Review: Home School in the Woods

I have heard about the wonderful products from Home School in the Woods for almost as long as I have been schooling my kids.  Last year we were blessed to be able to try a few of the projects.  We reviewed HISTORY Through the Ages Project Passport World History Study:Ancient Greece and World War II Time Travelers American Series. They were both chalked full of information and fun activities.  This year we are trying projects out from their new series:  Á La Carte. 

This time our choice was a little different. Usually we are given one item that we can review if we are interested or we might get to choose one item out of a few. This time we were basically given a $10 credit and allowed to chose up to three items that fit in that $10 range. I thought this was kind of cool because the projects ranged in prices. You could chose one item that was more expensive, one medium price range and one less expensive, etc.  I showed Issac our choices and explained the monetary range we had and let him chose what his top three were. Then we set down and talked about whether they would fit in that $10 range or not. He ended up choosing two that he really wanted to do and I had one item that I was interested in doing.  Issac chose The Jamestown Replica (3D) for $2.95 and the  Name That State! File Folder Game for $4.95. I chose the The Art of Quilling (3D) for $1.95.   I thought this downloadable project of making the 3D Jamestown replica would be a great project for my husband and Issac.  I downloaded the item and printed the pages.  Issac doesn't really care for coloring, so I actually colored them for him. My original thought was if he didn't want to color them then was that ok. It was his project, so if he didn't want to color it that was fine.  Then I started thinking it would look so much nicer with some color.  I enjoy coloring, so I spent a few minutes working on it. He and his dad ended up cutting the pieces out and putting the project together. I realized as the project progressed that this really wasn't something that was a great fit for Issac unfortunately. I noticed that my husband did the majority of all the work. Issac struggles with fine motor skills and that seemed to make this project very hard for him. My husband did most of the cutting as well as the basic construction of the product.  The directions were just a bit too hard for Issac to be able to follow. I think he loved the idea, but when it came to executing it the project was just too hard for him. The suggested age range is  3rd-8th grade. Issac is in 5th grade, so I thought it would be a good fit with a little help from my husband. He just needed much more help than we had expected he would have. My older son at the same age would have been able to complete this project on his own. Probably with no help from my husband or myself. For Issac it was just too hard to do right now.  I personally thought it was a really cute project and would be a great extra for a homeschooling project. The The Jamestown Replica (3D) is actually just one small part of Time Travelers: The American Revolution.  I like that we are able to pick projects and games in the new  Á La Carte section because sometimes you have your own plan for a time period and just want a few fun little activities to add to it.  

Issac also chose to get Name That State! File Folder Game. When I first saw this option I knew Issac would pick this because he has a great love of anything Geography related.  This is a super cute game that is easily played in several ways. There is an option to have the state map have no writing on it, have the abbreviations or have the full name.We chose to play with the abbreviations and see how we did with that. I like that the cards have the shape of the state on the front and then the back has the state name, capital, rank, when it entered the Union and the region. All that information lets you truly customize the game your way. You can play with the capitals, just the name, both, the region, etc.  The choices really are endless.  This game is part of the larger set Activity-Pak: Make-A-State Issac learns so much more when we are playing games or doing fun activities that he doesn't think of as school :) His entire education could be made of doing projects and playing games and he'd think he was never doing school.

When I saw the option of The Art of Quilling (3D) I knew that I wanted to do this project! It's not often that I do much crafting for myself anymore. I ordered a basic quilling set that had the tool and pre-cut papers.  I knew that would make things easier for me :) This project was one that I was able to complete in an afternoon and it felt very therapeutic! The directions were very clean and I really loved that there were pictures there to help me understand what I was doing. These instructions are some of the best I've ever seen for a craft project.  One thing I would recommend if you buy a pre-cut pack of papers is to make sure you have enough strips of the colors you are planning to use. I realized about half-way through my project that I didn't have enough of the colors I was using. I had to alter my plan just a tad bit, but I was still pleased with the end result. This project is part of a larger unit called Time Travelers: Colonial Life. I had such fun doing this project that I'm already researching other quilling projects to do in the near future. 

We have so loved the  Á La Carte choices we received from Home School in the Woods.  They've got so many options to choose from and you can easily encorporate them into your every day homeschool lessons. Some of the other items Issac and I were interested in were: A Trip to Town File Folder Game, The Erie Canal Lap Book Project,  Art Gallery File Folder Game and Pirate Panoply Game. I have a feeling we'll be trying these out soon! The crew had so many different options to review, so check out what all the families chose and how they fit them into their homeschool days.  Follow Home School in the Woods on social media to keep up to date on all their new products.

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