Schoolhouse Teachers – Something for Everyone (A Review)

I am a huge The Old Schoolhouse fan! As my first homeschooling magazine subscription, I feel a little nostalgic when I talk about them. I have the app to read the magazine on my phone, a file folder on my computer where I have downloaded many eBooks and unit studies over the years, and now I get to work on the Schoolhouse Review Crew. I’m almost giddy!

I was a fan before Schoolhouse Teachers! Now I’m …well, whatever comes after “fan.” Huge fan? Enormous fan? Enthusiastic fan? Well…no matter what you call it, I just love Schoolhouse Teachers!

If you have never heard of Schoolhouse Teachers or have but haven’t tried it out, you are missing out. I know many of us are quite happy with our curriculum so you don’t feel you need anything else. Well, again…you are missing out. They offer extras you never knew you needed or wanted!  You can visit their website at www.schoolhouseteachers.com and see what they have to offer. But most importantly they offer something for everyone.

For the Littles

If you have little ones, and by this I mean elementary school and younger, Schoolhouse Teachers has some great things to offer.

• Pre-K Read and Play activities is a fun one for us. We love the coloring pages and easy craft suggestions.
• Everyday Games is a feature that offers different learning games throughout the month.
• Elementary Spelling is offered for Pre-K, Lower and Upper Elementary. Providing weekly lists is helpful.
• Ditch the Desk is a fun feature that provides a family, hands-on activity for K-5.
• Reading Lessons are available for young and struggling readers. (They even have a Teachers Guide.)
• Figure of History explores various historical figures from history with activities and resources.

One of the best features is a Daily Checklist that gives a planned checklist to make using Schoolhouse Teachers easy for your homeschool. This picture is a snapshot of a Daily Checklist for Pre-K/Elemetary. You don’t even have to PLAN!!! There is one for middle school and high school as well. Schoolhouse Teachers even provides you with a blank planning sheet if you like to plan it yourself.

For the Older Ones

If you school middle schooler and high schoolers you will love what Schoolhouse Teachers has to offer.  There is a helpful planning sheet for middle school and high school to help you use Schoolhouse Teachers.  The selection of courses available to middle school and high school students is comprehensive.

• Classical History provides weekly history lessons. (We love this as they are tied to our Classical Conversations topic list but they are truly for anyone. For instance, Oct 1 was Age of Ancient Empire and it has continued through many of the Classical Conversations timeline cards.) Lessons include readings, pictures, videos, additional reading list, and activity pages to correspond to the topics.
• College Choice Guidance provides guidance for every student from elementary to Senior in high school giving hints and exploration topics on how to prepare for college as well as hints for parents for preparing and helping their children get ready for college.
• Economics provides students with fun ways to learn about economics including Chocolate Economics, Football Economics, and Christmas Budgets.
• Worldviews provides monthly studies on topics like Christianity and Science and Where Did the Universe Come From?
• Classics-Based Writing uses poetry, essays, and other classic pieces to help the student learn to read, understand, analyze and create.
• Chemistry provides monthly high school level Chemistry lessons including labs.

Just need a supplement?

You will find that supplemental curriculum is something that Schoolhouse Teachers excels in for almost any type of homeschooling family. Need to add some music and can’t carry a tune? Try out Guitar lessons or Voice lessons. Need some art instruction and have trouble drawing a circle? You will find Everyday Easels offers some great drawing and art lessons that are appropriate for almost any age. Their lessons are even broken down into grade such as K-2, 3-6, and so on.

Want your kids to learn a foreign language but have enough trouble with your own language? You are in luck, you can take Spanish or French lessons with Schoolhouse Teachers. The lessons are short and simple and easy to administer. For younger students you will need to be involved but for older students, they can do these as a self-study, leaving you time to work on other projects and lessons.

Some other extras that you might want to consider includes: Geography, Astronomy, Filmmaking, Lapbooking, Mock Trial, and Home Economics.

Your one-stop shop.

If you love to build your own curriculum but don’t like to have to search high and low over the internet to pull everything together, then Schoolhouse Teachers is definitively something for you to consider.  You can use the website to pull an entire curriculum together. They even have blank planning pages to help you.

Something great for mom and dad

The Old Schoolhouse (TOS) planners are one of the biggest benefits, in my humble opinion, which is offered as part of the Schoolhouse Teachers subscription. With planners for everyone, you can put together a planner for mom and dad as well as each of your children, regardless of their ages. Many resources and supplemental pages are available to help with life and household planning as well. The resource pages alone are invaluable. We love the Books of the Bible, Story Starters, and Famous Composers pages.

This year we had a planner for me and my 2^nd grader had her first planner using Primary Schoolhouse Planner. We will definitely continuing using these great resources for each year.

In addition to the free e-book each month, which may be an inspirational of self-help topic that can help you with your family, life or homeschool, each month Schoolhouse Teachers has a This Day in History feature.  I like this because it helps me remember what is going on and point out important events to the kids.  Additionally, each month there is a This Month’s Menu, which helps me get my monthly meal plans done quickly and gives me some new ideas too.

And don’t forget the back issues of The Old Schoolhouse magazine and monthly reading lists that are available to help you enrich your homeschool.

How we use Schoolhouse Teachers

The first thing we used Schoolhouse Teachers for in our house was with the Daily Writing Prompt. We use this once a week for creative writing. The daily prompts are very fun and keeps me from having to determine what to have her write about. Because we use it once a week we have a whole week of prompts to choose from so sometimes I pick-and-choose the topic. For instance, this week, we used a prompt to write about where you would sail if you could sail anywhere in the world and why. The prompts are great because they are detailed enough to help the child but leaves plenty of room for imagination. My daughter has enjoyed exploring many of the topics. Her favorite so far was writing about whether she would live in a castle, a houseboat, or a jungle hut. I loved her story!

Next, because we are in Classical Conversation, we find the Classical History very helpful. But I must say, even if you aren’t in Classical Conversations, you’ll love these lessons. So, we are using the lessons to move through our Timeline cards with Classical Conversations by going through the Classical History lesson each week. My daughter has really loved these lessons. She likes the coloring pages that we use why we listen to the Story of the World chapter that goes along with it. The video links are nice as well.

Lastly, we have decided to start guitar lessons. My daughter and I are doing them together. I’m very excited! She has wanted to take lessons and we, frankly, do not have them in the budget so the fact that guitar lessons are available as part of our membership is exciting. We aren’t starting until January, as we have to get another guitar, which we are borrowing from a friend, but…I’m very excited. We did do the first lesson though and really enjoyed it. It was very easy to follow and didn’t take too long!

We have tried out several of the other extras including lapbooking, geography, and French. I already had most of our curriculum for this year when some of the subjects were added so I’m planning to use many other things next year but for now, we are slowly integrating more of the subjects. We plan to switch to Schoolhouse Teacher’s Spanish lesson in January as well as adding the Everyday Astronomy to our schedule. The fact that the past lessons are available is great and most lessons have a printable format available so I’m doing some planning for the next term by printing out some of the lessons ahead of time.
Try it out

You can sign up for Schoolhouse Teachers on their website and try them out immediately. For only $1 for your first month, you have 30 days to try out everything. And believe me, you will need the 30 days to just make your way through these excellent resources. Then, if you want to continue your subscription, you will be billed $5.95 each month and keep enjoying the benefits. You can also choose to get a year subscriptions for $64.26.  However, right now you can get an annual subscription for $49.  Also, you can get an awesome The Old Schoolhouse tote and the 2013 Annual Print Book for purchasing an annual subscription. Check out the deal. You can cancel anytime, so no pressure or worries if things change or you decide it’s not for you. But I’m here to tell you, you will be impressed!

If you haven’t checked out The Old Schoolhouse magazine, you can see the December issue here. Or get their free app on your tablet or smart phone to read it on the go.

You can even try a sample lesson on Schoolhouse Teachers if you want in writing, math, and several others here. Don’t wait, try Schoolhouse Teachers out now. You won’t be disappointed. This month they are running a great special too.  If you purchase an annual subscription for a great

Do you want to read more reviews on Schoolhouse Teachers? Check out the Schoolhouse Review Crew reviews. If you have tried them or use Schoolhouse Teachers in your homeschool, I would love to hear what you love about them.