A video of all 44 Presidents morphing...

(This video is kind of neat, but kind of surreal at the same time.)

The new Carnival of Homeschooling is up!

Just like every Tuesday, there's a new carnival up and running today!

This week the Carnival has traveled to the Norfolk Homeschooling Examiner! So, grab a tall, cool glass of tea and join the fun!

This week's carnival has been broken up into six categories, so you know there's going to be something to suit your needs!

Here are the categories:


Part 1, "The lazy days of summer"
Part 2, "To unschool or not"
Part 3, "This is the homeschool life"
Part 4, "Books, books and more books"
Part 5, "Crafty homeschoolers"
Part 6, "Online resources"

Progressive Phonics is now free again!

When I first heard about Progressive Phonics back in 2006, when my middle child was in K, their books were being offered for free. The only caveat was they asked if you would come back and write a review for them. They progressively got the full collection up on their site, piece by piece.

After they had the complete set up on their site, they did charge a very small price for the downloads, and still offered many of the books for free. However, they have made it clear all along that their goal was never to actually make a profit from these books. To get the whole program was only around twenty dollars - a bargain for this caliber of learning materials.

Since I'm on the Progressive Phonics email list, I received an email today stating that they have a new sponsor and can now offer the whole program again at NO CHARGE!

A free reading program!

This program will be a great blessing to parents of struggling readers, whether they are in traditional school or homeschooled. It can be used with children who have learning disabilities, as well as children who aren't learning disabled or struggling readers, older kids/adults or young children. Teachers could use it as well - the books are great fun!

Check out their NEW web site! Old members will have to re-register, but it is much better than the old site. There is also a forum where you can ask questions or get advice about using the program.

**NOTE: If you have purchased Progressive Phonics within the last 30 days and paid for it, they are offering you a full refund! Just send an email to: finance@progressivephonics.com

Teaching kids about money at different stages...

The Frugal Dad has some tips on how to teach kids about money at any age!

Excerpt:

The June 2009 edition of Money magazine featured an article on how to Unspoil Your Kids. The article included an interesting chart outlining “What to Teach When,”
as suggested by Jon and Eileen Gallo, authors of The Financially Intelligent Parent.

I like the idea of breaking up financial lessons by age group, recognizing of course that some kids “get it” before others, despite their age. For instance, my daughter is fairly money-savvy and back when she was just seven or eight could explain in adult terms what a mortgage was, how taxes were collected, etc. She probably got that from hanging out with her frugal dad.

My son, on the other hand, at five years-old, is more interested in a shiny penny than a paper dollar. He’s yet to recognize the differences in currency (despite our best efforts). Actually, I think he does understand it on some level; he just likes shiny coins.

Who could blame him?

I’ll include the age brackets below, along with the suggested lessons from the Money
article, but as usual, I put my frugal spin on the ideas as well.

Go here for the rest!