the sound and the shape. For instance, the letter C is a curling cat, T is a tree, and S is a slithery snake.

Draw Letters

In the Draw Letters part, the child practices drawing the letters on the screen with his finger while speaking the sound with his mouth. Combining two 2 components (shape and sound) helps cement them in his mind. There are different ways to practice:

• drawing the letters within guidelines inside the Talking Shapes picture
• drawing the letters within guidelines only
• drawing the letters within the Talking Shapes picture with no guidelines
• drawing letters to make three-letter words

Play Game
There are 3 games to choose in the Play Game section.  

• Find the Shapes gives the child a word to spell. There are 6 letters inside their picture to choose at the top. The child drags each picture shape to the proper space to spell the word. So, if the word is cat, the child find the picture of the C and cat, then the A and acrobat, and finally the T and Tree. Then the word cat is read, sounded out, and read again.
• Find the Letters shows just the letters, no picture shape at the top. A word is read, and again, the child drags the letter into the appropriate place. As each letter is touched, its sound is read.
• Draw the Letters shows just the picture shapes at the top with no actual letters. When the target word is read, the child finds each picture, drags it to its place, and draws the letter. For instance, if the word is wet, the child will find the pictures of worm, elephant, and tree and draw the letters W, E, T. 

After each of the spelling games, the child listens to a short poem that incorporates the words. After it's read, a word will disappear, and the child has to find the word as it passes the screen in a floating balloon, flapping hen, or flying pig.

Zac (4) has been learning how to make simple CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words, so this app came at a perfect time. When we first downloaded it, he and I sat on the couch and played together. Within a few minutes, Alyssa (5) and Jake (8) joined us. They all were enjoying the stories and pictures so much that they were each trying to be the one to find the letters or pop balloons. Of course, it's a bit too easy for them (even Alyssa is reading long vowel words), so they never choose to play by themselves. It has been great for Zac though. Not only does he enjoy playing, but he's also making improvements with his reading. He has gone from sounding out each letter of the word, to reading the word as a whole.


You can purchase Talking Shapes (the first of 3 apps to teach 40 phonemes) for $5.99. It is compatible with the iPad and requires iOS 6.0 or later. 

You can connect with Talking Fingers through Facebook and their YouTube channel.

To see what others thought of this app, you can read more reviews on the Schoolhouse Review Crew blog.