Most of the time my children are playing, reading, doing science experiments, building, crafting or creating something. They do however occasionally watch movies. A question I often read on homeschool group websites is "what educational DVD's do you recommend?"
Here are our favorites:
Phonics
These Leap Frog videos are excellent. The first one starts by introducing children to letters and their sounds, the second one progresses to reading three letter words, and the thrid is about more complex words. They are entertaining and educational.
In the videos the children visit factories that make letters or words. In the Letter Factory they visit each letter stored in its room. Each letter is doing something that has to do with its sound. For example the C is /c/ /c/ /c/ cold. This was one of the major learning resources I used in teaching my children to read. It really works!
These Leap Frog videos are excellent. The first one starts by introducing children to letters and their sounds, the second one progresses to reading three letter words, and the thrid is about more complex words. They are entertaining and educational.
In the videos the children visit factories that make letters or words. In the Letter Factory they visit each letter stored in its room. Each letter is doing something that has to do with its sound. For example the C is /c/ /c/ /c/ cold. This was one of the major learning resources I used in teaching my children to read. It really works!
History
Animated Hero Classics Biographies by NEST Entertainment are a set of 20 thirty-minute videos each featuring a different hero. They provide a good introduction to different historical heros.
Here is the list of heros in the set:
Pocahontas, George Washington, Galileo, Marco Polo, Benjamin Franklin, Florence Nightingale, Thomas Edison, Harriet Tubman, Helen Keller, The Wright Brothers, Alexander Graham Bell, Marie Curie, The Maccabees, Beethoven, Louis Pasteur, Joan of Arc, Abraham Lincoln, William Bradford, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Christopher Columbus
It looks like some of them can be found on amazon or they can be purchased directly from Nest Entertainment.
Language
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Muzzy is a language learning program that people either tend to love or hate. You can see a portion of the video on youtube in English to determine if you would like it. Although it has worked well for our family I wouldn't recommend it for children under 8 years old due to the story-line.
The Muzzy program includes books, audio CDs and DVD or VHS. The video portion is broken into Level I, parts 1-6 and Level II, parts 1-6. Each part lasts about 15 minutes so there is around 3 hours of total video. We have not really used the audio or book portions of the the program.
The entertaining cartoon begins with very simple language in the native tongue, which in conjunction with the visual component is easily understood. Each progressive part increases slightly in difficulty. Upon viewing each part repeatedly, language comprehension grows and at the end of the program a decent introductory vocabulary is learned.
Muzzy is available in several languages and many Muzzy products are available on amazon. Unfortunately the packaging of the Muzzy languange program seems to have changed several times. It has changed so much in fact that it is difficult to know what you are ordering. We have Spanish Muzzy in the yellow and orange packaging, and German Muzzy in the blue packaging. It has been offered on DVD with all languages included. Muzzy can also be purchased direct from Early Advantage.
Animated Hero Classics Biographies by NEST Entertainment are a set of 20 thirty-minute videos each featuring a different hero. They provide a good introduction to different historical heros.
Here is the list of heros in the set:
Pocahontas, George Washington, Galileo, Marco Polo, Benjamin Franklin, Florence Nightingale, Thomas Edison, Harriet Tubman, Helen Keller, The Wright Brothers, Alexander Graham Bell, Marie Curie, The Maccabees, Beethoven, Louis Pasteur, Joan of Arc, Abraham Lincoln, William Bradford, Leonardo Da Vinci, and Christopher Columbus
It looks like some of them can be found on amazon or they can be purchased directly from Nest Entertainment.
Language
The Muzzy program includes books, audio CDs and DVD or VHS. The video portion is broken into Level I, parts 1-6 and Level II, parts 1-6. Each part lasts about 15 minutes so there is around 3 hours of total video. We have not really used the audio or book portions of the the program.
The entertaining cartoon begins with very simple language in the native tongue, which in conjunction with the visual component is easily understood. Each progressive part increases slightly in difficulty. Upon viewing each part repeatedly, language comprehension grows and at the end of the program a decent introductory vocabulary is learned.
Muzzy is available in several languages and many Muzzy products are available on amazon. Unfortunately the packaging of the Muzzy languange program seems to have changed several times. It has changed so much in fact that it is difficult to know what you are ordering. We have Spanish Muzzy in the yellow and orange packaging, and German Muzzy in the blue packaging. It has been offered on DVD with all languages included. Muzzy can also be purchased direct from Early Advantage.
German
After Muzzy we have continued learning German using the following videos produced for German children.
Spanish
We have also continued learning Spanish in the same fashion as German although with different videos. Some of them are available free on the internet or in portions on youtube.
Pocoyo – Spanish Boy, Duck and Elephant on youtube
We also were able to download Pocoyo to the ipad.
Plaza Sesamo - also on youtube
We also were able to download Pocoyo to the ipad.
Plaza Sesamo - also on youtube
* I did not receive any compensation for this recommendation. I'm just a homeschooling mom who has found many products that I like. If you're interested in the products I recommend on this blog I want to make it easy for you to find them.
** I am an Amazon associate and receive a small portion of the sales on orders made after clicking in from this site, which I promptly spend on homeschooling books and supplies for my children.
I used Leap frog when my kids were younger:) Loved them. I have heard of NEST but haven't viewed one yet. We love anything on the history channel or animal channel. Our library on base has a great section of history DVD's that we check out for various subjects.
ReplyDeleteFound your site via Hip Homeschool Hop. Great video suggestions! Please visit us too at http://homeschoolpool.info
ReplyDeleteWe love Muzzy! I bought the VHS tapes on ebay when Allie was a baby and we watched them all through her toddler years!
ReplyDeleteI am going to look into those history videos--very cool! Thanks for posting this resource!
I agree that the Animated Hero Classics videos are good ones. We have watched many of them that we've gotten through our library system and from Netflix. We just recently watched one on Louis Pasteur. We've also watched Muzzy videos before. I think that the video clips on History.com are great, and Biography.com also has good ones. BrainPOP is another good source. We have a paid subscription, which we LOVE, but there are free videos available as well.
ReplyDeleteThanks for linking up with Favorite Resources!
We used and loved the Leap Frog videos when my children were younger. We will have to try the Animated Hero Classics especialy since they are on Netflix. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteI loved you post because if I hadn't read 'Bolesno Grinje', I would have been misled. You are so right in all the points you raised. staggered was cruelty masqueraded as tradition.
ReplyDelete