Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate Review

I have two things that make me nervous.  My kids getting older and teaching high school.  You wouldn't think teaching high school would make me nervous, after all high school was some of the last schooling we all finished before college.  I should remember that better than my elementary and middle school years.  But WOW!!  Higher level science is so much hard to make easier to understand than elementary level.  I was glad to get the opportunity to review an online program especially for middle and high school aged students, Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate.

Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate is an online option for parents with students Grades 3 and up.  They offer courses in Earth Science, Mathematics (Grades 3+), Algebra (Grades 7 and up), Biology, Chemistry,  Composition, US History, A/P US History, A/P Biology, A/P Chemistry, A/P Government, A/P Composition and even Nutrition.

Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate provides a video lesson for students to watch.  They can easily do this from a computer/laptop or even a tablet.  Vocabulary is emphasized in the subjects to help the children grasp the material they are learning.  They can work at their own pace and then taken an online quiz  over each topic.  If they struggled on any answers, a video will display explaining the topic again to the student.  

Homeschool Courses is programmed to re-teach subjects that a student scores low in.  So it makes it super easy for parents, especially those with higher level students working in the A/P courses they offer.  If you have a student who is not keen or struggling their way through book work, Homeschool Courses can easily change up this fight and give them a feeling of control over their education.

Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate can be used both as a base for your homeschool or as a supplement for your students.

 Students can easily log in and choose the topic you assign to them.  We have been hopping around trying various features of Homeschool Courses just to give it a try for the kids working level.  I have found that it provides a challenge to students, but not in a difficult way.  The challenge that it provides helps to give students confidence in their abilities.  

We have used sections of the US Presidents topics in our Presidential studies.  The videos were easy to use for the kids and navigate through.  Homeschool Courses is very user friendly for kids, even those with slight delays.  

There was a lot of information packed into each video, and if I need to I can even print a transcript of each lesson.  The best part is, there is little or no extra planning needed on your part as the parent.  All the work is done, parents simply assign out the lessons.  Grading is done for you and you have access to the score through your parent account.  Students are not left hanging though as they finish up their lesson, they are given feedback and grading on their work so that they know how they are doing also.

I have to say that I really enjoy the layout of  Homeschool Courses.  I easily can assign lessons to the kids.  We are using English Composition and Nutrition as stand alone courses for Joey.  They are presenting a challenge for him, since he does have some learning disabilities.  But these challenges are not a bad thing.   Homeschool Courses is making him think and he is able to move at his own speed since the program adjusts to him.  He is quite proud of himself to be tackling high school level courses.

The A/P US History has provided even a challenge for me, since it has been so long since I needed to remember some of the acts of the earlier presidents and the laws they passed.  The videos can be stopped and started depending on attention spans, which is another bonus for our family.  As soon as I see eyes starting to glaze over, I can make an adjustment to pause and get up/move around and verbally discuss what we were watching.

Parents have a login and students have a separate login.  So I can easily track their grades for their transcripts.

Will we continue using  Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate?  The answer is a definite Yes.  I like the ease of use and the ability to use it as core or supplemental material.  I also like how it adjust to the student and helps give them confidence in their own abilities.

Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate offers a reasonable price and it is very easy to sign up.  This allows you to truly customize your child's education.

Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate is perfect for those extra tough subjects as the kids get older.  It has put my mind at ease teaching the higher level courses with the kids.

Several members of the Schoolhouse Review Crew were given the opportunity to review Homeschool Courses from Standard Deviants Accelerate.  Take some time to read how they used the various subjects in their homes by visiting the Schoolhouse Review Crew link below.

Supercharged Science - e-Science Review

Supercharged Science

Age Range - K - 12 

Cost - $57.00 a month

Science is an area I struggle with.  I feel like I cannot give the kids a good scientific explanation to go along with experiments they do.  I get nervous that the kids will keep asking me questions that I don't think I'll be able to answer.  I am very grateful when they do not seek out further questions.  

We recently had a chance to try out Supercharged Science K-12 e-Science Program ($57.00 a month).  I thought how awesome, a science program laid out for me.  I had no idea at the time how much information was included.

At Supercharged Science they want to take away the boring part of science.  There is not stacks of textbooks and piles of papers.  They want to take you into the fun stuff, the experiments.  They want to help provide your child with a strong foundation that will help them through college.

The Supercharged Science K-12 e-science program includes over 900 science activities, experiments and projects for pk - high school.  They provide lesson plans, data/lab sheets, exercises, reading materials, and quizzes.  There are also videos of real scientists in action.  Supercharged Science even provides a tutorial on how to start and keep a science journal to help track your student's progress in science

We were getting ready to start a study unit on Geology, so we jumped ahead to work on studying our Earth.  So we dug into the lessons.  The amount of reading material provided was unbelievable.  I did not need to get any extra library books or have a textbook out.

I was very impressed that there was so much information that I needed to weed out what Lydia and I were working on.

Several hands-on Experiments are included under each science topic.

If you want to use them, questions and quizzes are also included.  I didn't use them other than to draw Lydia out about the topics.  But there are plenty of questions included.

We are still working on our science unit in Geology.  We do science 3 days a week, and we are drawing out this unit for a few weeks.  

Here is one of my favorite parts I discovered on Supercharged Science.  The questions section.  You can actually post a question to help you explain the topics to your children!!  They answer the questions to help you out!  You can read through some that have been asked even, so your question may already have been answered.  

We have had some failed crystal experiments that we are repeating.  So our science journals now list, "Make sure to read all directions and follow them."

Supercharged Science actually has science topics broken down into grade level suggestions.  

They really try to make science such an easy subject to teach.  Not only is all the material included, but they also make sure that parents know how to use the website correctly so that you get the most out of the information you have been given.

I really like that I have all the information and material there at my disposal, and I can choose to present what I want and when I want to.  Lessons can be made as long or as short as I need to for that science class.  Supercharged Science does provide a lot of flexibility.  

Will we continue?  I am debating continuing using Supercharged Science only because of the cost.   The monthly cost is a bit steep for our budget.  Even with cutting our field trip budget back, it would be difficult to afford.  Although if we begin traveling more, it will be worth using Supercharged Science because I will have Science curriculum with no textbooks to carry in and out of hotels.  I keep leaning toward yes.  I believe that we will be continuing with the lower level K-8 option since it has a lower price of $37.00. 

Supercharged Science is allowing our readers to try their program for a month for only $1.00.  Simply visit this link from Supercharged Science to enroll for this trial.  You can experiment to see if Super Charged Science is a program for your family.

Other members of the School House Review Crew were able to use Supercharged Science with their families, visit their blogs below to see how it worked for them.